Rolling in the Upside Downs. Jul 22- travel day

[Rescuer]

Rolling in the Upside Downs - ABBA. 3/7/22

Index is here

We were up at 3am and Ds was actually cheery, must have been excited about his holiday! Ran around like a mad person doing some quick tasks to make sure everything was totally ready for my friend who was coming to house to do a little dog sitting and we were off!

Shocked, we managed to get all the luggage in the car and at this we had no idea how we were getting the extra case that’s inside a case in the car on the way back😂, maybe we’d just leave Ds behind on his phone, I wonder how long it would actually take for him to notice we’d gone without him 😂

I did feel sorry for Dh facing the 3.5hr drive so I did the nice,decent thing for once,and didn’t fall asleep in the car. Ds, however, was out for the count before we even finished the bypass! He did wake up later with suitcase wheel marks on his head.

Dh was a bit concerned about driving those border roads in the dark but it was light way before we got there.

I was a bit anxious about the airport as I like to know everything, its the control freak teacher in me and I hadn’t really had any time to figure anything out. We’d been to Manchester airport once on our Christmas trip but it was with a Flybe internal flight and virgin so I’d never been landslide. Plus I was aware of all the negative publicity about check in and security lines there. I’d looked for fast track security the night before but surprisingly with it being very last minute there was no availability.

The drive was smooth with a brief leg stretch and coffee stop but we made good time and our plan to get there at 7.30am was looking good.

Dh had booked parking through the Manchester airport site, drop and go. I don’t know if there were better deals when we were that last minute £194 didn’t seem that bad for 23 nights, especially after having spent a while looking at last minute trains and London hotels (eye watering with Wimbledon on). I’ll be putting in an expenses claim to BA for that anyway. They only just paid back our February expenses on our pre travel day.

It was really easy to find and super well organised, we were expecting a field somewhere 😂 in the middle of nowhere ( too many years of cheap airport parking at Edinburgh and Glasgow) but it was right by terminal 3. We were ushered in quickly and came out to find a wee bus waiting to drop us at Terminal 2.

I don’t know what I was expecting, chaotic scenes of some sort like a Flight of a passage line on Christmas Day, but the terminal looked calm and quiet. It actually wasn’t too busy.

Got to the Aer Lingus desks, there was a bit of a line but as we’d checked in online they directed us to the machines to print our baggage labels and then we were straight to bag drop. So far so good.

Security next, it was showing as 15-20 minutes on the website but that hadn’t changed all morning so I was sceptical. There was a line but it didn’t look mental, more than 20 minutes but I was confident we’d be fine as it was only 7.55am at this point.

Right enough it took 30 minutes on the dot. It was very efficient and they had a lot of staff directing you and asking you questions. They advised to take my glucose monitor out my bag which I always ask just in case.

No extra checks for us or the bags this morning and I came through feeling not too stressed at all.

8.30am and we were all sorted, I could hardly believe it, it couldn’t have worked out better than this.

We were all starving now. Ds wandered off on the prowl for something to eat and came back suggesting one of the sit down places for a proper breakfast. I find breakfast the most tricky meal to deal with being low carb and not being an egg fan.

Easy for them, they both had the full cooked, we debated sharing but I ended up ordering off the kids menu and just getting bacon and sausages, along with the mushroom from Dh I was set. The guy at the bar was like just don’t tell me the kids meal is for you and it’s grand.

£39 and filled a hole, exactly what we all needed.

We had a wee wander and I picked up a salad from Pret as I hadn’t been able to change my meal choice to a diabetic meal this last minute and I wasn’t sure what the food would be like. I really wanted the salmon and mango one, it’s so good but they didn’t have it so I managed to cope with the Italian chicken one which is also great. 😂

On the way to the gate I realised that our balance for our October holiday was due to be paid while we were away. I’d meant to do it last night but obviously I’d been a bit preoccupied so I made sure to get that sorted. I was also thankful that it wasn’t BA I was giving my cash to!

As we were waiting to board we were talking about BA and decided next time it would be ABBA, anyone but BA😂. Then we started looking at ABBA song titles to see if any would match our current mood. ‘I have a dream…of a holiday’ or ‘take a chance on me…’!

We’d all been allocated seats together in the middle and the 4th seat stayed empty at boarding. Bonus.

We were all asleep for take off and had a well needed power nap.

The flight was great and the staff were really friendly. Dh watched moon fall and Northman. Ds watched Easy A and the Social Network. There was a few things I fancied but I couldn’t really be bothered and read instead.

They came round with the little pretzels and drinks. I used to love those, I gifted my packet to Dh.

The food choices were bolognaise pasta or chicken with a pepper sauce which all 3 of us had, it even told you how many carbs it was. I just ate the chicken and it was surprisingly nice.

There was also pasta salad and bread and little strawberry mousse which again had the carb content on it, normally desserts are pretty much a no but it was quite low so I was chuffed with myself that I could have a treat.

They came round with little tubs of ice cream that Ds and Dh enjoyed. Then not long before landing they offered tea and coffee and gave out wraps and a flapjack. The flapjack got high praise indeed.

I had an Italian chicken salad from pret which was delicious (4g of carbs per 100g) and some Serrano ham crisps.

They didn’t really come round with drinks but you could go and get them if you wanted.

I thought the inflight service was really good. Dh commented that it didn’t really feel like we were going to Florida as we were all really chilled but I think that was just on the back of yesterdays high stress level!

They landed early at 15.30. All very civilised coming of the plane and as we turned the corner into immigration it didn’t look too bad at all. We all estimated between 20-30 minutes wait which I’m not going to be moaning about at all. It turned out to be 35 minutes and we were at the desk less than 2 minutes before heading through.

I’d used air tags after reading all the luggage dramas and had already seen that our luggage was in Orlando with us which was a relief. All 3 were waiting on us at the carousel.

Excited for a monorail ride and to see this familiar sight again.

Last couple of trips we’d been picked up by a guy that runs a Facebook group and drives for Uber but he wasn’t taking bookings. I thought about just using Uber but since it was the 4th July weekend I was a bit worried about demand and there’d been some reports of Uber and Lyft being more expensive and harder to get than previous years. Skippy ground transportation got good reviews so I booked with them. I’d messaged the night before to say our flights had been changed and could they come get us earlier but due to the time difference I hadn’t received a reply.

Thankfully, there was a WhatsApp from them with a confirmation that this was no problem and instructions for when we landed. We ended up waiting a little for them as it was pouring with rain and the traffic was bad, they kept in touch so it was no big deal.

Dockside was heaving inside when we arrived due to the rain. Check in lines were ok though and we didn’t wait long. I could have checked in on line but I think if you do that it automatically sets up a daily charging hold and I was keen to avoid that with staying 8 nights and having to pay for 7 nights on arrival as we booked with an annual pass holder rate. The person that checked us in was lovely, I love the way Universal text you a link that has everything you need to know about the hotel.

Room allocation was great, floor 10, pool view and not too far from the lifts. The rooms are really nice but storage isn’t the best. The little bedroom has no drawers and the bigger area no closet but it’s nice and spacious and Ds loved the fact he has his own space.

We unpacked and tried to decide on dinner it was between the food court and red lobster. It was a faff finding a way out on to idrive but not far really. Red Lobster is literally yards from the car park but there’s no way out of the hotel directly on to idrive. I thought this was a bit of a pain at first but it’s only about 5 minutes walk.

We opted for Red Lobster as we thought it might be a good shout but it was a 45-50 minute for a table, I knew that by the time I got food I’d be flagging so we quickly headed to Walgreens for some snacks then back to Dockside.

Everywhere was pretty busy but all the staff were lovely.

Dh had chicken and waffles. Wouldn’t have been my choices, more breakfasty. He liked them. Not amazing but ok. He did like the side of Mac and cheese with it though. See carb overload, probably why he’s still asleep and I’m wide awake 😂

Ds had a turkey club croissant, I don’t think that’s what he meant to order but he really liked it, it was huge, fresh and he also had the sweet potatoe fries from mine.

I had a cheddar bacon burger, I asked for it in lettuce rather than a bun, I think I confused them but they were really happy to do it. The burger was actually delicious, really chunky with mountains of lettuce…there is a burger in there somewhere. 😂

We bought a refillable mug and asked for length of stay. The guy in the till said they can only activate it for 7 days then it’s a couple of dollars to add on an extra day. He was lovely, it’s activated for 7 days but he only charged us for 4.

Also got annual pass discount.

The food court seems good, lots of interesting things, not a lot low carb but salad, good to know they wrap your burger and they had a salmon with green beans and cous cous that looked nice. They also have some low carb alcohol options, white claw. Great choices for the carb eaters though pizza, pasta, burgers, sandwiches, salmon bagels. bakery…

There was a guy doing live music in the bar area and we listened to that while eating our tea. All very nice and a nice wee extra touch for a value resort.

Walgreens snacks. Don’t judge me on the sugar free chocolate - we all need a treat 😂

With all the flight carry on we’d only watched 30 minutes of the final chapter of stranger things so it was our plan to watch the rest as I’d taken the fire stick - could I get it to work, no, imagine how popular I was with Ds….Never mind I’d actually got him to Florida after all the carry on, those brownie points were well used up now. 😂

We were loving the night time view, you could see so far, even some fireworks in the distance.

We were in bed asleep by 10pm but rudely awakened by banging and screaming children. It took me a minute to realise it was coming from another room, I was too tired to figure out the direction. Sounded like they were playing football. 5 minutes later I heard the parents come in and shout at them for the noise. It was silent after that.

[Loobylou_82]

Great travel day and food looked good from the food court. Glad it was all stressfree for you

[mick]

That was a good travel day after all the problems you had

Joan

[Florida1972]

Great start and a good, stress free travel day which I’m sure was needed after all the shenanigans from BA. Looking forward to reading more 🙂

[Lizzim]

So much less stress than the day before

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by Loobylou_82

Great travel day and food looked good from the food court. Glad it was all stressfree for you

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Thanks. Couldn’t believe how smoothly it all went.

Originally Posted by mick

That was a good travel day after all the problems you had

Joan

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Thanks. I was hoping we’d had our fill of issues the day before. It was a really good travel day, no issues at all.

Originally Posted by Florida1972

Great start and a good, stress free travel day which I’m sure was needed after all the shenanigans from BA. Looking forward to reading more 🙂

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Thanks. I’m not sure I’d have dealt well with any other issues, we were just so glad to be on our way.

Originally Posted by Lizzim

So much less stress than the day before

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Thanks. I know, the stress just faded away and without the help of a wine or two as well 😂

[jothp]

Glad to hear that your travel day went smoothly and seemed so much less stressful than the previous day. The rooms at dockside look lovely.

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by jothp

Glad to hear that your travel day went smoothly and seemed so much less stressful than the previous day. The rooms at dockside look lovely.

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Thanks Jo. We didn’t really know what to expect at Dockside, the rooms were great.

[WIGGYSMUM]

What a long travel day , especially the long drive to Manchester but so worth it !
Looking forward to the report after your fab food one 🤗

Emma x

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by WIGGYSMUM

What a long travel day , especially the long drive to Manchester but so worth it !
Looking forward to the report after your fab food one 🤗

Emma x

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Thanks Emma.
It was a bit mad but maybe easier than we imagined that option would be. We’ve just been talking about Manchester as a potential option next year. The one thing we all agree on is BA via Heathrow is an absolute no no😂