3rd Time's The Charm - Pre-Trippie 1

[00swan]

Me - Hayley - 37
Him - Justin - 38

3rd Time's The Charm - Pre-Trippie

So, I'm ashamed to say that I have just finished my 2007 Trip Report - why did it take so long? Well, I guess we always knew we'd be coming back, but didn't know when and I'm somewhat flakey in that I've found it hard to DIBB without any firm plans.

Also, my notes were pretty hit & miss in places, but I hope you've enjoyed reading what I have remembered.

So, on to the next one !

We had always hoped to be able to go every year, or at least every other year, but when we were out in 2007 I made a phone call home to catch up with my Mother who dropped a rather large bombshell.

She & my father had been talking about selling up and moving to a smaller property in readiness of their reaching retirement. However, having looked around locally, they couldn't find anything that would be big enough to park the vehicles/motorhome and still be cost effective and small enough to be manageable as they get older.

So, my brother had a bright idea. He knew I had always wanted to move back to the village (he lives next door to my parents so understands the draw) - so why not convert their home into two? I could sell my house, buy half of theirs - they realise some assets and get a smaller place, with daughter next door to help out as they get older. Inspired !

So, this meant that holidays had to be put on hold for a while. Bear in mind that I only moved into that house 3 months prior to this !

Eventually we got planning permission to build an extention to the property and I put my house on the market in May 2008.

And, you all know the rest - the bottom fell out of the housing market & it took months to sell. Eventually, after taking a £30,000 drop in the asking price (ouch :angry we moved on in April 2009.

Now we're here and feeling incredibly settled, we decided it was time to return to the Mouse.

My nephew (who's 19) lives next door with my Brother/SIL and we asked him if he could house/dogsit next May - fine with him. My parents agreed to help out while he was at work, to let the dog out & give him some attention, so all we need to do is book the holiday & work out how to pay for it !

EDITED 11/01/10 - Change of plan - after finding a wonderful dog behavoirist who also boards dogs, we've now booked Oscar in with her while we're away. Nephew is planning to move out of home soon & I'd much prefer Oscar to have the company of other dogs and people during the day, when Nephew would be at work. He had a trial run this weekend and got on really well, so have booked him in for a monthly visit to get him used to having his own holidays.


So, we started to price things up. I had hoped to use our saved Tesco vouchers for a deal with Virgin, but it just didn't work out as cost-effective for us.

Instead, we decided to go DIY and we found what we think to be a good deal with BA and then the heavens shined on us when we found we could book our favourite hotel, The Hampton Inn Pointe Orlando, through Monarch.

It was a shame that we had to pay up front, but that's what a 0% credit card is for !

FLIGHTS:
BA flight 13th May - returning UK 30th May - £822 - 2 adults, economy (booked direct with BA)

EDITED 09/10/09 - £80 spent today to pre-book our seats. I know this is a is a much-maligned service from BA, but I think they have those of us who are prone to panic over a barrel.

I didn't want to wait for OLCI to find out that we're having to be either separated or in a seat that we have to get up every 5 mins to let someone out. OH is 6'5" so wants an aisle seat too.

So, we've booked 16D & 16E in World Traveller (777 3 class) - Seat Guru tell us that these are okay (no entertainment system running under to lose space from).

Cost - £80 - £20 per person per flight.

HOTEL:
Hotel - Hampton Inn Pointe Orlando - 16 nights via Monarch - £591 - double room, including breakfast

Total - £1,413 for two big kids

By doing it DIY, we were able to book an odd number of days -since the BA flight was cheaper on a Thursday, we could afford to book 2 more nights in the hotel - all for the same price if we'd done 14 nights Sat-Sat ! Bonus.

ESTA:

Found out on the DIBB that you can do this up to 2 years in advance of travel - so decided to get done early - did within a few days of booking flights.

PARK TICKETS:

We've opted for 6 day Magic Your Way Disney tickets (got them for the price of 3 days + 3 days free ! ), 14 day Seaworld/Busch and 14 day Universal 2 park tickets - all from Orlando Attractions - great customer service & tickets arrived so quickly - £275 each (adult).

When I first looked at tickets, I was looking at spending £440 each with an UK-based site, but decided that we didn't need to park hop and wasn't worried about expiry of tickets, so have decided to take this route

OVERNIGHT AT GATWICK/PARKING:

Have booked to return to Lowfield Farm near Gatwick for our overnight - £49 for the room B&B, plus free lifts to the airport & collection for your return flight - £2 night car parking. Stayed here in 2006 and 2007

MCO AIRPORT TRANSFERS:

Haven't booked these yet, but think I'll go for Quicksilver, rather than getting a shuttle - I know $110 isn't cheap when it's two of us (town car return), but I like the idea of not feeling like being herded like cattle on a mini-bus.

EDITED 13/10/09 - Decided to bite the bullet today & booked with Quicksilver - $110 round trip from MCO to the hotel & back - just waiting for the email confirmation now. This is for a town car to collect just us, rather than a shuttle (which we did last time) - it'll be nice to be chauffered - haven't told OH yet (unless he reads this) he'll be expecting a shuttle & then we come through immigration there'll be a lovely man standing there with our name on a board, ready to pick us up. How many times have you seen this in the movies and wanted it to happen to you ! ? !

Just praying that I've filled in the forms properly, got a little confused as to whether I should be entering the times in 24 hour format or not. Oh well, let's hope the confirmation has the right details. Fingers crossed please.

EDITED 14/10/09 - All confirmed - after speaking to Greg on a thread on here, all was fine !

DOLLARS $$$:

I've opted for the Fairfx card this year - will top it up with about $850 and then get $150 in cash somewhere else - we've upped our budget a little from last year, but not much and if necessary I can always top up the card online when we're there (know the Hampton has a pc in the lobby I can use) - Justin has ordered Travellers Cheques in advance (getting $1.70 for delivery in October) and will take about the same amount of money as me.

Edited to say - I got on average $1.64/£ on my Fairfx card - have stuck $1,000 on it now

TRAVEL INSURANCE:

Had a look at lots of different options for this, but a lot of single trip insurances only covered up to 15 days - but we need cover for 17 (16 nights) - so ended up with an Annual Multi-Trip cover - got this from Tescos (at last, was able to use my vouchers for something) - doubled up my vouchers into a deal - £55 in vouchers + £3 cash - £113 for cover starting now.

Had considered waiting, but my fellow DIBB'ers told me to book the insurance now, in case of problems/cancellations, etc.

ITINERARY:

Well, we're not really there yet - keep playing with the days & can't quite make up our minds - will probably post this as a separate pre-trippie in due course.

Same with ideas on where to eat - we're not planning to book any ADR's at the mo, but minds can be changed !

OTHER STUFF:

We're hoping Justin's sister & family may be going out at the same time again next year - it's always lovely to meet up with them for the odd park day / meal out.

In the meantime, I guess I just have to keep on DIBBing & watching the countdown go down so slowly It's currently at 274 days (at time of posting) so it will be interesting to watch it roll down from here ! The countdown was at 330 days when we booked the holiday, so it's already starting to head in the right direction !

Roll on May 2010 !

Happy planning to all,
Hayley.

[Guest]

Fab! Can't wait to hear all about your plans.

Happy Dibbing!

xx

[VickieMH]

Thanks for alll the info it really helps to understand where u are going and what u are spending and u got a great deal there... Great start.. Happy Planning xx

[00swan]

Originally Posted by VickieMH

Thanks for alll the info it really helps to understand where u are going and what u are spending and u got a great deal there... Great start.. Happy Planning xx

See more...

Thanks Vickie - so many people ask how much things are, how much to take, etc - so I thought I'd offer details - hope it helps some first-timers.

(just added more notes about park tickets + travel insurance while I thought about it)

[Andi]

Wow you are so organised already

Would love to be in the same position - but our flights for next summer have not been released yet.

Happy planning.

[carolynne67]

Hi, You have it so sorted already. We will be there around the same time17th May - 4th June so will look out for you!

[Guest]

Must be something in the name "3rd Times The Charm" as have previously read another pre-trippie with the same name.

Hope your countdown speeds up soon, have a great time planning.

[00swan]

Originally Posted by Cheekieminx

Must be something in the name "3rd Times The Charm" as have previously read another pre-trippie with the same name.

Hope your countdown speeds up soon, have a great time planning.

See more...

Ooh, whoops - I did a search for the name but didn't come up with anything - hope I haven't offended anyone ! There's an "8th Times the Charm" - wonder if that's what you mean?

[00swan]

Originally Posted by carolynne67

Hi, You have it so sorted already. We will be there around the same time17th May - 4th June so will look out for you!

See more...

Great time of year to visit !

[margyloveswdw]

Wow, you are so organised! Sounds like a great trip is to be had!