5 do Florida for the 1st time - October 2018 - Day 1 - Travel day and Arrival at Beach Club

[Milpston]

Index

Today was one of my photo lite days. When you are lugging two young kids and lots of luggage my camera was pretty much the last thing I was thinking about... trip report fail.

So we were all up around 05:30 this morning so what we could be down to breakfast at the Hilton for 06:00. Breakfast actually opened at 05:00. We were due to fly with BA at 09:40. The first thing I did when I opened my eyes was check on my phone to see that the flight was shown as on time. I then pretty much sprung out of bed. I'm not a morning person and hate getting up in the mornings. It's funny how it is so different when you are getting up to go on holiday.
We arrived down in the restaurant and there were just a few other families in there.
Emma asked for Special K for breakfast so fully expecting them not to have it I was pleasantly surprised when they did. We got the kids sorted first then took it in turns to go and get our breakfast. I have to say I don't think I have ever been let down by a Hilton breakfast.

I had my usual small cooked breakfast from the buffet. I didn't go up for seconds which is the curse of an early breakfast. If it had been a bit later I'm sure I would have been in the mood to smash it properly

Chloe ate a hot breakfast too.

Benjamin had a selection of items and Emma stuck with her Special K.. which she didn't touch. We then got her some toast but she didn't eat that either as there was no peanut butter.

Bizarrely I do not have a picture of what Sally ate for breakfast. I have only just realised why. If you look closely at the first picture on this post you will notice she has a knife and fork in her hand. It was taken a few seconds before she pulled up a chair and ate straight from the buffet. I always make sure I'm never behind her in a buffet queue because it's a disappointing experience.
The staff pretty much left us alone but were friendly and good with the kids. They gave them an activity pack each just before we left.

After breakfast we headed back up to the room to lock up the cases and gather our bits together. We then headed off into the airport through the covered walkway. We picked up a luggage trolley from the walkway and stacked it out with all our cases and hand luggage.

So I had checked in online and opted to collect boarding passes at the airport. We had packed lightly for this holiday thinking that we would probably bring some bits home. Also we knew there was laundry facilities at Beach Club and the villas.


So on arrival in the South Terminal we headed off to check in. I spoke to a nice lady at the bag drop area who directed me inside the ropes and told us to wait by another lady who would check us in shortly. Anyway after being asked by this other woman about 10 times why we were there and me telling her about 10 times that this was where I was told to come she finally did what she had to do, gave us our boarding passes and directed us to the bag drop. Due to packing lightly only two of our four cases were over weight
The nice lady who we originally spoke to came over and helped us. She laid out our options which were, effectively, to pay or to repack our cases to get them all under the limit (highly unlikely to happen).
Anyway, she then told us to hold on a minute before taking us to a desk right at the end with no queue. She had a chat with the guy at the desk, gave us a wink and left telling us he would look after us. All bags checked and off we went with no charges. He tagged the stroller which we were taking to the gate. He told us the stroller would be taken from there and we would be met by it at the exit of the plane the other end. He did say though that this wouldn't happen on our return to Gatwick. All checked in I headed out the front of the terminal to have a last smoke.

I returned to Sally and the kids and we headed to security. We were directed through the family line and were through in a few minutes to the departure lounge.

I remember before we had Emma and Benjamin that now was usually the queue to stock up on a raft of magazines and newspapers to study on the flight. We don't bother any more as it's never going to happen with young kids. I had a look in duty free. 400 Benson and Hedges were £98. I had looked at the BA website a few days earlier and vaguely remembered seeing them for £75 on there so I left it hoping they were cheaper on the plane.

I took control of the kids while Sally and Chloe had a look in the shops and got a few snacks for the kids on the plane. We also bought some headphones for Emma to use on the plane. We then had a look around for the soft ply area. We parked ourselves in there and released Emma and Benjamin for a bit. Sally took Emma off to the rest room and found a huge queue for the ladies so brought her back and I took her to the mens where there was no queue. The soft play is pretty small and basic but is a godsend just to let the kids have a bit of freedom for a while in an otherwise heavily confined day.

Sally got chatting to another family that were on the Tampa flight and it wasn't long before our boarding gate was shown. We took a slow walk down to the gate where there was the usual throng of people up and queuing to be the first on to sit down for 9 hours despite boarding not starting yet. There was an announcement that there would be a short delay in boarding due to our plane arriving late. We found some space and let the kids have a bit more of a run around for a bit. It was nice to let them have a good look at the planes. This was Benjamin's first flight and Emma would not remember her previous ones.

We had been able to book our seats for free at the time of booking our flights due to having an infant with us. After much deliberation I opted for 2 pairs of seats right at the back of the plane where it narrows slightly and become 2-4-2 instead of 2-4-3. We let Emma decide who she wanted to sit with this morning. Benjamin would start on Sally's lap as he is going through a bit of a clingy stage and nothing else would be worth the grief. Emma decided that she wanted to sit with Mummy and Benjamin so they sat in the row second from the back and with Chloe and I sat in front of them. This meant that Sally wouldn't have anyone in front of her reclining their seat while she has Benjamin on her lap. Personally I wish they would just put fixed backs on all the seats as it would save me having to repeatedly dig my knees in someone's back and repeatedly lean on their chair

We were about an our late taking off. After the stress of the last week I would snapped your hand off for that result.

As you can see things were going well on the flight... looks can be deceiving. Both Emma and Benjamin were a complete pain in the a**e. Everything one had the other wanted. They were winding each other up and squabbling and were being a right hand full. On the other hand Chloe and I were quite comfortable and content After the first hour I look at Sally and could see the eyes welling up and her saying, "never again". She had that, "what are we doing?", look on her face. After a hellish first hour passed both the kids settle for a nap and the thunder clouds lifted a little.

Behind Sally was the very back row. There was no-ne in the seats so I took the opportunity to lay Emma across the Within a couple of minutes an air hostess asked me to move her as these seats were reserved for staff rest breaks. I told her I would, of course, move her immediately f the seats were needed and she said they were so I took her onto my lap. The seats remained empty for the next 3 and half hours. Now, I know I had no entitlement to use those seats but I can't see how it was doing any harm and just thought it was unnecessary and a pretty poor attitude. While I'm at it I'm sure cabin crew used to be friendlier than I've seen in more recent years. They weren't rude or anything like that I just felt no warmth from them at all. I don't recall them engaging with the kids at all. They were pretty irrelevant all round really. I have mainly flown BA when going transatlantic so maybe it's time for a change next time. Having said that I know I will book purely on price and BA do good fly drive deals. I think I am just tight and begrudge spending thousands to be treated like an inconvenience for hours on end

The kids only slept for 45 minutes so when they woke we split them up and I took Emma to sit with me. For the rest the of the flight the kids didn't sleep but were as good as gold. It was in the second half of the flight where our seat choice played dividends.

You can just about see the aisle seat from the row in front of us. This created a nice little space behind it to stand and stretch our legs. At different times Emma or Benjamin were sat in the floor there and playing with the young children from across the aisle. They were out of the way and everyone could still get passed. We had bouts of turbulence on the way out so the seat belt signs were put on quite regularly. I'm sure the likes of the end of Hurricane Michael and other weather systems in the area probably had an effect.

I had pre-ordered a children's meal for Emma which obviously she didn't touch. The regular meals were a choice of a pasta dish or tikka masala. They were the usual, only in my opinion, inedible slop. I did end up eating three of the little lemon cheesecakes though so it wasn't all bad. I never felt the urge to photograph any of it. I don't really need the reminder.

We arrived at Tampa and were optimistically looking forward to a smooth run through the airport to get on our way despite being right at the back of the plane. On exiting the plane we were told that no push chairs would be unloaded here and they would be with the rest of the baggage. We were then met by a long and static queue and about 2 immigration officers 'working'. This wasn't in the plan and was part of the reason for choosing to fly into Tampa. We were in queue for well over 2 hours. There was literally only one family behind us. These were from premium economy but they were delayed getting of the plane due to their teenager, from what I could work out, losing or having an expensive item stolen on the plane. The Dad was really not happy with him and just wouldn't leave it alone throughout the long torturous queue. If you are reading I'm sorry but it was nice to have something to take our mind off our own long wait. We got the usual crosses from the machines and then re-joined the next part of the queue. By now the kids were getting a bit miserable and tired. Benjamin fell asleep on Sally's shoulder so I lugged all the hand luggage. I think we swapped over a few times. Emma was a little angel despite being tired. Eventually we got through and the bonus was our cases were easy to find as they were pretty much the only ones left.

Considering the wait we were al fairly relaxed. Once out though into the airport Sally and Chloe went to get a coffee. I went to find a smoking area after asking a few members of airport staff I gave up and went back to the rest. We then got on the shuttle train to the rental car centre which was quick and easy.

We then headed to the Avis garage. Somehow I managed to get us in the wrong lift so the floor we were looking floor was just a corridor with, "staff access only". We then went down to the ground floor and ended up outside on the other side of the road from the rental garage. Awesome result as I had a couple of quick smokes and it was lovely to step out into the Florida sunshine and it felt really warm.
Back in we went and followed the idiot proof signs down to the Avis preferred desk in the garage. I checked the paperwork and noticed it said, "Lincoln Navigator", so I asked if it would be possible to have a Chevy Suburban. She basically said this car was the only option they had left. We waited for a few minutes for them to bring car seats over. We then went to our car. I have to say I wasn't very impressed. There was lots of dust on the instruments in the front and by the look of under the wheel arches someone had been off roading in it. I was all set to head back and kick off a little but Sally wasn't in the mood to let me so we began to load all our luggage in. I accidentally pressed a button that sally almost got folded up into the electric middle seats and I realised things were getting a little tense after our long da it made me smirk a bit though It was a bit of a squeeze but we got it all in. I remembered that I wanted to pre-pay for a tank of fuel but the moment had passed by then so we set off.

We had hired a sat nav from Discount Florida Car hire which they had already input the address of The Beach Club. Obviously the sat nav didn't initially work as we were in a multi storey car park. Handily as you exit there is a layby marker, "GPS Pull off", or something similar so we pulled in there and waited for the sat nav to find a signal.

Both the kids were immediately asleep in the car. We got out onto the main roads around 18:45 or almost midnight BST. All was good with the world again. I feel like I've done a bit of nit picking today. It was not a bad travel day. It was hard going like any long haul journey with kids but we were now starting to relax knowing we were back in control of our own destiny.

You wouldn't be able to tell but Sally is now back in control of the camera for the journey over to Disney. Yes! We were finally almost at Disney after months of planning.

The journey was fairly slow going but there were no solid traffic jams so not bad at all really. Originally it was in the plan to fo to Disney Springs tonight or walk into Epcot. Epcot had long since been removed as we couldn't activate our 21 day tickets until tomorrow or they wouldn't last until our last day in the Magic Kingdom. With the slight delay to our flight, immigration and the slow journey Disney Springs was no longer an option so we made the snap decision to go to a supermarket to get some bits for the room. We reset the sat nav and headed off to Walmart. I have no idea where it was. The kids were sparko so I waited with them and the car whilst Sally and Chloe went shopping. Whilst sitting there I checked my emails having got myself a three sim card before the trip. I had an email from Disney stating our room was ready (I would hope so) and it was room 4583. I had not made any requests on the online check in as it wouldn't work, I had made a (no guarantee) request on booking for a high floor with a balcony. I had also done a touring plans request. I sat in the car on google trying to find out if the room had a balcony but I didn't really get anywhere. Sally and Chloe seemed to get lost for a while in Walmart and came back with a selection of beer, wine, water, milk , biscuits, crisps and cereals etc. At one stage I was keeping every receipt from the holiday but our rooms started looking something like a recycling centre so I binned them all. I can see we spent £87.45 from my credit card bill.

The supermarket trip cost us about an hour and the kids did not wake. We arrived at the Beach Club between 21:00 and 21:30. We pulled up to the gate informed him we were checking in and then parked up at the main entrance. As I got out the car an American guy said to me, "Wow, is that your car?". He then took a photo of it. Bit strange really. During the journey the car had grown on me. It was so comfortable, such I high driving position and had every conceivable toy built in including a working sat nav with large screen. It was a beast of a motor and I'd love to have one again.

I handed the keys over and got it valet parked. We put the kids in the stroller, still asleep, and left the bell staff unloading the car. We walked into the Beach Club and distinctive smell hit us. It's a beautiful looking hotel and we were just happy to have arrived. There was no queue at check in so it was swift an easy. We took our magic bands still on the carrier thing and were soon on our way up to our room.

We took the lift by the Market Place and up to the fourth floor. It was a short walk from there. I stood at my door, took a deep breath and opened the door hoping to see a balcony...… YES. I actually later checked and the room was about 3 along from the one I requested with Touring Plans.

We had booked a Garden view room so knew it was unlikely we would be at the front being able to see the lake. I stood went out to the balcony and this was the view on that first night.

I was over the moon. We flipped over the day bed and put Emma in.

Benjamin woke for a bit to try on his magic band and have some milk

Luggage arrived in the room about 5 minutes after we did. Once we had put some bits away I went for a little wander and a smoke outside before returning for a couple of beers with Sally before flaking out at 22:30. Our arrival at the Beach Club had been everything we had hoped and couldn't wait to spend our first week here.

The kids woke at 02:30...

[Palm trees]

Sounds like a great day overall... I smiled at the very last line!

[DisneyDaffodil]

Great travel day, always a tiring day especially with little ones. My DD was saying the same as you on our way back, how bad she felt kneeing the poor man who fully reclined onto her lap and how awkward she felt hanging on his seat to get up as she had no foot space due to his constantly reclining seat 😂

[Cinderella]

Well done on that journey👍 Great view from your room!

[Goldia]

Good idea to start the day with just a small breakfast

It sounds like your seat choices on the plane were great to give the little ones a chance to have a bit of space. Such a shame the flight attendant didn't let you use the seats behind, you're right it does seem petty.

A pain that it took such a long time to get through Tampa and out on the road.

Your room looks lovely though and the view looks fab, I can't wait to see some photos of the view in daytime.

[clubhouse]

Great day, we are at the Beach Club next year so looking forward to reading more.

[Eccle]

It sounds like a good travel day overall with young children, I remember vowing never to fly again with an 18 month old! It's a shame there was such a queue at Tampa, we had a really good experience there.

Beach Club looks great!

[Jockey]

Great day

[mick]

Great day

Joan

[GezzasGem]

You made it in one piece! Nothing like that first step onto Disney property then climbing into bed your first night 😁