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Old 26 Jan 20, 12:45 AM  
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berniegroves
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Team Groves are Florida bound - October 2017 - day 21

Day 21 - 26th October

Time to leave!

I couldn’t believe it! Our three week holiday had come to an end. I’m not too proud to say I shed a few tears throughout this last day.

I was up early to try and tidy up the last of the packing as we were going to be using the Downtown Disney check in that Virgin operate.
We left the kids to sleep as long as possible as it would be a long day.
I checked the stroller over and then folded it down and left it outside the villa ready for Kingdom Strollers to collect.

We woke them up and got dressed and headed to Disney Springs with the luggage. We had some difficulty finding our way to the right section of the carpark because of all the roadworks. But we got there in the end.
I’d managed to spread the weight pretty evenly between the suitcases this time and so there wasn’t an issue when we were weighing the cases. We got checked in within about ten minutes and were on our way back to the car.
This service really is amazing, especially if you are staying in a villa with an early check out.

Our plan had been to go to Magic Kingdom for the morning. But the kids wanted to have a relaxing day and go back to the villa instead. So that’s what we did.

We had arranged a late check out of 2pm with the villa which meant that whatever we decided to do we had the villa as a back up.
So back to the villa we went, the kids used the cinema room one last time and played on the table football, they played with their toys and we used the swimming pool for one last time.


I dried our swimsuits in the dryer after we got out of the pool and then put them in our hand luggage.
It was a very relaxed morning and a lovely ending to our trip.
But I must say that I was very sad not to go back to Disney one last time. I’d hoped that visiting Magic Kingdom on our last day would become tradition and I was disappointed that I hadn’t said a proper goodbye to the park when we were last there (I know that sounds silly). But our family makes decisions together and everyone else wanted a chilled morning so that’s what we did and it did turn out to be lovely.

At midday we drove to Championsgate for lunch at Chillis.
This is Simons favourite place to eat so he was very happy.
We were all feeling a bit blue about the holiday ending but we had a lovely lunch here.


We drove back to the villa and just had time to get changed into our travelling clothes. Then the people from Car on the Drive arrived to collect us and take us to the airport.
We said goodbye to our home for the last three weeks and drove towards the airport all feeling a little glum.


We got to the airport in good time and I love the car on the drive service. It’s so nice being dropped at the door with just our hand luggage.

We decided to go straight through security as we know from past experience it can take a really long time. Today was no different. I think it took about 40 minutes, creeping really slowly forward in a long twisty line before reaching the front and then having to move at the speed of light to get everything on the conveyor belt.
I always find it SO stressful!

Everything that happened at the airport is a bit of a blur. I think I’m
Never at my best on the return journey as it just feels so sad.


We had gotten a really good deal on Premium Economy when we booked, it was only a couple of pounds difference between Economy and Premium Economy so we’d snapped it up.
We were sat in a row of 4 and the seats were very comfy with lots more leg room.

The kids curled up in their seats and watched shows on their iPads. Miley in particular loves being on the plane.

Grayson fell asleep pretty quickly and missed one of the meals. But he didn’t really sleep for long enough and woke up after a few hours. He carried on watching his iPad. When the next food service was served he barely touched it and then he started to say he felt sick! Oh no! At this point we had about an hour left of the flight, the end was in sight but it’s not ideal with a poorly child.
He was sick once, very suddenly, and luckily he had one of the Virgin red blankets on his lap so that saved him. Although he did hit Simon a bit too! Oops!

Miley had finally fallen asleep a few hours before we landed so she was asleep at this point.

I started to feel queasy at this point, but didn’t think much of it, until Simon told me that he felt sick too! Argh!
I now started thinking about what we would do if we did indeed all have sickness bugs!
My plan in that case was to get a room at an airport hotel and spend the next 24 hours quarantined!

Miley woke up as we were coming in to land and she also said she felt sick!

We were off the plane quickly as we were in premium economy and once we were off and breathing different air we all started to feel a bit better, although Grayson was still looking peaky.

Passport control was quick and painless and initially baggage claim was pretty good too. Three of our four bags arrived immediately which was exciting. But then we waited and waited and waited for the last one. Eventually there was only one suitcase going around on the conveyor belt and it looked suspiciously like ours, although this one was much older and had a number of ribbons etc attached to it.
We had to go to the baggage claim desk and log a report for a lost bag. We showed them the bag that was left and they agreed that it looked as though someone had taken our case by mistake.
I just don’t understand this at all, I can understand getting the wrong case off the belt, but to actually leave the airport, load up your car and go all the way home without realising.
It was a similar case but wasn’t exactly the same, and theirs had ribbons on to make it distinctive!

The airport said all we could do was wait and see if the other people phoned to say they’d taken the wrong case. But they said the onus would be on those people to return our case to the airport! So we were really concerned that the people wouldn’t want to go to that effort and that they might just claim their bag and keep ours too!
The suitcase had a number of keepsakes from the holiday as well as the kids two Duffy bears and other bits and pieces, so I spent 48 hours being extremely worried we wouldn’t get it back.

So we ended up being in the airport for around 45 minutes longer than everyone else due to this and Grayson was still saying he felt poorly which was adding to the stress.

We eventually left, walked across the road to the valet carpark and collected our car. I was SO glad that we didn’t gave to worry about getting on a bus with the kids and the luggage at this point.
Ten minutes later after playing suitcase Tetris and we were loaded into the car and on our way.
The kids fell asleep pretty quickly, sleeping in the car is unheard of for Miley, so she must have been exhausted.
We stopped at the services close to home for a toilet break and for Simon to get a cup of tea for some caffeine.
I asked Simon if he could remember anything from our journey home and he said he remembered having a tantrum about something at the services. He said he can’t remember what annoyed him but that he was tired and grumpy! Lol!

We were home shortly after, the journey took about 2 hours in total.
I was so pleased that I’d made an extra effort to clean and tidy the house before we went away as it was so nice to come home to a super tidy house. Although it never stays super tidy for long.

We waited for 48 hours until we heard about our suitcase. Simon was calling to check each day as we were desperate to get it back. Finally they told us the other people had contacted them and were going to return it.

It was finally returned to us on 31st October, we were SO pleased!


Unfortunately our brand new suitcase was totally ruined as the front pocket section had been totally ripped. You can’t see it in the photo but it just flaps away from the frame of the suitcase.
But at least we had it back. But I do wish people would check their suitcases before leaving the airport!

Anyway, our holiday was done and it had been a great one!
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