The "Dee Don't Do Disney Doh Do Dee" Tour 2011 - Day One

[mkingdon]

Previously on this tour...

The Pre ramble

Day One - Wednesday 27th July 2011

Welcome to the latest episode in the seemingly endless annual tours of Florida by the Williams family.

With sincere apologies to our Dibbers from the Merseyside area, I bid you a hello to the “Dee Don’t Do Disney Doh Do Dee” Tour 2011. I am actually a loyal Liverpool FC fan, which I hope will grant me at least some chance of forgiveness for my crass mockery of the Scouse accent for this year’s title.

This year, our tour was different, and as you may have guessed from the crassly constructed title, we did not “do” Disney theme parks this year. We did step foot on Disney property, and grant them some of our dollars, but grant me poetic licence enough to say we didn’t do Disney so that my title works?

The tale begins on the 27th of July 2011, with our journey down to Heathrow airport. The sheer craziness of flight prices this year had meant that the only way we were getting to the US was from Heathrow or as Amy Winehouse’s drug mule, and the latter option was cruelly removed shortly before our departure.

At some time close to 3.30 am, whilst lay in bed. Knowing that I will need all my energies for the lengthy journey ahead of me, I try my best to ignore these stirrings, which was a good job as Louise was already awake and up and about.

Having given a great deal of consideration over multiple seconds as to why Louise would be awake at this time, I fall back asleep and awake again at 7.30am. I “en suite” myself into a state of readiness involving water, shower gel and an electric razor, and then prepare an extravagant breakfast of cereal and Tips de PG.

At around 8.30am, this crucially being 24 hours from our actual take off time, I ventured into the loft/office suite, (it is an office suite if we ever want to sell the house! ) to the main PC in the house so that I may check in on line and print off those lovely boarding cards, thus saving me hours of querey at the airport tomorrow. Despite minutes of wrestling with the Air (O) Canada web site, it would appear that my desires were to remain unsatisfied. No matter which route I tried, and I tried many, I was greeted with only different variations of error message, each mocking me with its red text, and sarcastic nature. Each, delivering a subtext and insinuation that I was both unworthy and technically incompetent, and I shall have to queue with the hoy and polloi at Heathrow.

During this time, the girls had been ripped from their pits by Louise, and in a whirl of showers, hairdryers and GHDs, each female edged nearer to state in which they would be willing to face the world. My job, as it is each year, is to then undo the cases I have spent ages trying to close, in order that I may now force into them three pairs of scolding hot GHDs. Lovely.

With appearances done, the girls go and sit in the car, ready for the off, but not before the annual photo at the front door. Oh how they look forward to this event!

As Louise was still faffing about doing what I do not know, I take the chance to inflict further humiliation on the girls by asking them to pose next to their respective photos we had done when they were “ickle”.

Now that I have shown them who is boss, they retreat to the car, put the radio on, and annoy the neighbours with the banging toons escaping the Mondeo via every open door and boot.

After half an hour of this, Louise declares herself ready. I taunt the cats by telling them we’re off for a fortnight and a bit, so they’d better make that bowl of food last. There is plenty of food on the kitchen unit and all they have to do is figure out how to open a tin and they will be fine.

We spend a crucial few seconds sat in the car trying to work out what we have forgotten, but it appears we have all we need, and off we go at 10.45am. To set the tone for the holiday I don my super new sunglasses, called Wraparounds, which, well, wrap around my existing glasses. These were a gift from my Mum, concerned that I do not possess a pair of prescription sunglasses. The reason I do not is shown quite clearly in the picture below!

The girls are delighted with my new fashion conscious acquisition, and are thankful for the darkened back windows in the Mondeo as we travel through the village, first in search of petrol.

We find it at Asda, and I fill up leaving the camera in the hands of Louise.

This is Emily, but she doesn’t like having her photo taken, and is also quite concerned about being recognised whilst I have my wraparounds on!

With juice a plenty, we head for the motorway. A quick phone call goodbye to Louise’s mum happens on the M62 (handsfree occifer! ), and the next thing you know we are southbound on the M6. With it being a special occasion I splash out on the incredible expense of the M6 toll. Well, you only live once, and all is well until Louise mentions she needs a wee. I take that to mean that at some point in the near future we should stop at some services. Having been in the car for just over an hour, as a man, I assume that this is insufficient time to warrant a stop, and sail past the next services, all nonchalant like, only to incur the wrath and tongue of a cross legged Louise, who proceeds to call me every name under the sun, and a few that aren’t. Fear not social services, the girls are iPodded up, and can hear nothing above the angst of whatever Emo/Screamo nonsense they are listening to.

Lesson learned, Louise pulls me off at Warwick Services. Luckily the car park wasn’t too busy so nobody saw!

Then loo breaks are taken, but the girls stay in the car watching the chap in the car next to us eat a fruit salad, and every time he puts something in his mouth they both shout “Nom Nom Nom Nom” and then fall about in fits of laughter. You sort of had to be there.

Onwards now, further south, and Rebecca becomes both bored and hyper for the last hour, and treats us to a good old sing-along to the radio which we always “enjoy”. We were all very glad to arrive at the Travelodge (Heathrow Central) at around 2.15pm. I leave females in the car, and wander in to see the lay of the land. Eventually, up several flights of stairs I find reception with the relevant “ist” sat behind it.

I give her my booking details and she tells me check in is not until 2.30pm. Wearily I wander back downstairs to the car, and notice that to leave the car in the car park of the hotel in which I have paid to stay, I have to pay! I am on holiday, so trifling matters like this will not get me down. I read the instructions, call the number provided, and then wrestle with the automated system for the next few minutes. Despite three attempts, it does not get my registration number right, consistently mistaking a C for a T.

I give up, and press the option for a human. When no human materialises after a further few minutes, I give the automated system one more go, and assume my best Dick Van Dyke cockerney accent. This does the trick, and I think the parking is all sorted. It is now 2.27pm, and I gather everything relevant from the car, bundle them into the lift with the luggage, and approach reception once more.

She still could not check us in, as it was “not quite 2.30pm”, so we stood staring at her for those few minutes.

Eventually we get sorted, and make it to the room. Right then, I understood why it had only cost £25! It was a little prison cell like, and I am glad we did not know what some of the stains on the carpet were. It was one of those hotels were everything costs extra, so I had to limit the girls to alternate breaths, so as not to incur the extra oxygen charges.

On reflection we would not stay here again. In the scheme of things, the extra £80 to £100 it would have been to stay somewhere less in need of a crime scene clean up would have been well worth the investment.

It was still quite early, and with little else to do, we watched a bit of telly.

Friends, it seems, is always on.

This was followed by the Rocky Horror Show episode of Glee, and this forced my hand to make a move. From my very smart phone, I had found out that there was a TGI Fridays in Kingston on Thames, and this is where we would dine this very evening.

The sat nav is programmed, and within twenty minutes we are parked up and entering a very quiet TGIs. We had –

Me – Boneless Wings & Quesadillas
Louise – Mozzarella Sticks & Pasta
Emily – Mozzarella Sticks & Pasta (a different one, but not a detail I captured)
Rebecca – Mozzarella Sticks & Pasta (as above)

The waiter spotted our out of town accent, and asked where we were from. We told him, and he said he was from Leeds. Now that’s a hell of a commute to Kingston every day, but who was I to argue. He asked what brought us to “the south” and after explaining our imminent departure we had a long chat about Florida. He had lived there for five years until quite recently, and loved the place.

The bill was £75, including tip, for the meal, not the chat.

We wandered back to the car park, and I was fearful of a typical London style car park charge of around £16 for the hour and a bit we were there, but no, a very acceptable £1.20 cheered me right up.

Back to the lovely Travelodge, and I averted a major disaster by getting the loan of a hairdryer from reception. Without that, the world would have ended. My hairstyle just doesn’t happen you know!

A little more TV, and a slight hiccup, as Rebecca had forgotten to bring her “travelling jeans” with her, so we had to quickly plan out what she would do the trip in, as the Ugg Boots and thick training pants worn in the car today would not have been too great!

At this point, around 10pm (well, Rebecca actually said it was fifty two minutes past nine! ), we set all four alarms on each of our phones, starting at 2.30am, and tried to get some sleep.

Tomorrow – More journey, and I don’t mean Don’t Stop Believing.

[Ariel's Mum]

First to comment ? Loving it so far xx

[Bigkitty266]

Good first part cant wait for the next

Is that the Asda at astley bridge by any chance

[mkingdon]

Originally Posted by Bigkitty266

Good first part cant wait for the next

Is that the Asda at astley bridge by any chance

See more...

Indeed it is

[chaffey]

Excellent as always Craig, DH will be down in a minute asking me what I have been laughing at.

[pepsicube]

[Minicooper]

Fab ... the trippe has started

[Guest]

Excellent start Craig and liking the pop culture references... nice shades by the way

[ely3857]

I've given Gavin more than one ear bashing for driving past a potential loo stop!

[Mouse mess]

Brilliant, OMG look at your grown up girls!
Looking forward to more