The Archer's stay offsite - September 2019

[MrsArcher2b]

Happiness is the richest thing we will ever own

In the spirit of Donald, here we go again throwing our money at the happiest place on earth!

Welcome friends, to my first ever pre-trip report.

Cast
Me, Kayleigh - 32, will turn 33 a week before we go.
Favourite Disney Film: Beauty And The Beast or The Princess And The Frog

Him, James - 34, will turn 35 next week.
Favourite Disney Film: Says he can't pick, lol.

DLP in October 2016 - Just before we got engaged.

Our wedding in 2018 - so I'm no longer MrsArcher2B

When

September 8th until September 22nd

Where

We are staying offsite in an AOA villa with Virgin. We've done this before and really enjoy the freedom. We also get car hire included with this booking and will both be driving.

The Plan

Pre travel plans will involve taking our cockapoo, Maisie, to my parents for a holiday of her own. The catch here is that I live in Essex and they live in Brighton so I need to figure out when to take her or whether to ask them to come and collect her for me.

She has actually never spent a night away from me before as she's only 7 months old. She's my little velcro dog and a proper mummy's girl. Next week I'm taking my hubby away for his birthday and my parents will have her for a few nights so we will soon find out how she is. She's stayed there with me several times and loves it so I'm sure she will be fine and very spoilt

My Father-in-Law is going to take us to the airport and collect us again in return for me taking him in May saving us the expense of airport parking, woohoo.

No park tickets have been bought yet as this was a pretty spur of the moment booking but we would like to do Disney (obviously), Universal, Kennedy Space Centre and I really want to do MNSSHP too. After having a nosy on other trip reports I see that the Magical Dining Month is while we're there and I saw someone had a great deal last year to dine at Seaworld and then stay in the park so if this comes up again and we have the money, who know's.

I'm tempted to get the Disney ticket offer that's on at the moment where you get free toy story magic bands if you buy before April but I'll see where our finances are first. Might have to get a 0% credit card ready, haha. I've never had a magic band and they look so cute and really handy!

Pooh Sized Problems

Lastly, I'm currently feeling quite Pooh sized and as much as I love Winnie, I just don't pull off his figure in the same way. As Merida says, "You control your destiny - you don't need magic to do it. And there are no magical shortcuts to solving your problems". It looks like I'm gonna have to do this the old fashioned way, so I'll be keeping a bit of a log on here too to keep me accountable.

I love to shop. I really love to shop in Florida and so does J. The dream is to shop in a lower dress size, not worry about how I look, will I fit, etc and just enjoy every single second of the magic.

[MrsArcher2b]

Page saved for updates

[vampiress88]

Looks good

[JanetteP]

Hi Kayleigh, your plans sound great. I posted the deal for Seaworld and it has been the same deal in previous years too, hopefully this year will be the same.Fantastic value with the free entry to Seaworld too. We had some fabulous meals on the Magical Dining Month last year. We ate at Morimoto Asia, The Melting Pot (twice!), STK and Edie V's. I wish I'd also tried Ruth's Chris as this was highly recommended to us. Hope you have a fabulous time.

[MrsArcher2b]

Thanks Janette, I'm really looking forward to seeing what deals come up. I'll put all of those restaurants on my list.
Hopefully the budget will stretch to Seaworld. It looks amazing at night!

[Eccle]

Your plans for your trip sound great. If you can manage the tickets in time to get the free magic band, I do think they are good, I love just being able to tap in for a ride

[MrsArcher2b]

Thanks Eccle. I'll try that

[MrsArcher2b]

UPDATE

Park tickets have been booked and paid for via American Attractions. They were doing adults for kids prices on Disney tickets but we actually ended up getting the 14 day Disney/Universal combo tickets as well as Kennedy Space Centre. We also got £20 off thanks to the code MSE10 making our total cost £1306 which I was pretty pleased with. I'd like to try the magic bands so I might just grab some when we're there. Ideas for where to get them cheap?

I am super excited because I also booked tickets for MNSSHP! Neither of us have done this before. It looks so cool. We aren't costume people so don't need to worry about that but I'll be all ears for any other tips for the party.

We did consider HHN but to be honest James is not big into horror and I really don't think he would enjoy it. He said if I wanted to do it he would give it a go which is sweet but I'd rather save the money and put it towards something we will both have fun doing.

I've got my eye on the Orlando Explorer Pass from Costco. It's around £57pp for 4 attractions. James had mentioned that he quite fancied the Sea Life centre and maybe Madame Tussauds. This would let us do this and then possibly the Orlando Eye thing and Gatorland on our last day. Can you skip the aviary in Gatorland? Birds are not hubby's thing.

Tentative itinerary

Sunday 8th - Get to the villa around 7:30pm and dump our things. Head out to stock up on some food and bits for the villa and get dinner. We might just get something to take home.

Monday 9th - Check in at Contempo. Hollywood Studios inc fireworks.

Tuesday 10th - Animal Kingdom. NYPD pizza. I-drive premium outlets.

Wednesday 11th - Universal. Walmart.

Thursday 12th - Magic Kingdom - maybe a BOG lunch so I can have a look in the castle. I love Beauty and the Beast. Disney Springs.

Friday 13th - Have a look around I-drive. Mall @ Millenia. Cheesecake Factory.

Saturday 14th - Kennedy Space Centre. Chilled night in.

Sunday 15th - Florida Mall. Burlington. Vineland premium outlets.

Monday 16th - Universal. Super target.

Tuesday 17th - lazy morning. Epcot. MNSSHP.

Wednesday 18th - Celebration. Disney mini golf. Lake buena vista factory stores.

Thursday 19th - Sea Life. Madame Tussauds. Orlando Eye. Tony Roma's.

Friday 20th - Revisit anywhere we want a second look at.

Saturday 21st - Same.

Sunday 22nd - Disney Springs check in and look around. Gatorland. Back to the airport.

Let me know your thoughts and suggestions if you have any. We still want some down time so towards the end of the holiday we'll be taking it a little easier and make sure we're rested before we head home again.

Thanks for reading xx