1st WDW Trip and 1st holiday as a 5! October 2018

[Milpston]

Index

So I have decided that I will do a full trip report for our WDW trip in October 2018.

First of all I think I will cover the introductions of the cast.

I'm Paul and I'm 38. Ill be 39 by the time this trip comes around. My Wife Sally Is 37 and will be 38 by the time we go. This is us from 2013 on our honeymoon. There are very few photos of me in existence as I tend to try and stay the other side of the lens.

My long suffering Step-Daughter Chloe 16 (will turn 17 the day we land back in the UK) will be with us. She does well to put up with me winding her up most of the time. She is doing her GCSE's this year and then going on to 6th form or college from there. Yes, we are being bad parents and taking her out of school for part of this trip. A touchy subject I know but we have never done it before and you never know if this will be her last family holiday with us.

Our holidays dried up a fair bit in 2014 when our Daughter Emma came along.

I did do a previous trip report for our honeymoon but it wasn't Disney related. We did fly in and out of Florida though if that counts. If you google my username then you will find it. Its called something like B2B pictorial review Allure Of The Seas... I'm far too simple to post a link to it.

She is currently 3 and will turn 4 a month or so after we return home. She is a bit of a character and like most that age can be either one of the loveliest little girls in the world or a complete s#d depending on how the mood takes her. She is Disney mad and is watching Mickey Mouse Club House as I type this and she is nuts about Disney princesses. I have to confess she was probably the main motivation when I booked this trip.

I found The Dibb in May 2016 and I think it was soon after that we booked 4 nights at Newport Bay at Disneyland Paris in February 2017. I had never been before although Sally and Chloe had been once of twice a few years before. I have never really been in to Disney but I have to say I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. I thought it was horrifically expensive for what it was but we all enjoyed it all the same.

I have some fantastic memories from this short trip. I really didn't expect Emma to get as much out of it as she did. She was 2 years and 2 months at the time but to this day still talks about, "the elephant ride, tea cups and the horsey one". We really enjoyed Innoventions character meal although strangely my fondest memory was Emma shouting, "bye bye Donald Duck at Mickey Mouse". However, I couldn't shake the feeling that it just didn't feel right walking round in thermals rather than shorts and T-shirt in the Florida sunshine.

As you can probably see from the photographs Sally was about 6 months pregnant by the time we went to Paris. It was a real hardship as it meant I had to go on all the bigger rides with Chloe From the moment Sally fell pregnant we had already decided that we would do a big Florida trip for three weeks in 2021. This seemed a sensible time to go as the kids would be roughly 4 and 6.

In May of last year Benjamin was born. Benjamin will be 17 months when we go.

I was lucky enough to have a month off work around the time he was born through the use of Annual leave and paternity leave. I probably shouldn't say this but I get bored really easily (even with a new baby and toddler) so I soon found myself back on The Dibb and nosing through trip reports and everything else Florida related. I am facing my problems and not afraid to say I became a bit of an addict

We have very little experience of WDW between us. I have been to MK for a day back in around 2001/2 and did a day at Typhoon Lagoon on the same trip. In 2011 we went on a cruise and spent a week in a villa in Davenport before driving down for the cruise. On both holidays I did Universal and SeaWorld parks. We also did Discovery Cove in 2011 which all three of us really enjoyed. Now with having a princess mad little girl and a boy who loves Mickey Mouse Clubhouse already it was probably time for a change.

I was spending hours reading up and planning for a big all out trip in 2021. Eventually I posted something on here asking people's thoughts on doing it like that or trying to do an earlier budget version and whether it would be worth it with our youngest two. I got a resounding, "yes".

I remember clearly (I was sitting in exactly the same position as I am at this second) turning to Sally and saying, "Sod it, shall we just go next year?" I got a clear and resounding, "No". She was right because she had just started a year of maternity leave and we hadn't really saved much to help get us through that". I sulked for a little and then started selling it to her and she was clearly more interested than whenever I had mentioned 2021. One of her favourite sayings was, "I just can't get excited about something that may or may not happen in 4 years time".

That same day I got my bank card and just said, "sod it, we'll find a way". It was the 4th June so Benjamin was about 3 weeks old. I paid our deposit and it was game on. 7 nights at Saratoga Springs Resort in a deluxe Studio with the full Dining package.

I had been really undecided that whether to stay on site as I'd loved having a villa and a pool on previous trips. The dining plan was the main lure and I decided a split stay with 7 nights of each would suit us best. I had already spent weeks and weeks looking at villas on all the normal sites and had got well and truly confused

I now had to find a cheap villa to appease Sally that this was a smaller scale budget trip than the one we had talked about in 2021. That was to be three weeks including the yacht club and a few days at the coast. The same day I booked Disney I put a request on the villa section on The Dibb. I had already sent a few enquiries... some hadn't replied and some were unavailable. I had quite a few silly things that my villa had to have... a spa or hot tub, a nice view, at least two master bedrooms, a lanai, a barbeque and I can't even remember the specifics now. I initially got a very friendly reply from one but it was outside of the price range and so I thanked her and moved on. Anyway, within a couple of hours I decided I'd just have to up my budget (the start of a theme as I'm sure it is for most people) as the villa was ideal for us.

So I re-contacted Debra (Tetrarch on here) and booked Hibiscus Ridge for our 2nd week. I immediately felt at ease even just swapping emails with her. She is always posting on the Dibb Forums including loads of helpful advice especially regarding checks to make when booking villas. This and all the help and advice she offered me quickly made me decide that the extra budget (and bigger villa than we were initially looking at) was well worth it.

I think the villa looks gorgeous and I think we will be excited to leave the bubble to head here. I have pinched a few pictures from the villa website. There are 5 bedrooms, 2 living rooms, plenty of bathrooms and it had absolutely everything we wanted whilst looking out onto a golf course. It's in Highlands Reserve and in walking distance of Berry Town Centre so we may decide to wander out for dinner one night so we can have a drink.

So that was it. Within 24 hours we had our 2 week Disney only holiday booked for the 5 of us. We even got in for the $200 gift card promotion too. Just a few months to wait at this stage before we could look at flights. I had looked at Virgin fly drives through a few companies but I wasn't paying the prices they were offering.

[Milpston]

So having that all sorted I was soon back to work and was pleased to find that there was plenty of overtime available and I started grabbing every hour of it to start putting funds towards the holiday as soon as possible.

After a month of solid overtime I soon started thinking that it seemed a shame to only do two weeks having dragged the kids all the way across the Atlantic so I quickly looked to see if I could extend our stay at Hibiscus Ridge by another week. I was gutted to see that the following week had already been booked by some very unthoughtful person Undeterred I started hunting for another villa. This time I didn't restrict myself to 3 bedroom villas and soon came across Disney Sunset Villa and sent an enquiry to Geraldine (Asher on here). She was quick to respond and it was available. She kindly held the dates for me for a day or two so I could check Sally and I could get the extra time of work. On 14th July I confirmed the booking and paid another deposit. Disney Sunset Villa is a 5 bedroom villa with a lovely lake view at Sunset Lakes. I had been looking at Sunset Lakes a lot previously but hadn't found a smaller villa that ticked all my requirements. This one has a lovely Master bedroom and ensuite with door leading to the hot tub and pool. The second Master suite is directly above and has a balcony overlooking the lake. I think it will be an ideal retreat for Chloe if she has had enough of 24/7 with the Emma and Benjamin after the first two weeks.
Geraldine was really pleasant and easy to deal with. Also very helpful sending me loads of information on all things Florida. I don't believe all Dibb owners can be as helpful as the two I am dealing with. I just don't recall owners of the villas I have booked previously been just so friendly. It really makes a difference and puts your mind at ease when booking with them. I have sent them both daft questions at different stages and they have never been anything but friendly an helpful

I've struggled to get pictures of the villa from the website today but I have just found a couple on a different villa site they sell through.

Now we were talking. I was happy that we were now getting a three week holiday. The idea being that we would be able to take things at a much more sensible pace with the kids and have some pool days so that they (and we) don't get too grumpy by trying to do too much. It was just a waiting game for the flights to be released now.

[Milpston]

Over the following months I was constantly looking at Skyscanner, Kayak and reading all the cheap/glitch threads on The Dibb trying to get an idea of the best flights to get, I pretty much decided that I would like to book direct with an Airline and a Flydrive would probably be best for us. Car hire prices were coming out a lot more expensive than when I last hired a car in Florida. I pretty much ruled out Virgin as they were just coming out too expensive. I was hoping for a BA Flydrive and wanted a 7 seater as I just don't think anything smaller would give us enough room along with our luggage. I toyed with the idea of indirect as I know there can be significant cost savings. However, I decided that I just couldn't face it having two under 4's with us.

I believe our flights were released on 12th or 13th of November. I was sitting at work on a night shift going through the options. Direct LGW to MCO was just coming out really expensive. I had set a budget of around £3000 for the flights and car hire. From memory MCO was coming out at nearer to £4k. I had no issues with a fairly long drive but Heathrow - MIA direct wasn't giving any saving at all which came as a bit of a surprise. LGW-TPA was only marginally cheaper than MCO so I was a bit gutted. Eventually... it was a tough night at work... I looked at LGW --> TPA and then returning FLL ---> LGW. This was coming out more sensible so I contacted Geraldine and she had availability for us to extend our second villa stay to 8 nights. Annoyingly I just couldn't get to the booking page for this option on the BA website so I posted a question on The Dibb to see if anyone knew why. I rang BA the following day and got it all sorted by a lovely lady. She even asked me if I was on The Dibb as she said she had read my post... you never know who is watching!

So after a couple of calls it was all booked on 14th November and bang on the budget I had set. (annoyingly if I'd waited until the sale I would have saved about £200 hey ho).

Probably completely the wrong type of plane but you get the point!

We will be flying:

12/10/18 - 09:25 LGW arriving TPA at 13:50 (I think that flight time has changed marginally since but I can't put my hands on that email at the moment)
3/11/18 - 18:10 FLL arriving LGW at 06:50 on 04/11/18

I was able to go straight in and book our seats free of charge as we have an infant with us. After a bot of deliberation we have gone for two pairs at the back where there is no third seat. It may take us longer to get off but we think this will work well for us and are not expecting Tampa Airport to be too horrific at immigration... famous last words.

Included is a fully insured 'Chrysler Pacifica or similar'. I haven't decided what do about car seats yet but will probably just take them from Avis on arrival. Obviously we will be collecting the car at Tampa International and dropping it back at Fort Lauderdale International. I joined Avis preferred prior to booking. This reminds me that I still don't think it is showing on my Avis preferred account despite the number being provided at the time. Will have to look at that.

The drive down to Fort Lauderdale does not bother us. We wouldn't have planned a park on that last day so are quite happy with it. I have done the drive before and it was very straight forward. We are hoping to have lunch at the restaurant we ate on the first night of our honeymoon before heading to the airport.

So our 22 night trip is coming together nicely

[Milpston]

On 24th November we got our updated confirmation invoice from Disney for our SSR booking and our "Hooray your coming to Disney", email the following day so hat was that sorted. I also managed to link it all on the MDE so that was that sorted!

I had been planning on booking getting a taxi from Essex to Gatwick either on the morning of the flight or the night before so I started getting some quotes for the taxis. I was a bit concerned that we wouldn't get us and all the luggage in our car. When I saw how much the prices had gone up since we last did it I scrapped that idea!

I had been looking at Airport hotels but was struggling to find a hotel that would take the 5 of us in a room even though Benjamin is under 2. Eventually, on 19th December, I booked a family room at the Hilton in the South Terminal. I used our Tesco Club card vouchers and only had to add about £30 to it so that was a bit of a result. I had been trying to get parking and a hotel together but all the deals only seemed to include 14 nights parking so when adding on the extra week or so were coming out at not such a great deal.

Breakfast included so I'm hoping we will be able to do Twilight check in, have a nice early breakfast and then wander across to the airport nice and relaxed... yeah who am I trying to kid?

At this stage I couldn't help but think it was a shame to go to Florida for 22 nights and not see Universal. They were definitely my favourite parks last time I went. I saw the Hogsmeade area in 2011 and loved Forbidden Journey. I hadn't read the books or seen the films but watched them all when I got back. (Think I did it the wrong way round really). I've loved looking at the pictures of Diagon Alley and got to the stage I would avoid those days in trip reports knowing that I wouldn't be going. I had always thought we may squeeze in a day at Seaworld whilst we were out there as I think the kids would enjoy lots of the shows and marine attractions. I had been reading the through the tickets forum pretty regularly so on the Boxing Day sales I gave in to temptation and bought us Universal & SeaWorld switch tickets from Orlando Attraction Tickets. I think there was only about £10-20 each difference in paying on the gate for a day at SeaWorld to getting the 14 day passes for SeaWorld, Busch Gardens and Aquatica which includes free parking. At the moment I'm not planning on doing Busch Gardens or Aquatica it's cost me pretty much nothing to have them as an option.

So it looks like we will get to see this after all.

On 1st January I booked meet and greet parking from the Gatwick South Terminal. It cost £90.00 for 24 nights parking so I couldn't really be too upset with that. Chloe and Sally may be upset when they realise we may have to cut back on the luggage a bit to get it all down to Gatwick thought

My next little mad moment came on 16th January. The Dibb has a lot to answer for when it come to this holiday! I've added a night at the Hard Rock Hotel to get the fast passes. I got a reasonable deal booking it with BA. Can you tell this holiday has been pretty much designed by The Dibb?. Once I'd got Universal tickets it was a no brainer really. I know there's not too much for Emma and Benjamin at Universal so this was the only really fair way that Sally, Chloe and I could do some a fair few of the bigger rides whilst there. I am hoping by mid afternoon we can be back at the HRH pool for an hour or two. I toyed with club level but eventually decided we probably wouldn't get our money's worth from that. Chloe is delighted as she has fancied the HRH right from the start... probably knew I'd end up booking it too.

[Milpston]

Index

I had always had it in the back of my mind that we would take the kids for a beach day whilst in Florida. I had looked at various places such as Cocoa Beach, Daytona Beach, Anna Maria Island, Treasure Island, St Pete's Beach and Clearwater. Hotels all seem to be really expensive. On 27th January I had, what I hope will be, one of my last mad moments. I was laying in bed and found a sensible deal and I quickly swapped a couple of emails with the hotel and booked a night direct. It means we would have a week at Saratoga Springs, a week at Hibiscus Ridge with a night at HRH in the middle and finally 8 nights at Disney Sunset Villa with a night at the coast in the middle of that week. I had followed lots of threads on the Accommodation boards and when I asked about this hotel I got some really positive responses. So we will have one night at Opal Sands in Clearwater. All have private balconies that are Gulf facing so I think it will be really pleasant. I'm actually starting to think I should have booked a couple of nights but I'm trying to behave from now on!

I was always leaning towards Clearwater and am hoping to do a little trip on Little Toots whilst we are there to see the dolphins. A bit frustrating for my obsessive holiday planning side that they don't take bookings until a week before

So that was it. I thought I was pretty much done. I had been following along lots of threads on here re people still awaiting booking confirmations for SSR and OKW for stays not long after we would be there. I was secretly relieved that we had our booking confirmed way back in November. Then when I saw some were getting moved to the Beach Club and AKL was secretly a bit jealous but tried to ignore the thought. I had considered upgrading to AKL not long after I booked but decided in the end that it wasn't worth the extra. The Beach club was out of range so I hadn't even looked at it apart from pricing up Beach and Yacht club when thinking of 2021.

Well... on 2nd February I had just arrived at work for a 12 hour night shift, Just as I arrived I look and noticed an email on my phone from Disney. It stated that we could no longer be accommodated at SSR and we had been moved to a Royal room at POR with our full DDP at no extra charge, I was steaming! I quickly called Disney and they wee of little help. I told her that I wasn't happy and wouldn't be accepting a Moderate when we had booked a deluxe. They then said they'd have to contact another team...blah blah blah and call me back the following day. I put the phone down and slowly got more annoyed that they had just changed it without even calling me as I was aware that they had called others from threads on here. I then looked at MDE and it had already changed to POR. I tried to call back a few minutes later but they had closed. Nobody enjoyed working with me much that night! So when I got home I stayed up waiting for the phone lines to open again at 09:00 despite having to do another 12 hour night shift that night. I had posted on The Dibb to find out what others thought of the change I had received and everyone pretty much confirmed what I thought and that I hadn't done too well! So when I got through at 09:00 the lady asked me why I was calling as I had called the day before and it was in hand. She then went on to say the person dealing with it wasn't in for another couple of days and that no one from that team was in until 12:00 but there was no point in calling then because they would have to wait for an email back before I would get an answer. I politely informed her I would be calling at 12:00 on the dot to get it sorted out! I tried to get a bit of sleep but that never really happened. Then at about 11:30 I got a call from a lovely guy called Crosby. After a bit of a chat, and laughing at me when I suggested he Contemporary, he confirmed he could move me to the Beach Club. I had been looking at ADR's and telling Sally we had too many in the Epcot area. I was seriously happy and after showing Sally and Chloe Tim Tracker's tour of The Yacht and Beach Club done in January so were they. I have found me checking MDE regularly though to check there is no more surprises lurking!

So that's us pretty much up to date. It will now start with 7 nights at The Beach Club

The more thought I've given it since then the better it seems to feel. the location will just be awesome and opens up so many more options for splitting days in parks.

I am now working on and tweaking our daily plans. I have a very good idea of most of the ADR's I would like and will start looking closer at fastpasses after that. I sent of for a passport for Benjamin yesterday so as soon as that comes back I will sort our Estas... yes I know I should have done that already. I have holiday insurance which I already pay for quarterly but I have just notices Sally still has her maiden name on that so I will sort that in the next day or two.

I have ordered a Halifax Clarity card each which have arrived recently. I have always just taken everything in cash but think I should try and be a little more sensible this time. I managed to buy a second hand Babyjogger mini double on a local Facebook site for £50 which is in really good condition. I was going to hire one for about treble that from Kingdom Strollers but Sally said she really wanted one for the airports.

The only things that I can think of that I need to do is to upgrade our Disney Ultimate Tickets from 14 to 21 days. I'm also waiting for the tickets to be released for MNSSHP too. I wasn't going to do this but who knows if we will ever go back and if we do whether it will ever be at the same time of year!

I feel like I'm fairly well planned now so will have to wait and see what goes wrong

[Milpston]

So having started my Pre-trip report I found the motivation to call Disney this morning and upgrade my 14 day Ultimate tickets to 21 days. It's only taken me about 8 months to get round to it!

Well I'm glad I did. I was convinced it was £40 extra per ticket totalling £160 but called to find out it was only an extra £40 for all of us. My updated invoice arrived before I had put the phone down. Now to update my spreadsheet. I feel like I've just saved £120 by sitting on my bum this morning

[Gill247]

Yaye, excellent pre trip report, loved reading about all your plans coming together! Sounds like it will be an amazing holiday!

We fly from Gatwick the day before you.

I'm still not over the shock of being upgraded to Beach Club!

Would love to hear your ADR plans, think we need more for Epcot area now.

I'm also eagerly awaiting the release of MNSSHP tickets - any idea when this will be?

Happy Planning!

[Milpston]

Originally Posted by Gill247

Yaye, excellent pre trip report, loved reading about all your plans coming together! Sounds like it will be an amazing holiday!

We fly from Gatwick the day before you.

I'm still not over the shock of being upgraded to Beach Club!

Would love to hear your ADR plans, think we need more for Epcot area now.

I'm also eagerly awaiting the release of MNSSHP tickets - any idea when this will be?

Happy Planning!

See more...

Thank you and glad so many of us are so pleased with our upgrades! At the moment have 3 restaurants on our list for the Epcot area. The yachtsman steak house is a must try for us. We did have coral reef but friends of ours have kind of changed our minds and now thinking Garden Grill instead which seems to get good reviews. I had been thinking Teppan Edo for along time but I really don’t think Emma would end up eating anything there. We have Akershus Banqueting Hall on our current list too as a princess fix. All still subject to change but we have a list to work with! I think some snacks at the F&W festival will be worked through too!

The general consensus seems to be that the dates for MNSSHP will be released sometime in April and then the ticket will be available some time in May. It looks fairly easy to work out which nights the party will be running with the 6pm closures at MK. Not sure The Dibb park hours go to October yet but I have been working off the projected hours on Touring Plans.

[Milpston]

My sons passport has arrived and Estas all submitted and authorised. Another thing ticked off the list!

[Eccle]

It sounds like a great trip! We flew into Tampa just over two weeks ago and immigration was pretty quick to get through, much better than Orlando