The Back, Sack and Hijack Tour 05/06 - Day Fifteen Thursday 12th Jan 06

[mkingdon]

Introduction
Day One 29th December
Day Two 30th December
Day Three 31st Dec
Day Four 1st Jan 2006
Day Five 2nd Jan 06
Day Six Jan 3rd 2006
Day Seven 4th Jan 2006
Day Eight Jan 5th 2006
Day Nine 6th Jan 2006
Day Ten Saturday 7th Jan
Day Eleven Sunday 8th Jan
Day Twelve Monday 9th Jan
Day Thirteen Tuesday 10th Jan
Day Fourteen 11th Jan 2006

So we are at the end of another trip to Florida. Today, we wake to the prospect of nothing but hassle and travelling, and once this day dawns we just want to be home.

I have made no notes at all about today, as I just can’t bring myself to do so.

So from memory here is what we did.

We were all up early today as he knew we had to finish the packing…even I helped. It was quite a painless experience having bought a new bag, but it still resulted in a lot of running around and packing twice as much as we brought with us.

We say goodbye to the neighbours, and exchange e-mail addresses. We also leave them with the contents of our fridge. They may never need to buy a donut again!

We load the car up, and play the, "which way round do the cases have to go before I can shut the boot" game for a while, but finally, I lock up the house for the last time, and we pull away.

I drive, despite the tears, up to the 192 and Sherbeth. We’re going to take advantage of the TCD advance check in thing, although none of us are sure where that actually is. We think it’s at the Premium Outlet at LBV so set off for that.

Luckily we’d guessed right, and we find the “gift shop”, which I find a bit strange, where you check in. There is no queue at all, and we are quickly checked in and free of cases. The paying for this take twice as long as the doing it, and whilst I’m at it I book us all into the Guest House.

I consider trying to do a deal with them. I wonder if they do half price deals if you book again before you leave. I suspect Louise would have my nuts for earrings so I leave it.

Back into the car, and we stop at the Gap store as Mum & Dad want to exchange some stuff they bought earlier. We wait in the car to my delight.

One massive benefit of dumping the cases is that now we have nowhere to put any more shopping! Thank you TCD.

Enough messing about now, it’s time to eat. We drive north up the 535 towards DTD. The decision is Sizzlers for an all you can eat. Oh not again, I complain!

It’s quiet in there, and we lay waste to the buffet in no time at all. I make an extra special “last day” effort, and extend the boundaries of the all you can eat concept. I am one muffin away from making a mess of “what I’m traveling in”.

So, fed and full, we drive down the 535 to the Walmart there, as we want to exchange some clothes we bought earlier in the trip. We do that painlessly, and then drive back up the 535 to DTD. Rebecca wants to do Disney Quest one last time, so we let Mum and Dad go shopping and we head for some last minute fun.

It is SO quiet in here today. Everything is a walk on and we get loads done. Of course we do the “tumble drier” again (Cyber Space Mountain), and we have all the video games at our disposal which is great. If only I were allowed to play them! :angry:

After a while, we somehow get split up, and me and Emily find ourselves scouring the place for Louise and Rebecca. I suspect they were doing exactly the same at the same time, just on different floors!

Eventually we decide to walk outside and see if they are there. They are not. We are due to meet up with Mum and Dad soon so we guess they have already set off to do that. We buy a water as we walk up to the “Soap and Poncy Powder” shop to meet up.

Just as we do that we spot Louise and Rebecca walking up behind us.

1. It’s all my fault we got split up
2. Why didn’t we look for them
3. Why didn’t we wait
4. Louise had no money to buy a drink and they are both thirsty
5. We are late for meeting up with Mum & Dad

My “it’s your fault” list now complete, we walk on.

The weather is fantastic today and we gloomily comment about the weather we will be going back to. It’s quite a long hot walk, and as we are passing the car the girls go straight to it, and I walk on to collect Mum & Dad.

We wander back to the car park and find the rest of the party wandering around looking for our car. That’s my fault too, as I should have either

1. Parked somewhere more obvious
2. Hired a bright yellow car

Time to head for the airport now. As we leave DTD the petrol light comes on. We’d agreed to take the car back empty so this would be a test of my nerves.

The I4 is quiet, but the journey back to the airport is always longer than the one coming. I check the petrol gauge, hmm, about every 5 seconds, and flip between definitely having to put some petrol in and being absolutely fine.

This is probably the longest car journey of my life. We finally get to the Sanford exit, and I think we’ll make it. It says 8 miles to the airport…no problem.

Turns out it is now time for schools to empty their kids all over the road. We hit every red light going and I age about 10 years in that last 8 miles.

Somehow, on a wing and a prayer we make it back to Dollar, and quickly turn the engine off.

Having already checked in we’re straight through to departures and into the Guest House. We get drinks and snacks, I play the PS2 for a bit and then we get some food from the food court. Not much choice and pricey, but hey, it’s an airport.

We do some shopping around the departure lounge and stock up on books, magazines and sweets and soon it’s time to board.

I take one last photo.



Emily shows she does not want to go home.



We join the line to board the plane, and we are in sight of the plane door when Louise asks where the green flight bag is?

Having got Ryan on my back, and several more bags in both hands I give her “it’s up my backside” look. A couple of broken ribs later, and I’m fighting my way back up the queue. As I reach the top, airport staff are going through our bag, looking for explosives!

I claim it, and they know it’s mine as it has our Discovery Cove photo in it. There you go Mr. Addams, he says!

I don’t have the time or energy to punch his lights out.

Onto the plane, and somehow the next 8 hours go by without too much incident. Yes, we’re tired, and uncomfortable, and we don’t get much sleep…but somehow we land, and we’re home.

Oh I forgot, there was one incident.

Not long into the flight, just across from us on the middle seats, some kids were messing about, and a lady who I presumed to be their Mum turns round and gives them a right rollocking for kicking her seat. They stop.

Moments later, a lady, well, a chav, gets up from not far away and basically offers the first lady outside. The first lady points out that might be dangerous, but the chav is not for backing down. Apparently these kids belonged to the chav, and thought it out of order that someone else told them to stop kicking seven bells out of her seat.

Chav tells her kids to carry on doing that as much as they like all the way home.

So the chav tells the first lady that as soon as we land, she’s “going to get it”. Ah, us Brits can be wonderful.

That never happened as far as we could tell, and we go to pick up our cases.

The baggage reclaim hall is under development, and is half the size it should be. So we find around 500 people stood around a tiny carousel, eight deep, trying to pull cases past each other. This results in dead legs, black eyes and frayed tempers…and that’s just me!

Our cases take an absolute age to appear…must be 40 minutes.

Cold, tired and hungry (of course) we wander out for our taxi, having called him 40 minutes ago when we landed.

Of course he isn’t there and an irate call and some more waiting see him appear with some apologies.

The drive home is depressing. The UK looks dirty, grey and cold…well it is! It is almost as if the US is in colour and now we’re black and white.

For the first time, I’ve not really missed anything about the UK, and I feel more than comfortable in the US. Thoughts of moving over there are in my mind. I dismiss them as post holiday blues, but weeks on now, and they still remain. You never know.

So we get home, turn the heating up to Full plus ten, attack the post and generally don’t know what to do with ourselves.

We go to bed for a bit and gradually find our way back to reality.

So another trip is done. It’s been a good one, and a different one, being at xmas, but also as it included a major crime incident and of course a medical procedure (actually that isn’t different at all).

Within a week, we’ve booked to go again. Of course, we can’t afford it, we never can, but we will. Why do we keep going back when we should be doing other things with our credit rating?

Well, to me, of course on the surface we (I) love the place, for its entertainment, weather, customer service and general good feeling.

On a more serious level (for once), I know that when the girls are older, and off to Kavos with some Herbert called Jordan (sorry to all parents of Jordan’s but half of Emily’s class are called Jordan it seems), I know that I will treasure these weeks we’ve spent together in WDW.

It’s pure quality time…time when we don’t have to rip the girls out of bed to get to school, time when we don’t have to worry if we can afford this or that…time when we are all together for longer than the hour or two each evening if we’re lucky.

I also know that when I am the Grandad, and we’re going to WDW with our girl’s girls/boys, our two will remember their Dad’s obsession with WDW, and the magical times we spent there when they were still kids, when life hadn’t confused them yet, and everything was simple.

That’s what WDW is to me, a magical place, for me and my family to remember how to have fun, sod the bank manger, the diet and the jobs, and enjoy each other and the wonderful experiences it has to offer.

I hope that the kids indulge their Dad for as long as they can, and keep agreeing to go back to WDW for a little bit more.

Roll on August.

Thank you to all those who have read these reports. Your nice comments are greatly appreciated. I would have liked (as always) to spend more time on them, but work, and this time, Louise being in hospital for the last two weeks following a planned operation, have cut short the amount of time, concentration and effort I would like to have given them. They feel a little rushed this time to be honest.

I do play to the audience (as you may have guessed), so thank you for putting up with my childish humour, and hearing the same jokes in each report!

I do enjoy writing these, and every now and again, I read them all. What a wonderful way to bring back the memories of previous trips, so thank you to the Dibb for giving me somewhere to keep them, and thank you for indulging my indulgences.

Until August...

Thanks

Craig.

[Guest]

Great timing - I just clicked on new posts for a last time before going to bed and got to be first to read your report! Thanks for taking the time to write your reports I've really enjoyed reading about your family - I feel like I know them all! - and your holiday. You have kept me entertained the last couple of weeks and I will look forward to the next lot in due course.

Sorry to hear Louise (first name terms see!) has been in hospital, I wish her a speedy recovery.

Love
SusieK

[Taggie]

Wow Craig, that was just amazing, I could really feel the sadness in your last day report
Your reports have been excellent, they all have real feeling to them, a feeling that we are there with you enjoying all the ups and commiserating the downs. I shall really miss not having them to read before bed anymore. I am so glad you spent the time on them and wish that mine where nearly 1/2 as good as yours.

Thanks for sharing your trip with us and hope that Louise is okay.

Look forward in anticipation for when you come back from your next trip

[Guest]

What am I going to do for nightly entertainment now!

Really enjoyed every one of your reports (again) Craig. I will be watching your countdown for the next lot now as well as my own. Thanks for all your efforts in writing them.

All the best to Louise.

[Guest]

Thanks for these, Craig. I've really enjoyed following you around on your holiday. Roll on August when you have some more trippies to write!

[Guest]

Thank you for sharing, i have enjoyed reading your trip reports so much, made me laugh out loud so many times hope louise recovers quickly

[Cinders Mum]

Craig, you are spot on with your comments on going back, this is our philosophy too ...

Hope Louise is on the mend and able to keep you in check very soon

thanks for taking time out to share with us ... it's been a great journey roll on the summer !

[Guest]

aaawwwww- I felt quite emotional reading that!

Glad you had a great time and thanks for the very entertaining reports.

[Dizzy]

Originally Posted by mkingdon

Well, to me, of course on the surface we (I) love the place, for its entertainment, weather, customer service and general good feeling.

On a more serious level (for once), I know that when the girls are older, and off to Kavos with some Herbert called Jordan (sorry to all parents of Jordan’s but half of Emily’s class are called Jordan it seems), I know that I will treasure these weeks we’ve spent together in WDW.

It’s pure quality time…time when we don’t have to rip the girls out of bed to get to school, time when we don’t have to worry if we can afford this or that…time when we are all together for longer than the hour or two each evening if we’re lucky.

I also know that when I am the Grandad, and we’re going to WDW with our girl’s girls/boys, our two will remember their Dad’s obsession with WDW, and the magical times we spent there when they were still kids, when life hadn’t confused them yet, and everything was simple.

That’s what WDW is to me, a magical place, for me and my family to remember how to have fun, sod the bank manger, the diet and the jobs, and enjoy each other and the wonderful experiences it has to offer.

I hope that the kids indulge their Dad for as long as they can, and keep agreeing to go back to WDW for a little bit more.

Thank you to all those who have read these reports. Your nice comments are greatly appreciated. I would have liked (as always) to spend more time on them, but work, and this time, Louise being in hospital for the last two weeks following a planned operation, have cut short the amount of time, concentration and effort I would like to have given them. They feel a little rushed this time to be honest.

I do play to the audience (as you may have guessed), so thank you for putting up with my childish humour, and hearing the same jokes in each report!

I do enjoy writing these, and every now and again, I read them all. What a wonderful way to bring back the memories of previous trips, so thank you to the Dibb for giving me somewhere to keep them, and thank you for indulging my indulgences.

See more...

Craig, this part has reduced me to tears. I think you have managed to actually put into words what most of us feel... beautiful.
I think writing my trippies helped keep our holiday alive a bit longer and I was so sad when I finished writing them. Thank you for your memories, it has been a magical (and hilarious ) read.

Hope Louise is well on the way to recovery.

Looking forward to your next set of trippies which should hopefully be completed just before our next trip

Thanks again.

[lthewliss]

Well, I was going to say everything the others have said already - am getting all teary! Loved the reports, they're fab. Hope Louise is doing welll, and love to the kids - and looking forward to your next holiday!