"she twisted my arm" 2 weeks on site pre trippy. September 18. Update 7 added

[uncle buc]

Hi,

So this is my first attempt of a florida trip report. I've been looking at the boards for a while but more of a stalker behind a bush rather than committing myself to writing anything meaningful on here.

Anyway I'm going to use this opportunity to put my thoughts and memories out there in the hope it may 1) encourage people to give there advice and 2) have something to look back on when our memories start to fade and we can't remember what we did last week, let alone a holiday years in the past.

Anyway, so here goes...

So you'll want to know who's going on this trip won't you?

There's just the two of us so I'll keep it short and sweet. Plus I don't want to spoil you with our life stories so early into our journey together.

First of all there's the wife, Mrs C. Thirty going on twelve. To say she's a disney nut is like saying the cast of towie enjoy the occasional selfie! (A little pop culture there for you).
Works very hard in the city, and can often be seen propping up the bars in the surround streets of her office after five. It was her who first introduced me to florida and even convinced me to return. (Didn't take much). Back to Mrs C's disney obsession. She owns every single disney classic movie and watches them pretty much every weekend. Our car is either playing a disney cd when she picks me up or has disney on Bluetooth when I'm behind the wheel. She's constantly in the queue at kath kidson (I think that's her name) when her new range of the same old stuff is out and right now is trying to convince me to finance her collection of disney pandora.
All being said she's a top girl and the only person I'd like to go away with.

As for me, well I'm amazing!
Just kidding, I'm alright I suppose mid thirties work in London as well. Like a quiet life so often agree with what ever the wife wants. (Am I right guys?) I'm a real nfl nut so take the opportunity to watch it whenever we can.

We've been married for 5 years and together for 11. I'll house often accommodates our friends on weekends and that's something we love doing. I'm sure as life moves on our circumstances will change but as for right now things are good.

So this trip of ours.

So at present all we have booked is 2 weeks at all (****SEE UPDATE LATER DATED 13/05/18****) We booked it in April so managed to swag the ddp in with the price. Never stayed on site before. Either done a condo or hotels in the past. We are planning to stay on I drive for 5 nights before disney to get universal done and also make use of the local eating and drinking establishments (when in rome).
Up next to book are flights, car, universal tickets and I drive hotel. I'll update once this is done.
I'm also keeping an eye out for next year's nfl fixtures to see if I can catch a couple of bucs games. That's if the boss says it's ok. I'm sure I can bribe her with a mouse shaped present of some type.

Anyway thanks for reading. I hope to update this soon and I am looking forward to writing my first full report soon.

Stay happy.

Update 1

After much searching, we've decided on flying with BA and went with a fly drive package.
So we're flying from gatwick to MCO then have 19 days full size car hire with Avis before returning home. We went for the later flight home (19:55) so we don't have to rush to the airport.

Prices are not as cheap as the budget airlines or going indirect but we've got enough time to pay it off and hey, we'll be on holiday!

Still looking at options for our 5 nights before AKL and swaying towards a hotel on I drive. Watch this space!

Stay Happy

UPDATE 2

Today we booked our hotel for the IDrive portion of our trip.

We are staying 5 nights at the Embassy Suites on Jamaican Court. Its a short journey to Universal and offers free shuttles which i'm sure we'll take advantage of (the parking charges at universal annoy us).

More importantly this hotel offers free breakfast and free drinks between 5pm and 7pm. This is probably the only way I'm dragging Mrs C from the parks!

So our basic itinerary now looks like this.

Day 1 Arrival from Gatwick to MCO via BA Flight (fly drive)
Day 1 to 6 Stay at Embassy Suites visiting Universal Sea World and Busch Gardens. Hopefully Catch a Bucs game on sunday if they are at home.
Day 6 to 19 Staying at Animal Kingdom Lodge where Mrs C will get her Disney on... (i'll be awkwardly standing in the background with a camera, Think american beauty camera guy if you've seen it)

Still loads more to organise in between but at least we now have somewhere to stay throughout the trip.

I'll of course update the report once we've added more plans to our trip.

Thanks for reading

Stay Happy

Update 3

So today we paid off our Disney Balance. Mrs C got very emotional speaking to the guy on the phone when she got to speak about the plans she has already made.

Speaking of that, we have just past our 180 days mark now and already booked the restaurants to use up all of our credits. The table service restaurants we have booked are;

Ohana
Be our Guest (lunch)
Garden Grill
Hoop-de-doo review
Calafornia Grill
The Edison
Sci-Fi Dine Inn
Tepanedo
Boma and Sanna (our home resort is Animal Kingdom Lodge)
Via Napoli
Liberty Tree Tavern
Skipper Canteen
Yak and Yeti

I know its a bit early to book restaurants 6 months in advance but Mrs C was itching to do something, so we thought what the hell. So by watching countless You Tube videos by DFB and the DIS we finally came up with our top choices.

Still loads to arrange but we’re getting ever closer…..

Update 4
So today we sat down and decided to pay everything off so that we knew exactly what we would have left in the beer (me) / disney march (mrs C) slush fund.

First thing first were the flights. Balance paid off with BA plus the hire car.

Then i called attraction tickets direct and purchased the 3 park Universal Tickets and also the BOGOF Halloween Horror Night Tickets which i'm really looking forward to, not so much Mrs C! The lady at Attraction Tickets was almost as excited as us and i can't recommend their service enough.

Then i got on to the Esta site and renewed them. Only to be told on the site that our applications were pending rather than authorised. Cue panic googling and "oh my god we should have done this before we paid for everything" even though we answered No to all the "have you ever been a naughty boy?" questions.

It turns out that after pressing the refresh button on the page, the status changed to authorised. Heart rate has now only just returned to normal.

5 months to go now and it's starting for feel just around the corner.

Hope to update you guys soon.

Stay Happy
Update 5
So pretty eventful day today.

We pretty much changed two weeks of our trip, thanks to the good people at WDW holidays. Long story short, a week ago we received an email stating the pool at AKL was to be closed during our trip for construction updates. This was a huge disappointment to us and one which put a bit of a downer on our impending holiday.

We spent the next week reading the Dibb and wondering what we were going to do. fast forward to today and after a very short call to WDW we were able to be switched to the same class room at the Boardwalk Inn for no additional cost.

Although we were sad not to be going to AKL, i think this is the best option for us.

Time to start researching and seeing what the Boardwalk has to offer.

Stay happy.

Update 6
We're at the 100 day Mark today! "It's all plain sailing from here kid".

We've just booked the Gatwick Hilton for the night before we fly. This was a last minute decision (well 3 months out), but we've decided to check in the night before and then not worry about having to be there 3 hours early on the day.

The Hilton is at the front doors to the terminal so we've also made the economical decision not to bring the motor and use the train instead. Saves us a few pennies and also does our bit for the old carbon footprint I guess.

We'll be interesting dragging our cases through central London but hey, good things don't come easy and all that.

We've also not decided on our hhn dates which may involve us driving straight there from the airport. Nuts I know but hey we might as well try to hit the ground running. And I'm sure they'll be lots of running once Mrs C hits the scare zones.

That's it for an update right now. Hope you all are getting everything you need sorted.

Stay happy

Update 7

Fast pass Day!

The responsibility of the FPs fell to me as Mrs c was at a hen weekend. Armed with orders from above i set about snaring all of the rides I was assigned to. I'm pleased to announce that I achieved my objective and 14 days of parks now have 3 FPs sorted.

It's now getting even closer.

Stay happy

[Mary A]

Welcome to the DIBB

[loves2plan]

Welcome! Look forward to reading along 😊

[uncle buc]

After much searching, we've decided on flying with BA and went with a fly drive package.
So we're flying from gatwick to MCO then have 19 days full size car hire with Avis before returning home. We went for the later flight home (19:55) so we don't have to rush to the airport.

Prices are not as cheap as the budget airlines or going indirect but we've got enough time to pay it off and hey, we'll be on holiday!

Still looking at options for our 5 nights before AKL and swaying towards a hotel on I drive. Watch this space!

Stay Happy

[eleele]

Hi. I like your writing style and your attitude . Looking forward to reading more updates.

[uncle buc]

UPDATE

Today we booked our hotel for the IDrive portion of our trip.

We are staying 5 nights at the Embassy Suites on Jamaican Court. Its a short journey to Universal and offers free shuttles which i'm sure we'll take advantage of (the parking charges at universal annoy us).

More importantly this hotel offers free breakfast and free drinks between 5pm and 7pm. This is probably the only way I'm dragging Mrs C from the parks!

So our basic itinerary now looks like this.

Day 1 Arrival from Gatwick to MCO via BA Flight (fly drive)
Day 1 to 6 Stay at Embassy Suites visiting Universal Sea World and Busch Gardens. Hopefully Catch a Bucs game on sunday if they are at home.
Day 6 to 19 Staying at Animal Kingdom Lodge where Mrs C will get her Disney on... (i'll be awkwardly standing in the background with a camera, Think american beauty camera guy if you've seen it)

Still loads more to organise in between but at least we now have somewhere to stay throughout the trip.

I'll of course update the report once we've added more plans to our trip.

Thanks for reading

Stay Happy.

[Goldia]

Ooh Embassy Sweets sounds like a good choice, free breakfast and free drinks! You've done well with the organising so far, are you planning on doing MNSSHP or HHN?

[uncle buc]

Originally Posted by Goldia

Ooh Embassy Sweets sounds like a good choice, free breakfast and free drinks! You've done well with the organising so far, are you planning on doing MNSSHP or HHN?

See more...

Yes thats the plan, we did both on our last visit in 2014 and had a great time. We were split with who enjoyed which the most. My OH was obviously the bigger mnsshp fan and she struggled abit with some of the houses (mainly Clowns) at hhn electing to wait outside for me. We had express so she didnt wait too long. Put her near a beer tent and she's golden anyway.

This trip Mrs C is planning on dressing us both up for mnsshp. Not my cup of tea but when in rome.

[Goldia]

Originally Posted by uncle buc

Yes thats the plan, we did both on our last visit in 2014 and had a great time. We were split with who enjoyed which the most. My OH was obviously the bigger mnsshp fan and she struggled abit with some of the houses (mainly Clowns) at hhn electing to wait outside for me. We had express so she didnt wait too long. Put her near a beer tent and she's golden anyway.

This trip Mrs C is planning on dressing us both up for mnsshp. Not my cup of tea but when in rome.

See more...

Haha looking forward to the outfits. I hope they are matching.

I'm not that keen on masks, or horror in fact, so the idea of HHN doesn't appeal so much, but propping up the bar is right up my alley!

[Bianca]

Originally Posted by uncle buc

...in the queue at kath kidson (I think that's her name) when her new range of the same old stuff is out...

See more...

LOL

Two weeks in AKL in April sounds fab!

Happy Planning! And Welcome to The Dibb.