Mardi Gras Madness - A week at Universal - Feb 2020 - Travel Day

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Mardi Gras Madness - A week at Universal - Feb 2020 - Travel Day 08.02.20.


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The holiday just crept up on us really under the circumstances but it was great to have a break and some well-deserved family time. I have, however, learned from this that I do not need to spend hours planning my outfits, I can just pick stuff I like and throw it in the case, life changing!

For once I wasn’t up half the night before doing last minute packing but we were still reluctant to get up at 5am this morning!

The roads were super quiet and even though we set off later than planned it only took about 25 minutes to the airport car park. It was freezing and windy (the first day of storm Ciara), so luckily a shuttle bus waited for us and we were straight to the airport with no waiting around in the cold.

There was no line at the Aer Lingus check in. We are normally BA and it’s often fairly packed and I’m sure we are still scarred from the year we waited over an hour and half just to bag drop and almost missed our first flight.

Security was the same, no line at all, so all very quick and efficient.

We just headed to Costa for a quick breakfast this morning in the airport.

Rolls with sausage for me and ds and a cheese and ham toastier for Dh. Coconut latte for me, loving lattes way more without the dairy. Raspberry Pepsi for ds and Dh.

Good start of a breakfast.

The Aer Lingus plane to Dublin was one of the tiny propeller ones, I think Ds was a bit surprised at its appearance. It was a really quick flight.

When we arrived, we came in and headed to Flight connections. As we came out the American pre-clearance was just there but we opted to have a wee wander around before heading through. We landed at 9.30 and I’d booked 51st and Green for 11am and you could stay for 3 hours so we were not in a rush. There was not really much to explore at Dublin airport.

When we headed back to pre-clearance it was not an issue that our flight had not been called to go through. They check your passports and boarding passes and then go through a hand luggage check. After that we joined the immigration line and we were in line less than 10 minutes. The officer was pleasant and asked a few general questions, I noticed our cases were on a monitor but we were not asked to identify them.

There certainly didn’t appear to be much through in this area. We headed straight to the lounge and checked in about 5 minutes before our time.

We went back and forth a bit about booking this but decided the night before to go ahead and book this as we had over 5 hours between flights. We could have booked a later domestic flight but it’s always good to have plenty time just in case. It was €35 each.

When we arrived they were serving breakfast. Offerings were tater tots, sausages, scrambled egg, beans, porridge, fruit, pastries and scones.

There were fizzy drinks, fruit juices, different waters and a coffee bar.

Here’s some breakfast plates.

The lounge switched over to lunch options around 12pm.

There were soups, spiced butternut squash and I think leek and potato. A beef curry, naan breads, rice and veggie pakora. Pastrami, cheese, salmon, salads, breads and crackers. Plus some sweet treats.

We picked at a variety of different plates, sampling most of what they had between the 3 of us.

It was lovely in here with views over the runway, ds thought it was all quite posh. The selection of food and drinks was good, the seats were comfy and we spent our 3 hours sitting comfortably, eating, drinking, watching the planes, chatting and playing on our phones. We didn’t opt to have much alcohol, dh had 2 bottles of beer and I had a glass of wine but you could have had more.

If we were heading out via Dublin again and time to kill, I’d definitely book 51st and Green again without hesitation.

We didn’t have long to wait once we left until they started boarding the plane, once all the special people had boarded, they started loading from the back which suited us as we were fairly close to the back. We had booked 2 at the window and one across the aisle, there must have been something happened at check in as a few of the back rows were wrong with people swapped about, the passengers just sorted it amongst themselves.

The IFE was pretty good with a massive choice of movies, DH’s earphone socket wasn’t working properly so he felt it was too annoying to watch films. I watched the Joker, man that was intense, I can’t decide if I liked it or not. DS who only loves flying because he gets to watch masses of movies watched Gemini Man, Hobbs and Shaw, Maleficent and some of an Iron Man film. No sleep of course despite my moaning so he was a grump.

I was a bit unsure of food options on Aer Lingus, I did see that you could pay to upgrade your meal and a lot of people around us had done so, it was fairly pricey and I’d already booked the lounge so I didn’t really think it was worth it for us, the paid options did look far better though and had proper cutlery.

Soft drinks were served fairly quickly with the lovely little pretzel snack that lets you know you are on holiday. Only 1 drinks service apart from water and tea and coffee with the food.

Those that had paid to upgrade were served a while before anyone else. Options for those just having the basic food were chicken in a pepper sauce or beef bolognese. Dh and I had the chicken, ds didn’t have anything but just asked for a Fanta.

The french pasta salad was inoffensive but didn’t taste really of anything. The chicken was ok in texture but I wouldn’t have called it a pepper sauce, again not much of a taste, Dh thought I was being a bit harsh. There was soda bread and a lemon mousse. I liked the pudding. As I was fairly full from all the lounge eats it wasn’t really an issue.

They brought little tubs of vanilla ice cream, this was nice.

Not long to go they brought Chicken Tikka calzone, interesting and not too bad. At this point all the lights were off the window blinds down and the seatbelt signs were on, as they were coincidently for every food service.

Was I impressed with Aer Lingus food options, not really, but I know I could have paid for better.

The flight itself was fine, it was the day of storm Ciara, the pilot took a different route and we ended up all the way up at the tip of Greenland.

It was a strange route and took 9 and a half hours but the flight itself didn’t have too much turbulence. The seatbelt signs were on fairly regularly and seemed to coincide a lot with food or drink service and I was fairly surprised that loads of people just tended to ignore them and wander to the toilet anyway. They did ask for the window blinds to be put down about half way through the flight as well.

When we landed, we taxied for ages, I don’t know if this was because we were a little late. The best thing about the Aer Lingus flight though was getting off the plane and bypassing immigration. You arrived straight at the monorail which we were on at 8.05pm.

A quick walk through to the luggage carousels, minimal wait for the luggage and then straight outside to get picked up.

We arrived at Aventura, checked in and were in our room just before 9pm. The last time stayed we had managed to get an upgrade toa skyline floor and ended up with a view of Volcano Bay, this time we were on the 6th floor which we were all happy with as it was high enough to avoid noise and you could still see loads.

I really like the rooms at Aventura, the full length windows make it feel way bigger than it is. It has everything you need, the beds are really comfy, the shower is great and huge. Loads of charging points and the Ipad thing is cool. The other thing I really like about this hotel is how compact it is, your room is only minutes from any part of the hotel you want to go to.

Although it wasn’t really that late in Florida time, we were exhausted so we were not up for wandering anywhere other than the hotel. I might have fancied a drink up in Bar 17 but it was closed for a private event so we settled for Urban Pantry.

I really like all the choices they have here and the fact it is all made fresh to order. We settled for sharing a couple of pizzas. Pepperoni and a meat lovers, a sprite and a Fanta, all to share between the 3 of us $36 after 10% pass holder discount.

It was just what we needed, I grabbed a mango and dragonfruit refresher from Satrbucks as well and we had a wee wander round to show DH where everything was.

We unpacked, while ds watched impractical jokers, I swear it has its own channel there and went to bed shattered but excited for the next day and Mardi Gras!

[Goldia]

You just threw things in a case what is this madness? No outfit planning I'm not sure I like this new idea sounds like a less stressful build up to the travel day though.

Ha ha, Max loves that stupid tv show too. Honestly, they are fully grown men

[4fromsuffolk]

Your DS is looking so grown up. My two Ds’s also love Impractical Jokers 😱.

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by Goldia

You just threw things in a case what is this madness? No outfit planning I'm not sure I like this new idea sounds like a less stressful build up to the travel day though.

Ha ha, Max loves that stupid tv show too. Honestly, they are fully grown men

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Well lets not get too carried away, Universal is obviously easier to pack for than Disney... You only take about 5 outfits (very jealous of your willpower as you know) so ypu can probbly still pack way faster than me.

I can manage an episode or 2 of Impractical Jokers at a time but Ds would watch it all day everyday, sure its channel 72 if you are staying at Universal in the summer.

Originally Posted by 4fromsuffolk

Your DS is looking so grown up. My two Ds’s also love Impractical Jokers 😱.

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Thanks, he is so tall and will soon be outgrowing Dh as well. He looks grown up but we are firmly back in the toddler years with the lack of listening

Have you seen the Impractical Jokers episode at Universal?

[dozy]

Looks fab. Def following

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by dozy

Looks fab. Def following

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Thank you

[4fromsuffolk]

No, we haven’t seen IJ at Universal. I will mention it to them and we can look out for that episode! 😱

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by 4fromsuffolk

No, we haven’t seen IJ at Universal. I will mention it to them and we can look out for that episode! 😱

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Just because you obviously need another episode to watch 😂

[mick]

A good travel day your room looks nice

Joan

[Rescuer]

Originally Posted by mick

A good travel day your room looks nice

Joan

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Thanks. I think Aventura is great for the price.