It's A Magic Cruising Christmas 2015 - Travel Day

[debidee]

So here we are it's finally travel day - hope you all had a lovely Christmas and Santa was good to you all!
We left home at just after 9am and arrived shortly after 10am at T3 Heathrow, after 3 loops of the terminal to find the valet drop off we were final on our way...
I was disappointed we weren't flying from T5 which is normally where all BA flights depart from, but apparently now Miami flights leave from here...

We had been talking on the way to the airport how maybe we should upgrade to Club from Premium Economy as it was a pretty long flight at just under 10 hours... we set ourselves a budget of £500 each and crossed our fingers walking over to bag drop. We had club for the way home but at the time of booking decided it wasn't worth it... now it felt very worth it lol!
Well as we arrived at the desk there were a family next to us listening in on my conversation as I enquired about upgrading, after a phone call she said it would be £649 each... I know we said £500 limit but sod it - it's Christmas! Well this woman then started raising her voice saying she wanted to upgrade and was told she couldn't, she had apparently booked 2 seats for her kids in economy and 2 seats in premium for her and her husband (I'm not judging ;-)) - she wanted to give her kids the premium and now take business class - she was kicking off saying she was here before us and the seats were hers blah blah blah...
We proceeded to bag drop and were told to go to customer service to pay much to this woman's disgust who was now demanding to see a manager...
We dashed over and paid quickly before the manager arrived and quickly made our way through fast track only glancing behind to see them still arguing at check in!
Ah well who knows what happened - maybe my silver status fairy godmother was looking down on us!

As we made it into the main terminal area it was heaving - I think it might be one of the busiest days for travel. Most seats were occupied and so we looked around for somewhere to get breakfast

We queued at The Bridge and it didn't take too long to be seated, Jez had a full breakfast and I had scrambled eggs. The food was pretty good - I especially liked the fact they had marmite on each table which IMO is a lovely combo with scrambled eggs! It was £27 including tip

So after breakfast Jez headed off to the lounge and obviously ;-) I went shopping! 1st up was Zara and it had a half price sale in and combined with duty free prices they were almost giving the stock away...
I got these beautiful earrings - I love how 1 is a cuff and well the other isn't! This set was just £6.66

Next up is this super super snuggly blanket style scarf - it's so soft and was perfect on the flight, even though I had a duvet I still get cold so this was amazing. It was £16.66

This jumper is really soft and I love the really deep v at the back - I'm thinking with skinny jeans and heels it will look really nice - this was £13.33

A really basic t-shirt - I like the back being slightly dipped and this was a steal at £3.33

Final purchase is this beautiful double layer blouse t-shirt, I might even wear this tomorrow to board the boat! So keep an eye out for its debut appearance! This was £16.66

Very pleased with my mini haul I next wandered over to Mac - I wanted a couple of deeper / winter lipstick shades and I really wanted them in creme sheen as opposed to Matt which is pretty drying on the lips - I picked 'hang up' and 'brave red' These were £13.15 each

Enough shopping so apart from a couple of magazines from WH Smiths I headed to the lounge to meet Jez. I have to say this lounge is pretty small and not a patch on the ones at T5... Ah well the glass of something bubbly helped

Whilst I sipped my fizzy I gave Jez another Christmas surprise - 2 more travel adapters - you can see he is thrilled!

After an hour or so we made our way to gate 42 - which happens to be the furthest gate in T3 grrrrr
On board and seated one behind the other in 13G and 14G. This will do nicely for the next 9+ hours!

A little goodie bag of Elemis products with a lip balm, hand cream and moisturiser was waiting for me :-)

I settled down to watch a selection of YouTube videos I had been saving over the last couple of weeks - mostly on shopping / beauty hauls... nothing like last minute inspiration :-)
I really recommend downloading a YouTube player especially if you don't fancy any of the films... or like me have seen most of them!

Someone forgot to take photos of their lunch... you would think by now it would be natural lol! So here is what I had... to start it was a goats cheese and butternut squash salad plus another salad! And then I had the steak and risotto, both we yummy and nice to have on proper plates! Dessert was either cheese or chocolate cake, I was already feeling like Minnie Mouse with the amount of cheese I had eaten lately so went for the chocolate cake. It was so rich I only managed 1/2 of it!

After dinner I watched a film - it was Aloha with Emma Stone and Bradley Cooper, it was fab a bit of a tear jerker but good to take away a couple of hours... thumbs up and worth a watch

Now it was time to snooze - still had 5.5 hours to go and last night I didn't sleep well so made use of the flat bed! After my 3 hour little sleep I decided to check out Chefs Kitchen, here there is a large selection of snacks and drinks...I just got some fruit and jelly beans

With just over an hour to go tea was brought round - a selection of sandwiches, a cream scone and a mini Christmas cake!
All in all the flight was great and being able to lie out flat and get a few hours sleep is definitely a bonus! I know it wasn't cheap to upgrade but for me worth every penny

Getting off the plane was a bit of a nightmare, there was a problem with the bridge so we had to go up to top deck and exit that way! I'd forgotten how big Miami airport is so it took about 15 mins to reach immigration (plus I was getting used to wearing flip flops again which I don't think helped! )
Immigration was absolutely packed! Big tip if you have used ESTA before use the automated machines - I seriously think this saved us a good hour queuing! Luggage was already waiting by the time we got to the carousel

We grabbed our cases and up to level 2 to the hotel shuttles - we are staying at the Hilton Miami Airport tonight, room is on the 14th floor and is pretty standard Hilton!

So that just about wraps up travel day, we are boarding at 11am tomorrow and I'm sure will be up super early - hope you can join us then... until tomorrow my bed is calling! Debs xx

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New Photo Added by debidee - 27 Dec 15 2:39 AM.

[Megandllsmum]

Hi Debs xx
Great travel day, well done on the upgrading could've been a bit frosty if you hadn't acted quickly lol... I take it there was no sign of the family in your section of the plane
Really looking forward to seeing your trippie ...you know me lol but havnt really seen many cruise reports.
Have a great day today and look forward to reading more in the morning
Sam xx

[ShopandRide]

Oooh been waiting for this. Really don't know how you kept your eyes open to post your travel day trip report after arriving. Very impressed with the airport shopping - can't wait to see what you buy in Florida!

[Guest]

Great first travel day. Love your reports Debs, so thorough, brilliant pics and interesting too x

[lua1904]

Love your trip reports, can't wait for the rest 😄 Have a fab holiday

[twinkleshmoo]

Hi Deb

Sounds like a smooth and comfortable travel day. Look forward to reading along with your adventures xx

[mrsdjh]

Nice travel day - the food and the Elemis goodies look great! Nice to see you managed a bit of shopping today too.

Have a fantastic trip x
Diane

[Tor32]

Sounds a luxurious start to a great trip.

[Guest]

Great travel day!