Dan on the other hand just sees it as extremely boring, and obviously apart from the excitement of the plane taking off, the kids do too. One of the great things about the modern age is not only the personal in flight entertainment, but the fact that you can look on the internet to see what options you have before you go. So we'd looked up the films available and I was actually rather impressed. Lots to choose from, and some really quite new (eg not long out of the cinema). As I'm not much of a cinema goer, there was lots for me to choose from, and lots for the kids too.
Our flight was at 11.20am from Gatwick, so we left home at 6.30am (we planned to leave at 6.30am and actually did - anyone who knows us well will know that this is quite an achievement!!). There was an uneventful journey to the airport, we dropped off the car, checked in (BA staff were very helpful with the wheelchair etc.,) and dropped off our bags. I mention this because the discussion about how many suitcases to take had been debated more than any other aspect of this holiday.
I was on the side of "take as much as possible so we can buy as much as possible" school (not like me eh?), whilst Dan was on the side of a little more caution (and the one in charge of the bank balance!). We needed new suitcases and a few weeks before had bought four. Two big ones for us and two little ones for the boys. Which I thought was fine. However, with Dad now being in a wheelchair (and having his own suitcase), we had five people travelling but only three able to push suitcases (as one of us would be pushing Dad in the wheelchair). Whilst I still thought we should try and take a suitcase each (we could take a trolley and you really aren't pushing them around for long), Dan, as the chief packer in the house, won the arguement, and we took two large suitcases and one small one (and Dad's one). Dan pushed the two suitcases, I pushed Dad, and the boys took the small suitcase and Dad's one.
We breakfasted in Cafe Rouge and did a little shopping. I get my shopping gene from my Dad, and possibly even more than me he can't resist any kind of "deal" or "bargain". So it didn't take much persuading from the kids to enter the "Win a Luxury Car" thing that you find in these places. You know the ones, £8 a ticket or something ridiculous, and obviously the more you buy the more you "save" ;) That done, we went off to board our plane.
The journey was pretty uneventful for the most part. There was a strange coincidence though in that on the way there a woman asked us if we were on the plane to Orlando, as that is where she was going, but she wasn't sure she was going the right way. Turns out her seat was next to Ollie's on the plane! She was a lovely American lady, happy to chat away to Ollie for as long as he wanted (and those that know Ollie know he likes to talk and isn't afraid of talking to strangers!). She called him "my darling" and answered all his questions (she flew a lot). She even helped me look after Ollie when he was a little sick at the end of the flight (I think he overheated). She was my first experience of an American on the trip and a lovely one too :)
The boys amused themselves by watching movie after movie on the plane, at least three each. When you add a bit of eating, going to the loo, and a little playing on the iPad, it's amazing how quickly nine hours goes - the boys getting bored and restless on the plane was one of my worries, and it was such a relief when they were fine!
It's a shame to note that airplane food hasn't come on much since I last had a meal on a plane! I had sausages and mash and it was pretty rank tbh. Having said that, pudding was a divine chocolate mousse from Lily O'Briens, which kinda made up for it!
I read a little, watched Despicable Me 2 (which the children had been telling me for ages was hilarious (I didn't like it as much as no.1 tbh), and did some colouring in (I'm such a child lol), so didn't get too bored either.
We arrived about 4.30pm local time and went through all the security checks etc.. Made a mental note to wear gloves if ever committing a crime in America as they now take your fingerprints and keep them forever!
We collected our rather large car (another heavily debated topic!), a Ford Expedition, and off we went. Good old Sat Nav makes life so much easier, not only telling you where to go, but giving you a good idea/reminder about driving on the right etc., so that negotiating junctions etc. was without incident.
By the time we got to our villa it was getting dark, so here's a photo of it in the daytime:
It was really lovely. To be honest, we'd paid more than we wanted to for a week, but because we were booking so late, there wasn't too much to chose from that had everything we wanted. This house was huge! It had five bedrooms (luckily one double downstairs for dad as upstairs would have been an issue with his foot!), and our bathroom was bigger than our master bedroom at home! It also had the biggest dressing room I'd ever seen (you could have comfortably had it as another double bedroom!). The boys were delighted to find an electric piano and a karaoke system in the lounge!
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| The biggest dressing room I've ever seen (leading to our bathroom) |
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| Lounge through to kitchen |
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| The pool (and Dad eating his breakfast lol) |
(As an aside, I'd spent months looking at villas in Florida and wondering why on earth ALL of them had these stupid big "greenhouses" on the back, and thinking that surely with all that sun it would be like an oven in there?? Only to realise once we'd got there that it's not glass, it's just netting (D'oh!!), and extremely useful in keeping bugs and dust etc. out!)
Anyway, we raced to the supermarket, bought some bits for supper, then went to bed at what was about 2am England time! And that's the end of day one!
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