Our dream holiday in Orlando: we’re off on an epic trip!

A while back we showed you this video reveal of the plan for our dream holiday in Orlando. Bearing in mind that by the day of our trip we clearly knew we were off to Florida’s Disney World resort, so we considered Daddy’s attempt to wind us up nothing short of brutal:

Easyjet

We quickly put him straight and dragged him away from the Easyjet desks:

"dream holiday to Orlando"

Panic over, we set about getting excited. Here are some basic tips on how to make the most of a long plane journey with kids:

  • Arrive at the airport super-early. Yes early! The grown-ups will say this is to minimise the stress, and the risk of unforeseen glitches, but really it is to maximise the time allocated to shopping, eating steak, drinking Sprite, and sampling all the chocolate in the Duty Free shop. You’ll also want to make sure you try on at least 16 different perfumes. It has a lovely effect once you’re cooped up in your plane seat. We were also allowed to change our own £20 notes for dollars at the place where they sell money, and we also paused to appreciate the rain we weren’t going to see for another 2 weeks.

"how to pass time at the airport"

 

  • Always go straight through security checks. You never know how long the queues will be, nor which item of illegal stash you will have forgotten to extract from your hand luggage. Mummy normally plans very carefully, only to discover a tube of Arnica in her first aid pack. So this time she put everything that could possibly delay us in to a clear plastic bag and swanned through feeling smug. She forgot to remove her electricals from her bag – her ipad, her phone, and her netbook all had to be scrutinised under the stern glare of the official-looking lady. Mummy felt chastened until Daddy got told off by the police for taking photos of her shame.
  • You won’t actually need your iPad. Gone are the days when you had to sit through the same film as everyone else and then twiddle your thumbs for an hour until the next one started. I watched 3 films of my own choosing, back to back on our 10 hour flight. I also ate every snack, refused every meal, filled in every bit of my activity pack, and made full use of my “sleep” accessories. I didn’t actually sleep, but I did put it all on, including the items my father told me were sock puppets – for my hands. (There is a picture somewhere, mother is hunting it down as you read, so watch this space).
  • On arrival at your destination, before you go into military mode ensuring that your luggage is on its trolley and pushed through the customs queues as fast as possible, take a moment to confirm that you have picked up the correct suitcase. The 30 seconds it takes to perform this check will save you 2 hours of stomping around the airport corridors with a selection of officials attempting to locate your actual bag. And untold embarrassment at the panicked faces of another poor family trying to get started with their dream holiday in Orlando!

"duffer Dad"So, our story has begun. This is the first in a week long series of posts about our dream holiday in Orlando. Check back tomorrow, when I will expound my theories on what makes a good theme park – the good, the bad, and the average of Orlando theme parks!

 

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