Another Florida Catch-Up | Buying too many floral dresses & More Universal Awesomeness!

I’m just going to stop apologising for not updating now.
Friday was a chilled day, so we headed to Lakeland Square Mall for a spot of shopping. We started off in Burlington Coat Factory where I was sure I could buy a winter coat from, but with no avail we headed into the main part of the mall. I haven’t seen a decent winter coat ANYWHERE in Florida so far. I mean, I understand that it’s hot all of the time here, but surely Floridians like to venture out of Florida?!

We headed to another couple of shops, and I bought my first (and probably favourite) floral dress. After that, me and Emma made a beeline for Hot Topic. My inner 14 year old was screaming to buy all the things, but I managed to resist buying a million My Chemical Romance shirts and a handful of band stickers, and left empty handed. Maybe on Friday when we visit the Florida Mall I’ll take home a Hot Topic souvenir. After an obligatory trip to Bath & Body Works to buy my weight in hand sanitisers, we met my parents and headed back. Lakeland Square Mall wasn’t that good, and I wouldn’t recommend the 45 minute drive to get there. Stick to Florida Mall, it’s better, bigger and has a better choice.

We decided to eat at Golden Corral, which was an all-you-can-eat type affair. It was AMAZING. My first plate consisted of caesar salad, bourbon chicken and other stuff. I then had pot roast with mashed potato and veg, with chocolate cake for dessert. Yum!

After Golden Corral, we went to Target. This was our first ever visit to Target and I loved it! I bought floral dress two here. Not as pretty as floral dress one, and I’ll have to lose the bulk of my holiday weight to look nice in it, but it’s lovely none-the-less, and for only $24 I can’t really complain!

Last Saturday saw Mum and Emma horse riding at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort. I almost had a little weep when we went through the Magic Kingdom arch to get there. I miss Disney. While they rode, me, Dad and Nanna ventured to find somewhere we could grab a coffee, but with no avail, we took to the shade of a big tree and I looked up how much it would cost to stay at a Disney hotel. I found that the cheapest was the All Stars Music Resort (aka hell) at £546 for 4 adults for a week. The most expensive was the Animal Kingdom Lodge (aka a milder hell) for £3423 a week for 4 adults. I honestly would HATE to stay on Disney itself. I’d quite like to stay in one of Universal’s hotels (have to save that for when I come without my parents as they’d rather die than stay in a hotel on holiday), but Disney would be an absolute no go for us.

When Mum & Emma got back we went back to the villa for a bit, before me, Mum and Nanna headed off down the 192 to a flea market. Where the next hour and a bit of my life was spent being harassed by sellers there who were desperate to sell their goods, including a couple of Russian women who absolutely reeked of alcohol trying to sell us some very pretty, overpriced, Russian dolls. Never again will I step foot in a flea market.

Sunday, my parents, myself and Emma headed to Universal again. We got there a bit later at 2pm this time to find it pretty quiet.

We bought our Halloween Horror Nights tickets for Friday (SO EXCITED), and headed to Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem first, then mum and I went on Rip Ride Rock It again, mum vowed never to do this ride again. There’s actually a roller coaster that I love that Mum hates! Me and Emma rode The Mummy, and then we all went on Disaster, which really lived up to its name. As when we were approaching the main ride, it broke down. Disappointed.

After a quick stop at Diagon Alley and a go on Escape From Gringotts, we went on the Hogwarts Express to Hogsmeade and went on the Forbidden Journey and Flight Of The Hippogriff. Thinking this was going to be our last trip to Universal apart from Halloween Horror Nights, I left sad and emotional.

Monday saw us at Sea World. I was in two minds about whether I wanted to go after watching Blackfish and hearing the horrible stories about the killer whales, but two of my favourite coasters are there so I gave in…

We rode Manta first, which is an amazing lying down coaster. But unfortunately got us stuck lying down when we got to the station, meaning we were face down for a good five minutes. Then I got stuck in my seat. Trust me.

We went to see the dolphins next, followed by the Blue Horizons show, which was pretty good, but sort of ruined by the most annoying Sea World employee ever who wouldn’t shut her beak, shouting how she loved this bit, and how “that’s normal” whatever the hell that means.

We rode Journey to Atlantis next, the parents told us that if we sat at the front, most of the splash would go over us. They lied. Me and Emma got off absolutely soaking wet! Me and Mum rode Kraken next, which is always fun. Then the new Empire of the Penguin attraction. The ride was crap, but it was worth it to see the penguins at the end. Their enclosure is much bigger now and they look happy enough!

After that, we went for some lunch by the lagoon. On the way, we got stopped by two Sea World employees who were giving away prizes, all we had to do was act like sea lions… It was fun and we got free fast passes for the family. Not bad considering they’re almost $50 each!

I opted for a BBQ chicken burger, which was nice, we watched the dancing fountains for a bit before going on the Sky Tower. Emma felt really ill by this point (probably burger poisoning), so we decided to call it a day.

 

After the longest nap ever, we (minus Dad, he was fishing) went to the Orlando Premium Outlets where I bought the ASPCA cat Vans & bag, which I’ve wanted for ages.

 

We went in to the Disney Store too, where I spent way too long deciding which pillow pet to buy. I opted for Dumbo.

 

And also dragged everyone to Forever 21 where I bought floral dress three and four. I saw these in the other Forever 21, but they didn’t have my size. $150 down, we headed home. Not before stopping at Pizza Hut for carry out!

Yesterday me and Emma decided that we needed to fuel our Universal addiction some more. So at 1pm, Mum & Dad dropped us off and we went in alone! It felt so weird without any form of parental guidance.

 

Universal first! We went straight to The Transformers ride, which we hadn’t been on yet! We both really enjoyed it! Like Spiderman but more fun in my opinion, though not being a Transformers fan, I had no idea who was who and what was going on.

 

After taking some photos of “New York” and “San Francisco”, and also some of the HHN props (the big candle with creepy faces in and the VW Beetle), we went into Diagon Alley and waited for Escape From Gringotts. We were seated with people who screamed at absolutely everything, which was hilarious! We had a wander round the shops there, before going on The Simpson’s ride, and then back to “London” for the Hogwarts Express.

Over at Islands of Adventure, we went to Burger Digs for lunch, and then back to Hogsmeade to ride the Forbidden Journey. After a look around Hogsmeade we headed for the pick up point.

After a dip in the pool back home, we had steak for tea and went to sleep!

Today we’re going back to Sea World to see the things we missed, and going to Bahama Breeze! So excited for Bahama Breeze, I’ve been waiting all holiday for their amazing cocktails!

 

 

Florida Catch-Up | Shopping, Aquatica & Islands of Adventure!

Firstly, I’d like to apologise for a few days of missing posts. I’ve either been too busy or too tired to update, so I’ll do a quick run-down of the past few days, and then focus on yesterdays!

On Tuesday we chilled by the pool for most of the morning. The weather was glorious, and we were definitely in for a warm one!

Obligatory pool and legs photo!

In the afternoon, we headed over to Orlando Premium Outlets on I-Drive, it’s bigger than the one we usually go to on Vineland but definitely not as good. Had a walk round the Vans outlet but didn’t buy anything. Then went in Forever 21, which is sort of like a cheap Topshop and is AMAZING. I spent way too long in there and only ended up buying a few things. Some amazing jeans, a pretty floral top, a cute rabbit jewellery stand and a hairbrush.

When we got back to the villa, I had a horrendous headache so went for a lie down. We then headed out to Downtown Disney later – bad idea! It was peeing down the whole way round and we all (me mostly) ended up looking like drowned rats. Never again! Especially due to the renovations of Pleasure Island, the whole thing is upside down and just not a very enjoyable experience. We had a look round World of Disney, which is probably the biggest Disney store in the world! And also got our free Ghirardelli chocolate then went home and went to bed.
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Wednesday was a lovely day spent at our favourite water park – Aquatica. We got there nice and early to see if we could hire a private cabana for the day. We managed to get one overlooking Roa’s Rapids which cost $121, but it was definitely well spent. It included towels, a locker, a fridge with 14 bottles of water, and a concierge serving you food and drink if you wish. We also got a Banana Beach Buffet wristband, which was all you can eat and drink all day. Some of the choices were pulled pork, pizza, chicken legs, salad, pasta, mac & cheese, chocolate pudding and cake.

This is the only photo I took of the day. Mum and Dad at our cabana.

We started off the day on Roa’s Rapids, which is sort of like a fast lazy river. Then went on the family slides, in the wave pool, on the lazy river. Towards the end of the day, Emma and I went in the wave pool which was fun. All in all it was a lovely day. I love Aquatica!

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Yesterday was one of my favourite parks – Islands of Adventure!

As soon as we got in we headed over to The Hulk and rode that first! I LOVE this coaster. It’s just so fun and I forgot how awesome it was!
We then got some breakfast. Mum, Dad and Nanna had Cinnabon and me and Em went to Starbucks, where I opted for a caramel frappucino and some banana walnut bread, lovely!

For some reason I chickened out of doing Doctor Doom’s Fearfall, despite the fact I’ve rode it tonnes of times. I just really wasn’t feeling it, and it is genuinely terrifying!

The Spiderman ride was up next! We took Nanna on this one and she loved it! Me and Emma went round again and had another go as it was just a walk on.

We went round to the comic book store where Emma bought a Deadpool t-shirt, and then headed over to Popeye & Bluto’s Bilge Rat Barges. NEVER AGAIN! I’ve rode this before, but I never got as soaked as this before! I was literally drenched through and it took me ages to dry. We went in the “human dryers” which seemed to make little difference, and moved on. We decided not to ride Dudley Do Right’s Ripsaw Falls because we didn’t want to get wet again. Through to Jurassic Park now where we went on Jurassic Park River Adventure, which was great as usual. For some reason I really screamed going down the drop and the photo is both hilarious and horrible at the same time.

Lunch time now, we went to Burger Digs, which is our usual IoA restaurant of choice. I opted for a grilled chicken sandwich, fries and salad.

After lunch, it was time for Hogsmeade!

 

We took Nanna on the “Hogwarts tour” (or Hogswash as she called it). And then rode Forbidden Journey. This ride is great. It’s a simulator “robo-coaster” ride, where you’re stuck on the end of a robotic arm and swung all over the place. It’s fun though! After that we rode Flight of the Hippogriff (me and Em went on twice), and then Dragon Challege, which is ace. I actually kept my eyes open during it this time too (last time I shut my eyes the entire way round). We also met a lady from Boston who sat on our row, she thought it was amazing how we were from England and “sounded just like in the movie”.

Then finally, it was time to ride the Hogwarts Express!

It was absolutely amazing and everything I thought it would be! Needless to say, by the time we got to “London”, I was well and truly feeling like a wizard. So much so, that I headed straight for Ollivanders and bought a wand!

Almost $40 and Voldy’s wand acquired, I felt so powerful! We were going to ride Gringotts again but the wait time was 30 minutes (which is good, but we didn’t want to leave Nanna outside for that long). Back to Kings Cross now for the return trip to Hogsmeade!

HULL TRAINS! 😀

Nanna and Mum going through the wall at Platform 9 and 3/4.

Excuse my face, but wand and Hogwarts Express selfie.

Emma on the Hogwarts Express.

We arrived back in Hogsmeade where I bought a $13 Butterbeer, just for the souvenir cup. Worth it though. I drank half of it before deciding I didn’t like it, so chucked at least $8 worth of Butterbeer in the bin.

We wandered through to Seuss Landing where we went on the Cara-Seuss-El, One Fish Two Fish and the Cat in the Hat ride, then headed out. It was at this point that we seriously started to get tired, and we took the long, arduous trip through City Walk to the car.

On the way home we stopped at Walmart for some stuff for tea, got home, went in the pool, ate, went to sleep.

Hopefully today we’re going shopping, so I’m gonna do some serious spending! Catch you soon!

 

 

Day 3 | 90 Degree Heat, Escaping From Gringotts and LOTS of photos!

So I thought I’d at least be a little bit over the jet lag now but apparently not. It’s 5:30am and I’m awake. It is the perfect time to do my blog posts though so we’ll focus on the up sides. Yesterday was AMAZING. I can’t even get over how brilliant Diagon Alley is, but I’ll start from the very beginning even though I just want to talk about that.

Woke up around 5:30am and ran myself a bath. Decided I could get away with a fringe wash so just did that to save time (if you don’t know what a fringe wash is, it’s where you just wash your fringe. If you’re plagued with greasy hair after just one day of washing it, fringe washing is great if you don’t like to wash your hair every day!). After I was all ready I had fruit, yoghurt and boiled eggs to set me up for the day. And I was ready!

Ignore my stupid face and just focus on the fact I’m wearing a Ravenclaw shirt please.

We set off just after 8 and got to Universal Orlando at around 8:35 which was the earliest we’ve ever been I think. But we thought if we got there early, went straight to Diagon Alley, we wouldn’t have to queue very long for Escape From Gringotts.

Family moving walkway selfie (minus Nanna, she’s not allowed on the moving walkway in her mobility scooter).

I honestly couldn’t stop smiling. Although I love Disney, I just love Universal that little bit more. Up until I found my roller coaster feet, Universal Studios was my favourite park where it came to rides too (now overtaken by Busch Gardens as it’s full of awesome coasters!). Universal Studios still is my favourite park in terms of the buildings and surroundings.

After getting our Special Assistance pass for Nanna (which we didn’t use once), we headed in and by this time I was absolutely buzzing with excitement. The first ride was Despicable Me: Minion Mayhem, which used to be Jimmy Neutron’s Nicktoon Blast. This was our first walk-on of the day. We were waiting 5 minutes, if that. But the woman who worked at the entrance for some reason blocked off the queue at a certain section, so we were just stood there stuck not knowing what to do…

This ride is fun, and is a good update from Jimmy Neutron which was a bit outdated. It’s a 3D simulator ride where riders sit in rows of four (poor Dad was sat alone) where you go through the process of “becoming a minion”. You’re jumping about all over the place and it’s just really fun! Plus the minions are super cute too! Nanna found it hilarious, although it jolted her back a little. Even Dad was smiling so it must have been good!

After that we walked up to Hollywood Rip Ride Rock It, which we just walked onto as well.. I was so excited to ride this because last time we came it was closed  because of teething problems. This was also Emma’s first “big” roller coaster, so she was really nervous! When we got on we picked our songs (I did one of the hidden songs which was Tom Petty – Runnin’ Down A Dream).

This roller coaster lifts you at a 90 degree angle. And when you watch it you think “Ah it won’t be that bad”. But jesus christ, it’s so intense! It was really fun though but probably more intense than any coaster I’ve been on. We consoled Emma in the fact that it’s more intense than The Hulk (if Emma goes on The Hulk she’ll get $40, $30 from Mum and $10 from me, she’s buzzed herself up about it for ages watching videos and I really hope she goes on it!).

Next up was Revenge Of The Mummy. I can’t even explain the lack of queue times. We didn’t even have to queue for this one either. Because of Nanna too we had to use the disabled entrance. We realised afterwards that this ride was too much for Nanna. She felt sick afterwards and me and Emma found ourselves constantly asking if she was okay. Including an instance where she started coughing and I really started to panic! Needless to say, she didn’t go on another ride all day.

Took some photos of “New York” when we got off The Mummy, including being photobombed by Dad! Also the Transformers ride wasn’t there last time we were here, and it upsets me how it ruins the look of New York (far left photo). Also see the props for Halloween Horror Night (VW beetle in the far right photo). It’s part of The Purge scare zone. I really hope we go! Emma’s said she doesn’t think she’ll be scared at HHN. So we have a $5 bet on. By the end of the night I’ll be $5 richer no doubt.

Diagon Alley was up next. Now I’ve watched endless videos of Diagon Alley, and looked at countless photos. But nothing can compare to being there and seeing it with your own eyes. Even “London” was amazing.

Walking through the wall to Diagon Alley was the most excited I’ve been in a long time! I literally could not stop smiling. It’s just so perfect, and the detail is absolutely amazing!

The only downside was the fact I was so warm by this point. It was 90 degrees and I felt so uncomfortable. I just hope that when we visit next week, I’m not too hot and can enjoy it properly! I also need to get a photo next to The Daily Prophet building – my future place of work of course!

Escape From Gringotts was the main attraction here so we headed towards that. Nanna waited outside in the shade with our bags and we headed in. The detail inside Gringotts bank is amazing too. Theme parks in Florida really do knock UK theme parks into the dust. Just the queuing area for one ride is better than a whole ride in the UK.

We were expecting a long wait for this one, but we were only waiting about 20 minutes, if that! All I have to say on this one is WOW. It is amazing. It has the coaster element of The Mummy, with the visuals of the Spiderman ride at Islands of Adventure, but no ride technology could ever match up! It’s so clever the way it switches from roller coaster to simulator.

After EFG, we had a look around Diagon Alley and Knockturn Alley. Emma bought an interactive wand (Ginny’s I think) and did some of the spells. Dad probably has photos of her doing spells in her cape. She’s a real wizard now!

I melted a bit more until we went to cool off in Knockturn Alley, which is equally as amazing! We had a look round Borgin and Burke’s where I got excited over Tom Riddle’s diary which they sold, only to find it was bloody $42! No way I’d pay £25 for a notebook, no matter how amazing it is.

After Diagon Alley, we headed over to the Springfield area. Now I don’t like The Simpsons, but this place is really impressive. Last time we were here, the only thing that was there was The Simpsons Ride, but they’ve extended it to be a full area. Complete with Moes Tavern, Kang & Kodo’s Twirl & Hurl (which me and Emma rode later on), a Duff Brewery bar and the Kwik-E-Mart.

Strangely, I don’t have many photos from Springfield. Only these two.

We headed into Moe’s Tavern to eat and cool down. I opted for a turkey wrap (in which the wrap part was green…not sure) and caesar salad. I needed cold food.

 

After eating, we headed over to Men In Black, which is a family favourite! And then back to Springfield. By this point we were all seriously flagging, so cooled down with what was probably the nicest ice cream I’ve ever eaten. We made the decision to call it a day and head back early, but we’d come back next week to ride the rides we’d missed and have another look round!

All in all, it was a successful day! When we got back I slept, ate, went in the pool and slept some more! Today we have a chill day. That’s the upsides of not doing Disney, we have time to chill and just take it easy. I think we’re going to Orlando Premium Outlets later, which means more shopping! YAY!

I’ll update again tomorrow, although I doubt it will be very interesting! Thanks for reading 🙂

Day 2 | Cake For Breakfast, Walmart and Swimming in the Rain

After waking at 3am and spending two hours messing around on my laptop, I went downstairs to find everyone already awake. I hate jet lag. Even today I woke up at 3am but forced myself to go to sleep again.

Pottered around for a bit downstairs before getting in the bath at around 8. We wanted to be out of the house for 9 to head to Ponderosa Steakhouse for their buffet breakfast. After we were all ready (I opted for my playsuit which was a huge thing for my as I’ve never had so much leg on show in my entire life, talk about a boost in confidence), we head for the familiar 192 to the amazing Ponderosa. Emma was so excited as she LOVES it there. Even when we ask her what she wants for tea at home, she replies with “Ponderosa”.

When we got there it was so quiet. Usually you have to queue along the side wall, but that’s all changed now due to a re-fit. The restaurant looks lovely now, both on the outside and the inside. There’s also a lot more choice in the food. It has everything from scrambled egg to chocolate cake.

As soon as I got there, my whole “eating healthy on holiday” facade went out of the window.
Here’s what I had:

A huge pile of scrambled egg, bacon, sausages, chicken-fricking-nuggets, sweet potato (which I thought were just plain, turns out they had brown sugar and honey on them, WHY?!), plate number two consisted of eggs benedict, and plate number three consisted of a pancake with maple syrup and pear for good measure, a blueberry waffle which I didn’t like, and a piece of sugar free cake. Washed down with two cups of coffee and an orange juice. Pretty sure the buffet only cost $6.99. Safe to stay I was absolutely stuffed and didn’t eat again for 12 hours!

Immediately after eating all of that I had huge regrets because I felt bloated and gross. But I didn’t let it dampen my spirits, as I attempted to take a selfie with my sister but my huge head was in the way.

 

Next up was the food shop at Walmart. Me, Nanna and Em went our separate ways whilst Mum and Dad got the food in. I only bought red cups, has to be done! But afterwards I went to the liquor store and awed over the huge array of vodkas! Literally two aisles worth. There’s vodka infused with cake, cinnamon toast, key lime pie, every single fruit you could think of, chocolate. “You name it, we got it”, in the words of the “people greeter” there. Yep, a liquor store with a people greeter. Although cinnamon toast infused vodka sounds amazing, I probably wouldn’t be able to stomach it, so I went for an uninteresting, yet tropical mango vodka. The aforementioned people greeter also twisted my arm up my back about alcoholic ice cream (yeah, like I really needed convincing). I went for Pink Squirrel, and for $1.50 reduced from $8 it was a steal! It also tastes amazing.

 

 

Next up was just nipping to the Mall at Millennia so I could get some new Vans. This was a must as my old ones are falling apart and there’s no way I could walk miles round the theme parks in any shoes other than Vans. I knew exactly what I wanted, some beautiful floral numbers for $55. I also saw a nice top in there too, so that was bought for me by my lovely Dad for $27.50.

I think the shoes are literally the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. And the Vans shop was great too! The lovely cashier told us that there’s also a store at the premium outlets which does buy one get one half price, and buy one get one free clothes. Not sure I’ll be able to resist.

On the way back from the Mall at Millennia, we passed ‘The Holy Land Experience’, which we’d read about prior to coming on holiday. We laughed for a while before Nanna said that it was a “sect thing to attract little girls and boys” in which Dad replied “it’s not the ‘Jimmy Saville Experience’ Barbara”. Of course we all thought she said “sex” thing. Maybe you had to be there but it was funny! I prefer “The Yewtree Experience”.

By the time we got back to the villa, a storm was coming in strong. Me and Emma went in the pool anyway, despite the fact it was absolutely peeing down. After an hour or so I showered and everyone went for a nap. Mum woke me up a few hours later and said we’d have to give up on Downtown Disney due to the rain but we were still going out for dinner. Outback Steakhouse was the restaurant of choice!

Pre-dinner selfie:

Our waiter at Outback, Alec, was just so lovely! When he heard we weren’t doing Disney, he told us he does it every day. We thought we were joking until he showed us his employee card. He worked at the Animal Kingdom driving the safari trucks. He was sat with us for ages telling us about his job and how amazing it is to make the magic for people. It made us all (apart from Dad) really want to do a day at Disney. He even told us to ask to ask for his truck if we made it to Animal Kingdom!

That aside, here’s what I had.

The Bloomin’ Onion was to share of course. I started with a Wallaby Darned cocktail which was lovely! Then had a 9oz steak, jacket potato with cheese and bacon, and a side salad. My second cocktail, which was considerably stronger than the first and resulted in me going a bit squiffy was a Sydney’s Cosmo.

After we’d finished we headed to Walgreens so I could get one of those puffy sponge things. But of course with my Nanna, we ended up spending ages in there.

We got home around midnight and went straight to bed!

Today is Universal Studios and I’m SO excited to see the new Diagon Alley! I’ll be updating all about that (definitely with lots of photos) tomorrow!

See you soon!

 

Day One | Arriving at The Sunshine State

Yesterday seemed like the longest day ever. It seems about a week ago that I woke up at the Premier Inn at Manchester. At the time of writing my notes last night, it was 10pm Florida time, meaning it was almost 3am UK time and I’d been awake almost 24 hours. God knows how I was still functioning! I was so tired that I actually didn’t feel tired, needless to say, as soon as my head hit the pillow I was fast asleep. But wide awake now at nearly 4am. Bloody jet lag!

We got to the Premier Inn at Manchester Airport on Thursday around 3pm, checked in and up to our rooms. We stayed here in 2010 too, and it really is a lovely hotel. And for 50 odd quid for two rooms, you really can’t go wrong.
Here’s a photo from our room, there’s another Premier Inn right opposite too.

 

The one opposite looks lovely on the outside, but apparently not nice inside. Whereas the one we stayed at closely resembles a prison on the outside, but it’s great inside. We got two rooms (Mum, Dad and Emma in one, me and Nanna in the other), both with huge double beds. To be fair, it wouldn’t have made a difference if I slept on a park bench. The night before a holiday I never sleep well anyway. The mixture of excitement and anxiety doesn’t bode well with me at all.

We went down to the hotel restaurant to eat. I had chicken and bacon BBQ salad. Even when I’m on holiday I make healthy choices! (Wonder how long that will last…probably until we go to Universal and I want ALL the wizard sweets!)

After a very tasty meal we returned back to our rooms where Nanna watched her soaps and I watched The Delivery Man on my Mac.

After that, I made an attempt to sleep, which didn’t go to plan. On the up hand, my Nanna was sleep talking about luggage so that was a laugh! I woke up periodically throughout the night so probably only slept about two hours in total.

When my alarm went off at 5am, I got in the shower, did my hair and got dressed. It annoyed me that the soft water made my hair really thin again (due to a medical condition I have, my hair is thin anyway, but because I lost weight it thickened up, but it just looked crappy yesterday – probably due to the water).

We got to the airport just before 7 where we’d booked the two cars in for the Meet & Greet parking, it was okay but the staff seemed slightly rude which didn’t bode well with my Mum, who complained loudly within earshot of said staff. The woman in question didn’t seem to care and continued to be nice to everyone else but us. Mum said it’s because we weren’t attractive young men…

Because my Nanna requires a wheelchair, we got a man pushing her around who knew his way around the airport and we got through check in without waiting, got through security without waiting and were among the first to get on the plane. It was a breeze!

When we were through, the man pushing Nanna took us to a restaurant so we could have our breakfast. I had a bacon sandwich on a really cute plate (I wanted to steal it but I’m not sure they’d let me on the plane with a stolen plate).

After we’d eaten, we had a roam around duty free. Where I found a Paperchase, and as usual, I spent way too long in there and didn’t buy anything. To me, Paperchase is like a stationary museum, I love it, but don’t own much from there.

Also this happened:

 

After a while, our gate was called and we made our way over there.
Family selfie on the way to the gate:

 

Our plane. Airbus A300-321.

 

 

Bye bye England!

Just before we boarded, Emma was subject to a random security check, where she made an inappropriate joke involving drugs and a laptop. Surprisngly, the security woman just laughed. If that had been in the US, it would have been a totally different story!

Despite reading tonnes of bad reviews about Thomas Cook and only a couple of good ones, the plane was lovely! We had loads of room and the staff were brilliant!

 

 

There was seat back IFE, which had okay choices, but we bought a premium movie & TV pack for an extra £4 which had more up to date films like Maleficent and The Muppets: Most Wanted.

After a while being in the air, one of the stewards came with my Mum’s celebration bundle which was a bottle of champagne and chocolates (we are going on this holiday to celebrate my Mum’s 50th 21st birthday). I felt so posh drinking champagne!

 

We encountered a little bit of turbulence which scared Emma. But I like turbulence! It’s like being on a roller coaster, except there’s no tracks and you’re thousands of feet in the air in a huge metal box.

The food was good too. I had the chicken curry with rice (the other choice was sausage and mash). We also got ‘Butler’s Secret’ crackers and cheese, a cinder toffee and caramel mousse and a little chocolate.

An hour or so before flying, the cabin crew brought round ‘afternoon tea’, which was such a lovely addition, although we were still stuffed from the meal. Still ate it though, obviously. We got two little sandwiches – cheese and pickle and egg mayo – with a scone, jam and clotted cream! Lovely. The scone felt so naughty though!

 

 

We landed an hour early and got through immigration and customs quickly because of Nanna! We also got the one immigration officer that hadn’t had a charisma bypass too! He laughed at least twice!

We picked the car up, which is a big Chrysler caravan which I’ll take photos of later, and made our way to the villa. It felt so nice being on the roads in Florida and just thinking “I’m home”. 🙂

As the sat nav my dad bought was playing up and I’m the only one who’s phone is free to use in America (thanks 3 for your feel at home perk, it’s actually brilliant!), I was in charge of getting the directions to the villa and getting us there safely. Of course, my phone took us to the wrong place and we ended up at what looked like a posh golf community.

We made it to the villa in the end just as the rain was coming in. Our villa is on a lovely gated community which is still being developed and the villa is AMAZING! I’ll take some photos later and upload them in a separate post. It’s stunning though. My Nanna has the biggest master bedroom which is downstairs, my parents the second master (which was supposed to be mine, but as we didn’t realise it was the second master and it has a walk in wardrobe and bigger en suite I gave my parents it) and me and Emma huge bedrooms with our own en suites. Seriously, the bed is so big that I can starfish in it and still not touch the edges.

This is the view from my room.

After the rain had finally stopped and we had my Nanna’s motility scooter and oxygen delivered (by a lovely man who works for Orlando Medical Rentals who have been so helpful with assisting me to get all that sorted!), we headed out to Publix to get some food, which is standard first night in Orlando procedure for us.

The familiar Publix smell was just so nostalgic and made me instantly smile. Me and Emma found the world food aisle and I took a photo of the British food.

 

They can sack off with the $1.99 Heinz tomato soup and $1.69 Bounty’s though!

When we got back to the villa, the sunset was beautiful, and I was just so happy to be back here.

 

We ate fried chicken, coleslaw, potato salad, BBQ beans, wedges and salad. This is a first night tradition in Orlando for us, and has been ever since we first came in 2002.

After tea, me and Emma went in the pool for half an hour before we all went to bed.
I promise that the post about today will be shorter than this! It was a very long day!
Today we’re going to Ponderosa for breakfast and shopping, which I’m SO excited for. WAL MART!

Goodbye for now from the home of the mouse! 🙂

 

 

 

More radio shows, an addiction to RollerCoaster Tycoon and Street Fighter playing fish.

Is it even possible for a week to go ridiculously fast but achingly slow? I catch myself checking the Florida countdown on my phone every day, expecting it to be less than a week to go. Today it says fifteen days and I can’t believe it’s come around so quickly! Still, it swiftly dampens my excitement when I realise that this time next month I’ll be back in England in the cold, but at least I’ll be back at university and I’m looking forward to that a whole lot too!

So this week I’ve got my second and third radio broadcasts in the bag!

On Monday I had a three hour long slot, and with it being my first show 100% alone it was immensely nerve racking. Especially considering how daunting the controls are. But it was fun pretending I knew what all the sliders and knobs did, despite the fact I was just winging it and hoping for the best. Here’s a photo of my hand pretending it knows what to do:

I was still profoundly nervous, but I tried my hardest not to vocalise my nerves on air and slowly but surely eased into it and tried to be a bit more natural and even had some one sided conversations about the ‘Ice Bucket Challenge’ and how un-ironic Alanis Morissette’s ‘Ironic’ actually is. And after a while it felt less rehearsed and just like I was going with the flow. I’ll get there eventually!

My show on Tuesday went by too quickly for my liking, it was only an hour slot but I did a bit of promoting for The Sesh at Linnet and Lark and played some up and coming bands so that was something a bit different. At the moment, the radio station is off air due to maintenance works so I didn’t do a show today, but I hope it’s up and running by Monday!

Today was mainly spent watching fish playing Street Fighter. Sounds crazy right? It really is so entertaining and it in no way should be as gripping as it is but most of my day was spent watching this and drinking copious amounts of very strong coffee. If you wish to watch fish playing Street Fighter (I promise you won’t regret it, but I can’t take any responsibility for large amounts of lost time), you can tune in here: http://www.twitch.tv/fishplaystreetfighter. There’s also a Fish play Pokémon Twitch stream, albeit boring compared to Fish play Street Fighter, it’s still good viewing.

I’ve also being spending extensive amounts of time on RollerCoaster Tycoon 4. I’d had it less than 24 hours and already completed most of the campaigns. I then rediscovered sandbox mode, with unlimited money and everything unlocked, just as I was going out. I found myself mentally building theme parks for the rest of the night.

I definitely started taking it way too seriously. Imagining up a theme parks with different themed lands and attractions. I even debated planning it out using pens and paper before building it, but when I caught myself internally drawing up theme park blueprints I knew I’d gone too far and snapped out of it and realised how ridiculous I was being.

RollerCoaster Tycoon is debilitatingly addictive though and I don’t plan on stopping any time soon (possibly after my holiday when I’m suffering from post-Florida blues and anything that reminds me of theme parks or the Sunshine State just makes me sad).

With fifteen days to go, I’ve finally downloaded the Universal Orlando app for my phone so I’m officially on countdown. Fifteen days seems so close, yet so far. This also means I have two weeks to pack everything I’m taking back up to university with me which is a huge chore in itself.

Anyway, it’s time to watch Sharknado 2 now, so I’ll catch you on the flip side. (What do you mean that saying isn’t cool any more?!)

 

That Obligatory Awkward First Post.

First posts on a new blog are probably one of of my least favourite things in the world – finding out Robin Williams has died is definitely number one on my least favourite list right now. First posts are awkward and unwanted, I just wish I could pre-load a blog with random posts, but that’s pretty difficult since I haven’t written them yet.

I just hate the notion of having to describe what I am, who I am and what I like in order to build an audience of readers, because I always end up missing something vital out. For example, I’m on my second paragraph and I haven’t even written my name yet. It’s Rachel by the way.

I decided to start a daily, weekly, whenever I feel like it-ly blog for several reasons. I’ve wanted to start one now for a long time, but I could never find the reason, or the words, to do so. But as my summer goes on, my life is getting a little bit more interesting (I say a little bit – no skydiving out of burning buildings for charity, or organising events that will be attended by thousands here folks).

But I guess I’ll get right into it and I hope you enjoy reading (because there’ll probably be a lot of words).

I’ve been volunteering at a place called BRiCWorks since I came home for summer. It’s a community hub for people recovering from drugs and alcohol and has been such a good place to spend my summer, and is undeniably a great cause to give my time to. The experience I’ve gained has been invaluable, and it would be difficult to pick up such a variety of experience and skills elsewhere.

For the first couple of months I was mainly working on their newsletters, behind the reception desk, or drinking lots of tea and hearing peoples recovery stories – the latter probably being my favourite while I’ve been there. I’ve met some really inspiring people, who have shown me that no matter how hard it gets, it’s always possible to pull through, and come out at the other side victorious.

Anyway, BRiCWorks have their own community radio station, Hull Recovery Radio, and after months of umm’ing and ahh’ing about it, I finally bit the bullet and asked if I could do a show. I really wanted to be involved with the radio side of Spark at university but didn’t have the confidence, so I knew if I built confidence through HRR, by the time term started I’d be ready to go back to Spark and get more involved, so this really was something I HAD to do.

They said they could fit me in on the Thursday, bearing in mind this was Monday, and I was expecting at least a week to mentally prepare myself for this. To say I was extremely nervous would be an understatement.

But I did a whole lot of preparing, and loaded about 20 songs I wanted to play on my trusty University of Sunderland USB stick and turned up on Thursday ready to do my show. As 1pm rolled around (I was due to go on at 1:30pm), I was told that it was time. It was 30 minutes earlier than it should have been so I went into full-on panic mode right then and there.
“What do you mean?! It’s only 1, I’m not due to go on until 1:30.”
I got a lot of words of encouragement and a hug from my Mum. As if I wasn’t nervous enough, my Mum was also there so that added to the nervousness tenfold. She even stood by with her phone to take a photo!

I sat in the chair and loaded the computer with my songs, which now, in hindsight, were a bad pick. I tried to pick songs that would be kind to everyones ears and not play a load of Bring Me The Horizon, Four Year Strong and A Day To Remember, but I just felt awkward when I introduced The Kinks and Oasis. Don’t get me wrong, I like The Kinks and Oasis, I’m just not really into them.

I genuinely felt like a poor mans version of Annie Mac, sat there in the presenters chair, with a myriad of computers and speakers around me, and a microphone in my face. It felt great to be honest. Here’s the aforementioned photo:

After doing a considerable amount of awkward things such as stopping songs too early, or too late, not fading songs out properly, and admitting to having the Sound Of Music soundtrack LP live on air, I finally got into it, stopped feeling so gawky and relaxed a little.

It helped that I was joined with one of the other DJ’s, Rick, (we’d had a lengthy conversation about games beforehand, so I liked him already). He had had only done a couple of shows for HRR but seemed so relaxed on air. I would have probably been a nervous wreck if it wasn’t for him to be honest! In between songs we chatted about music, got a couple of other people in to talk about things and just had a laugh. I’m pretty sure my show was meant to start at half 1 and finish at half 2, but we ended up occupying the radio studio until half 4.

I honestly never could have imagined how much I’d enjoy presenting a radio show, and I didn’t even get conscious about my horrible voice either! And doing this was a huge boost for my confidence, not to mention that I’m yearning to do it again already! So that’s one for the portfolio!

Speaking of portfolios, another reason I wanted to start this blog was so that I could blog about my holiday, which you’ll no doubt he hearing a lot about over the coming weeks if you read my blog. Finally, after four long years of waiting, and a couple of months of packing and re-packing my suitcase, I’m going back to the motherland. Florida. (Not really the motherland may I add, but it feels like I’m going home!)

I blogged my whole holiday in 2010 which you can read here: http://rachelamystriptoflorida.tumblr.com if you wish to. It’s full of awkwardness and crude language, but it’s a good read and has pretty photos. The URL is also meant to read like “Rachel Amy’s Trip To Florida”, not “Rachel Amy Strip To Florida”, sounding like I’m doing some kind of stripping road trip, I apologise.
Not even a trip to the moon could beat 2010’s trip (well maybe). It was amazing and one of the best holidays I’ve ever been on.

So yes, it’s just 24 days, 5 hours, and 13 minutes until I (with my Mum, Dad, sister – Emma, and Nanna), set off for Manchester Airport for two weeks in the Sunshine State. And honestly, I’m having trouble sleeping due to excitement already. Florida is 10x better than Christmas in my opinion and it will be so good to be back there!

If you’ve read this far, you deserve a gold star because this post is LONG. I don’t think my posts in future will be this long but you never know. Anyway, thank you for reading and be sure to keep an eye out for future posts – I’m going to Wales on Thursday so that’ll be an interesting read…

See y’all real soon!

(I’d just like to add a RIP to Robin Williams, will be sorely missed in the comedy/film world. Such sad news.)