As I failed to provide a full account of yesterday, here is a quick summary.
Jon picked us up bang on time, and we were on the road by half past five, and dropped off at the airport, north terminal for a change, in plenty of time. I think that we were just about the first people to be checked in for our flight, and once we'd waved goodbye to our luggage, we headed through security (none of us set off the security alarms for a change) and went in search of breakfast.
North Terminal doesn't have a Frankie and Benny's and so the closest that we could manage was breakfast at Garfunkel's. We had plenty of time to do our airport shopping - I got a couple of books, one by Marcus du Sautoy and one by Matthew Syed), the boys got some football magazines, and Nicky got her perfume. Oh yes, and re Jon's comment on an earlier post, Nicky did get some earrings as well (and has bought a necklace today!!).
At the gate for the plane, we discovered that it is indeed a small world after all as we bumped into my cousin Claire - she is in Florida for a fortnight with her family, staying at the Quality Inn on I-Drive.
The flight went smoothly - the extra legroom in the premium seats is definitely a benefit. The boys both managed to have a little snooze after lunch, and so far (touch wood) they have been absolutely fine on the jet-lag front - in fact they seem to have rather more energy than the grown-ups in the party.
The nine hours didn't seem to drag too much thanks to the films, TV, music and snoozing. I found a Texas Hold'em game on the in flight entertainment system which whiled away a couple of hours.
One of the benefits of being in the premium seats is that we were off the plane first, and so we were at the front of the line for immigration. This was probably just as well, as their computer systems were having some troubles, and so we were stood at one of the desks for at least ten minutes, during which time the rest of the immigration hall filled up with queue.
Our immigration officer was very nice, and was chatting with us and apologising for the delay. Interestingly, she did ask to see the letter that Owen's Mum had written, but there were no problems with getting us all into the country!
Once they had got their systems back up and running we went to collect our bags, and off to find our Alamo hire car centre (which is just outside the main terminal). One unusual point - we had a rented a "fullsize" rental car, and rather than be allocated a specific vehicle, once the paperwork had been completed, the guy on the desk pointed out a row of cars in the parking lot, and said that those were the fullsize ones, and that we could pick whichever one we fancied and take it - the keys were all in the cars.
So we wandered down the row, past a few Toyota Camrys and passed a few Impalas, and then we came to a black Dodge Avenger, which the boys immediately declared was the one for us - so that's what we took.
The deal with the rental car is that we have paid for a full tank of petrol, so this time we don't have to fill up on the way back to the airport. The upside of this is that we don't have to grapple with the complexities of American filling stations (which which my reputation is rather mixed), but the downside is that if we still have loads in the tank when we take it back, we will be wasting money. Mind you, I'm guessing that the Avenger's MPG is less than impressive, so we will probably get through it!
En route from the airport we decided that we'd rather just get to the hotel and unpack and not make a stop at the supermarket on the way, so we came straight to Bay Lake Towers. Checking in we were a little disappointed to be given a ground floor room, but there were no others available. In some ways, it is actually working out quite well, as we are pretty close to the pool, and we can get there by heading round the corner from our little terrace.
Once we were unpacked, food was required and so we went over the elevated walkway to the main Contemporary Resort and to the Contempo Cafe (which I think must be fairly new and a concession the the fact that Contemporary now has a DVC bit - it also appears to have pinched some of Chef Mickey's space) and had flatbreads / burgers, as well as getting our refillable mugs for the holiday - which I think are going to come in for some pretty heavy use in this heat.
On the way back the boys spotted the arcade, and so they loaded up a card with some credit and stopped for a quick play whilst Nicky and I picked up a few essentials (water, coffee and so on) at the little Marketplace store.
I'd been trying on and off to get the laptop to connect up in the room, but with no success, and so I phoned their support line. They took me through checking the settings on the computer, but they were all fine, and so they said that they'd send someone round to check the connections in the room - hence no post yesterday other than the quick one from the phone.
By this time we were all pretty much done in and so we called it a day. We managed to avoid working out how many hours it had been since we'd all got up many many hours and many many miles ago, but I think that it is safe to say that we all slept very well.
This morning, Nicky woke up at 4am - my fault because my phone buzzed on the bedside table with a reminder from my calendar - not that I heard it. The reminder was to let is know that we were on holiday. After that, we didn't get up until around seven, which is not bad going on day one, as often we have been up earlier, slowly getting used to the time difference.
Before we headed out I called the front desk to check that we would be able to buy park tickets at the entrance to the park. Sounds silly I know, but I realised that if we were going straight to the entrance then we would be bypassing the Ticket and Transportation Centre where most of the ticket booths are. However, the front desk reassured me that we could go to Guest Services at the gates and get the tickets there.
So, we walked to the Magic Kingdom - now there's a first - and it only took five minutes or so, and we were at the gates at a little after 8am. Today was an Extra Magic Hour morning at MK, and so we were able to go into the parks a little early (mind you, thinking back, we didn't have to show our resort ID when getting on rides before 9am?).
Once tickets were purchased we were through the turnstiles and off down Main Street. Nicky had the Bloggie video camera out to record the moment for posterity, but I'm afraid I haven't got to uploading of videos yet.
First stop (I bet Nanny and Granddad can guess this one) - the Main Street bakery, where we all had a morning pastry to set us on our way.
Second stop - and another unsurprising one - the Buzz Lightyear ride, where we only waited a couple of minutes at most. Jake and Owen went in front in one vehicle and Nicky and I went in the next one. In terms of scores, let's just say that the car behind won by quite a handsome margin - not that we're competitive at all!!
After Buzz we went up to the Transit Authority for a ride around Tomorrowland. As we went through Space Mountain, all of the lights were on, so we had a bit of a rare treat of being able to see all of the ride tracks where normally it is in darkness. The drawback of this turned out to be that the lights were on because they were having technical troubles with the ride, and so we weren't able to ride today.
Next stop was the Indy Speedway which we bumped our way around. By now it was getting pretty hot, and so we all agreed that making Philharmagic (in an air conditioned theatre) our next stop would be a very good idea).
Walking through Fantasyland it was interesting to see all of the building work that is going on for the expansion - due to be opening next year.
After we'd watched Donald and the orchestra in 3D we went to the famous "It's a Small World" and sung our way around in our little boat. Has to be done! (As we were going around the ride, we were picking out the various countries that are depicted by the characters. The group behind us was doing the same thing, and when they pointed out India, one of the members of their party said, "That's where all our jobs have gone!")
We decided that we could do one more ride before an ice cream break, and so we went to the Haunted Mansion, enjoying some of the new entertainments in the queueing area along the way, and then we stopped off for ice cream cookie sandwiches all round, before having our photos taken with Donald Duck.
Our final ride of the morning was on Pirates of the Caribbean. By now it was just after 11am, and whilst it was getting a little busier, it still wasn't too busy around the park, and the wait for Pirates was only about 15 minutes.
At this point we agreed that heading back to the hotel would be a good idea, so we went back to Main Street and through the shops (Nicky found a necklace) to the entrance, and rode the monorail back to our hotel. The boys stopped off in the arcade again for a quick play on the way back to our room.
After a brief pit-stop it was off to the pool for a swim. We swapped pools after about an hour so that we could go to the pool-side cafe at the main Contemporary pool where there was a slightly larger selection on the menu. Sitting at a table near the pool with our food, we were very popular with the local wildlife, and a fair number of birds and a few ducks were begudging us every mouthful.
I joined the boys in the pool after lunch for a ball game, but it started to come over rather overcast. Spotting that rain was on the way, Nicky headed back to the room with our stuff, but it wasn't until the rain started that the rest of us headed back. By the time we got back to our room, across the grass and onto our patio, the rain was seriously hard, and we may well have been wetter than when we got out of the pool.
We rested up in our room for a while, and true to form the rain didn't last for very long. We watched a bit of TV and then headed out in the car for a trip to Walgreen's for some more provisions, and we ended up trying out Applebee's for dinner. (Food was nice, but I don't think that it will prove to be as popular as our favourite Denny's / IHOP.)
Back at the hotel, I am catching up on the blogging and Nicky has gone round to the pool with the boys so that they could have another dip before bedtime.
I think we'll all be off to bed fairly soon. The plan is to head off to another park tomorrow morning - Epcot currently looking favourite.