Our first break of the year was two weeks escaping the freezing temperatures of the UK to sunny Orlando Florida or so we thought. In the days leading up to the flight out, it was questionable whether we would even get to the airport due to the snow, let alone take off. Flights all over the country were being delayed or cancelled. So we had to drive to Gatwick airport and just hope that it was actually going to leave at all. To cut a long story short, we took off 5 hours late on a ‘merged’ Virgin Atlantic flight. The flight was reasonably standard. Economy is never an easy trip, but bearable when you consider the price of Business Class. We landed in Orlando, Florida at 8pm. The temperature wasn’t what we had expected. At -2 degrees, it was colder than the UK. Oh, the irony.
We had spent the first week, at Disney World in newly purchased jumpers and coats. We visited the big four. Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom. We also managed a few trips to Celebration and the big shopping malls, Millenia and Florida Mall. The malls in Orlando are like any other around the world. Millions of car spaces, marble floors, trees indoors, full of shops, you get the picture. I bought some tops in Hollister and a coat in Gap while my wife was clearing out Neiman Marcus of cosmetics and perfume. The Florida Premium Outlets malls are slightly different in the quality of shops but equally good for bargain hunting. Stock tends to be stack high unlike the well presented Mall of the Millenia and Florida Mall.
While at Disney World, we spent some time getting our photos taken with the Disney characters. We had to queue for over 20 minutes from some of the characters but worth the wait. It was great fun, even James enjoyed it.
The second week was much warmer, with temperatures hitting 24 degrees and the humidity at 90%, we spent most of the time at the villa in the heated swimming pool and jacuzzi.