Tuesday 12 April - Seaworld

Tuesday morning was a little bit cloudy when we woke up, but it was still very warm indeed. We were all up early and out by 9am to drive to a nearby IHOP (International House of Pancakes!) for breakfast. The restaurant was very busy which meant we had a short delay in ordering, but our waitress was very apologetic (I think another waitress was in for a tongue lashing) and before long we had breakfast piled up on our plates! Mikey went for pancakes - what else? - while the rest of us opted for a more traditional bacon, eggs and sausages with delicious hash browns. The coffee just kept on coming - wonderful! - and by the time we left there were queues waiting to take our table.

The journey to Seaworld was over in about half an hour and we were soon parking in the vast car park and walking in. It didn't seem very busy which was great and we decided to head for the Shamu Stadium first so Keith could experience the "Believe" show. I had heard that the killer whale who had killed the trainer last year was back performing again and the difference this time was that the trainers didn't go into the water with the whales at all, they stood on a platform and interracted with them there. It was still extremely shmaltzy but Keith said he enjoyed it very much. I'm not so sure I'm comfortable with these huge creatures being kept in captivity but the show was entertaining nonetheless, especially when Shamu circles the huge pool and splashes everyone with his huge tail!

The children wanted to go on Journey to Atlantis again so we made our way there, stopping to look at the sharks on the way. The Shark Encounter is brilliant as you walk along a conveyor belt underneath an aquarium full of different types of sharks. They were beautiful in a scary way, I thought, their dead eyes flicking back and forth and maybe sizing us up for lunch!

I was still in two minds about going on Journey to Atlantis. The ride has a huge drop into water and it looked pretty scary to me...

 However, the children begged me to go on with them and Keith, so after stowing our bags in lockers, on we went. The agony was prolonged because the first boat we were supposed to get into was full of water so we had to wait for the next one and I wanted to turn tail and run!

The first part of the ride is very gentle and takes you on a pretty tour through magical glades with fish and lights everywhere. Then this mermaid appears, says everything is going to be alright and then changes into a demon type thing and laughs manically as you start to climb higher and higher! We climbed up and up and then suddenly a pair of doors opens and you go over the top and fall dramtically downwards into a pool of water. The feeling was horrible! However, this was not the end! You go round the corner, drop down again and then have a short roller coaster ride in darkness before being shot out at the end, dripping wet, shaking all over and knowing you're never going to go on it again!

To calm down a bit we went and had a look at the manatees and the alligators before heading over to Key West to see the dolphins. We wanted to feed them but when we found out it was $28 for the four of us to have a tray of food each (and each person had to have a tray) we changed our mind! Deciding to have a little snack ourselves we went in search of an ice-cream and sat in the shade watching everyone walk past in the intense heat. The clouds had gone and it was extremely warm, not really weather for walking around so we went off to the sealion and otter stadium to see another show - Clyde and Seamore take Pirate Island.

The show was very popular and was completely full. About ten minutes before it starts, a mime artist appears and takes the mickey out of everyone coming in to take their seats. Most people are unaware that he's doing it, except for the audience of course, who laugh loudly at what he does, the poor victim completely oblivious!

The show was very good, and again, Keith enjoyed the slapstick humour and the animals who performed very well. When it ended we decided to call it a day and headed back to the villa for a couple of hours by the pool which was bliss!

Before going out in the evening to Mikey's choice - Miller's Ale House - we called into the local supermarket to get some more essentials. The sky was very stormy but we didn't have any rain, just a gorgeous sunset. The Publix we went to was great and very handy as it's only five minutes away. It was chock full of Brits all doing their shopping and we even noticed a British pub next door!

We had a short wait at the restaurant as it was extremely busy. The restaurant specialises in "Zingers", boneless chicken wings coated in a crispy batter and covered in the sauce of your choice. We had them as a starter between us, served, bizarrely, with sticks of celery.

The wait for the main course was a bit long, and our waitress kept apologising. Keith and I had chosen flat iron steak with spicy shrimp, Sophie went for fajitas (again!) while Mikey had turkey burger. I'd ordered a salad and baked potato with my meal, but when the food eventually came they were obviously forgotten...oh dear, Mikey! One less point. We caught the waitress, she brought the salad but said that they had run out of baked potatoes...hmmm!

It was a good meal, let down by the poor service, unfortunately. It will be interesting to see how the voting goes as the other three were very happy with their meals!

Some photos from Islands of Adventure on Monday. Click on them to see them a bit larger.

Monday 11 April - thrills and laughs galore!

Our plan was to get up early and go to Islands of Adventure as it opened, but Sophie slept in until 10.30am which scuppered our plans. It turned out to be a good thing, though, as we spent the day at the villa relaxing and went to the theme park at 4pm. Our aim was to experience the new Harry Potter ride which I'd heard was very busy with long waiting times. However, this plan to get to the park later was a brilliant one as we didn't have to wait at all.

Islands of Adventure is out of this world - so many vivid colours and things to look at. We had a quick drink first as it was very, very hot and then went on the Poseidon's Adventure tour which was a pleasingly silly walk undergound (it was beautifully cool) as Poseidon and Zeus battled it out with fire and water. The acting was a bit cheesy, but it made us laugh. Harry Potter then beckoned and I have to say that Universal have done a fantastic job with Hogwarts. The village houses were covered in fake snow and all the fronts were shops which featured in the film. Above all of this towered Hogwarts castle. We entered the castle, put our bags in a locker and then walked the fair distance to the start of the ride. I was a bit nervous as the warnng notices were very serious! The ride starts as you enter the castle and it was like being on the set of the film. I was very impressed. Half way along Harry, Hermione and Ron appear as holograms and explain the plot, but there's so much to see that we didn't really take it in.

Loading of the ride is very fast as the cars move constantly and you have to get in them very quickly! A staff member pulls down the restraint and then off you go! It was brilliant! Each car (four people) is on a long automated arm which throws you about left and right and up and down, but we never went upside down. As you move around, screens open up and all the characters appear in front of you. At one point we're with Harry on his broomstick and then you go into darkened bits with Valdemort looming out of the darkness and frightening the living daylights out of you! I wouldn't recommend this ride for very young children or those who have neck problems as we were jolted about a lot, backwards and forwards. However, it was very enjoyable and I'm looking forward to going on it again!

We stumbled out into the daylight, laughed hysterically at the awful photo taken of us and then had a pleasant half hour watching a Sinbad show with lots of stunts, pyrotechnics and water. As the park was nearing closing time, we hastened off to the Spiderman ride, taking in Jurassic Park on the way which we'll save for another day.

The Spiderman ride was very similar to the Simpsons ride and again we had no wait time and were soon flying through the air with Spidey around the streets of New York as we battled it out with villains. All good fun!

Our venue for the evening was City Walk and The Latin Quarter restaurant - Sophie's choice. It morphs into a club later in the evening but it was a lovely place to eat with candlelit tables and a video playing Latin music. the children had fajitas, Keith had half a chicken and I had chicken and beef on skewers served with yellow rice. The food was delicious.

City Walk is a wonderful place at night, full of restaurants, shops and clubs and a huge cinema. We walked back to the car, negotiated the freeways in the dark (a bit hairy) and went back to the villa, a glass of wine my treat as we sat by the pool!

Sunday 10 April. Settling in...

The first night in a strange place is always a little disturbed so we were up several times on Saturday night. Firstly because our body clocks were still attuned to UK time - 5 hours ahead - and secondly because of the small noises that weren't familiar to us, like the whirring of the fridge and the beeping of the alarm!

After breakfast we headed off to find the Thomson offices where we had to register. Luckily we knew roughly where they were but Sophie spotted them and after about ten minutes we were all done and heading to Walmart to get some more shopping. Walmart was HUGE! We bought essentials such as loo rolls, washing liquid and foods for lunch then returned to the villa to spend the afternoon by the pool.

I suppose I should mention our villa! It's beautiful, has four bedrooms, three bathrooms, a large open plan kitchen, diner, living room and a snooker room!

Our plan was to go to Universal in the late afternoon to activate our park tickets so we set off with Keith giving me great directions. The roads were a lot busier than the last time we were here, with the freeway being very busy indeed. It was slightly hairy having cars overtaking me on both sides! However, we found our way to the park without any trouble and activated our tickets very easily. The park looked busy but there was hardly any wait time for the four rides we managed to fit in! First stop was Shrek which Keith loved, especially when the dragon sneezed and we were squirted with water! Next stop was The Simpsons ride and I think we annoyed the Chinese family in front of us who shared our car as we were shrieking and screaming the whole way through, while they just sat there looking terrified! Men In Black was a fabulous ride and needless to say Mikey got the best score in shooting at the Aliens!

Our last ride was Jaws - very cheesy but great nonetheless. By now it was still very hot, and as we'd walked around the entire park we headed back to the villa to have a swim in the pool before dinner. The temperature in the car was measuring 96F so a cool down was definitely needed!

Our dinner choice of Sunday night was the local Applebees, great because it's literally five minutes away. It was packed to the gunnels so we had a little wait, but the food was delicious. Three of us chose steak while Sophie went for the half rack of baby ribs. We decided to start a new exercise over the next few nights...we will each choose a restaurant and then the other three will score it, as in Come Dine With Me! The person who picks the most popular restaurant will win $10 off the other three!

After dinner, it was back to the villa, a glass of wine for me (I found a 1.5litre bottle of my favourite wine in the supermarket!) and then thankfully to bed!

Hello from hot and sunny Florida!

Phew! What a day we had yesterday, and as usual, we can't go on holiday without some sort of drama happening! More of that later!

We had a brilliant journey, setting off from home at 5am and getting to Birmingham airport well ahead of most of the passengers on our flight which meant we were all checked in and sitting in departures by 6.15am. We had some breakfast, did some shopping (I treated myself to a litre bottle of Jamesons for the amazing price of £13.99 - great for a nightcap) and were boarding at just before 9am. The flight was great. We seemed to have more legroom with the Thomson flight and the children happily watched films and played on the games. Keith discovered Bejeweled Blitz and spent most of the flight playing either that or Who Wants to be a Millionaire (we won $1,000,000!)! I also have to say the food was very good - a four course meal which was delicious and then, just before we landed, a cheese and onion wrap and a scone. No complaints there at all. I sat by the window and had an amazing view of the icy wastes of Canada and Newfoundland which were incredible.

Landing in Sanford, the drama began...

We made our way through Immigration and this time I'd made sure I'd filled the form in correctly. We were almost the last to go through again and the man dealing with us seemed fine, although I did notice he'd put my passport to one side. Three of us had our fingerprints and photos taken and then he said to me that he needed to ask me some more questions, but that Keith and the children could go and collect our luggage.

Thinking that it was just another routine form of security I followed him to a waiting area and was then called into an office. He joked about my surname and then asked me when was the last time I'd been to the US. He looked very serious and I replied that I'd been to Florida in May 2009. Then he said when was the last time I was in trouble and I had a terrible feeling that the last time I'd been here I'd done something wrong, like been spotted on a camera for speeding or a parking fine. All these thoughts were racing through my head and I was trying to remember what, if anything, I'd done.

He made a joke when I said that as far as I knew I hadn't been in trouble and then he said seriously, "Have you ever been to Colombia?" The question was so unexpected I nearly burst out laughing, but I said no, never been and would never really want to go. Then he asked if I'd ever had dual nationality, i.e. British and Colombian and I said no, trying not to sound incredulous!

He then explained that they were looking for someone with the same details as me and that they were ruling me out, which he was 99% sure he'd done. He disappeared off, then came back and did a lot of typing into the computer and told me he was trying to purge all the information so that the next time I came back to the US it wouldn't happen again. I was speechless, to be honest, and although relieved that the situation wasn't serious, I was a little worried that someone may have been trying to impersonate me! The consequences of not being allowed into the country were not worth thinking about! I would have been even more worried if I'd rejoined my family and Keith had said he didn't know me, a la the film Unknown!!!

Of course Keith and the children were very worried when they saw me being taken away but at least they know now that I'm not a Colombian drug baron!

Heaving a huge sigh of relief we made our way to the Thomson desk, picked up the directions to the villa and then went to get our car for the two weeks. We had no hassle at the desk, other than a payment for a full tank of fuel, and we chose a Chevrolet which had a nice big boot to take all our luggage. The journey to the villa was without incident and we were very close to the house we had in 2009 which was great as I knew my way around.

We unpacked and then headed off to the Sweetbay supermarket where we bought some essentials for breakfast the next morning. Our first meal was at Chili's where Mikey was desperate to go and we had a lovely meal with very friendly waiting staff. Keith went for the full rack of ribs while Sophie had fajitas, Mikey had Big Mouth Bites (mini hamburgers) and I had some crispy chicken strips. Delicious! The children even had balloons made for them by Randy so they were happy!

Back at the villa we rounded off our very long day with a drink by the pool (after my strawberry lemonade in the restaurant the whiskey was fantastic) and a sleepy chat. We were all shattered but I knew that the next morning we would be up early as we'd still be on UK time!

Spring cleaning!

Half of today has been spent giving the house a good clean and changing all the beds. It wasn't all work, though, as we escaped to the pub at lunchtime for a snack and a drink, which was very relaxing. The warm sunshine had brought lots of people out and we had Sophie with us as she had a training day at school. Poor old Mikey was still stuck in the classroom, but they did have an early Easter Egg Hunt to make up for being cooped up indoors on a beautiful day!

In the late afternoon, Sophie and I made the trip into town to go to the beauty salon where Sophie had false nails put on for her Birthday treat from my mum. I managed to avoid the Denis Healy look again by having my eyebrows shaped. I was very envious of Sophie's nails when she had them done - they were very natural looking and the therapist had just coloured them a delicate shade of pink with a clear varnish over the top. Now she'll have to look after them!

School dinner!

I had a lovely experience today when I was invited to Mikey's school for a "banquet". Mikey hadn't really told me what to expect, just that I had to be there at lunchtime and that he had made spaghetti bolognese, even though I'd chosen to have pizza. The children had been taking part in a Personal Interest Project and Mikey had chosen cooking, which was great!

I took my seat with the other mums, dads and grandparents and studied the handwritten menu. We started with butternut squash soup with croutons, followed by the meal of our choice and then finished with assorted tartlets and tea or coffee served with handmade sweets. The entire meal was made from scratch (even the pasta and pizza bases) and it was fantastic. The children served the meals themselves, cleared away the plates and they were brilliant. We all had a lovely time and as I wasn't expecting a four course meal, it was all the more special!

A walk in the sunshine

Although today started off cloudy, by the time I'd got to work at 8am, the sun was breaking through and the temperature was rising. We had two work experience boys in today and Polly, with a lot of patience and humour, managed to keep them occupied for most of the day. We were nowhere near as busy as yesterday so Keith and I escaped after lunch and walked to the post box, about twenty minutes away. It was very warm and sunny and it was lovely to be out enjoying the fresh air, rather than being cooped up in the office, grappling with the payroll!