Postcards from Orlando #4 - Wizarding World of Harry Potter Hogwarts Express

In a week that has brought much sadness to both the Orlando community and people across the world I dedicate the remaining eight videos of this series to all the people affected by the tragic shooting on Sunday.

In video 4 we take a wander around the ride line for The Wizarding World of Harry Potter - Hogwarts Express.

Postcards from Orlando #3 - Exploring Disney's Hollywood Studios

Here it is, postcard number 3 from Orlando has arrived.  

Join with us as we walk around Disney's Hollywood Studios.

Postcards from Orlando #2 - The Wizarding World of Harry Potter - Hogsmeade

Welcome to our second postcard from Orlando as I take you on a short journey around Hogsmeade at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

Postcards from Orlando #1 Illuminations reflections of Earth

 

Welcome to a short series of videos we are calling Postcards from Orlando.  In our first video we visit Epcot for the finale of Illuminations - reflections of Earth.

Lake Buena Vista Resort Village and Spa review

If you are looking at visiting WDW but want to stay off property we really enjoyed the Lake Buena Vista Resort Village and Spa.  Check out our review and room video. It is about 20 minutes drive to Magic Kingdom.

Main Street Trolley Show - Magic Kingdom Photoblog

I love the smaller scale entertainment you find at Disney World.  One piece I really enjoyed was the Main Street Trolley Show.

"Watch these citizens pour out of the trolley to dance and sing as they welcome you to the most magical place on earth!" 

The show lasts about twenty minutes and is currently on at 9.15am, 10.10am and 12.00pm.

Lots of energy and wholesomeness! 

Definitely one not to miss.

Travelling with a child with allergies to America with Virgin Atlantic

We hope that this blog post will be useful to people as we share our experience of travelling to Orlando with a child with nut allergies.

When we first started planning the trip last year we were surprised about the lack of information regarding taking medicine including an Epi-pen on a flight.  Judging by the number of post on Netmums this is clearly an important issue.

Our child is allergic to both walnuts and pecans and avoids eating them and coming in contact with them.  Following a bad allergic reaction requiring hospital treatment when he was younger he carries a bottle of Piriton (antihistamine) and an Epi-pen with him.

The main questions we needed help with were:

• Will there be any issues taking Piriton (a liquid) and an Epi-pen on a flight?
• What documentation should we take with us?
• What information should we tell the airline?
• Will this affect our travel insurance?

This is what we found out and a summary of our experiences.  We would definitely recommend your own research before you travel.

Will there be any issues taking Piriton (a liquid) and an Epi-pen on a flight?

Before we travelled we requested a new prescription for the Piriton as his old bottle had expired.  Conscious of the 100ml rule we didn't want to take the standard 150ml bottle on the flight.  Our local pharmacy were more than accommodating in splitting the bottle into two 75ml batches in smaller 100ml bottles.  Both were clearly labelled with all the relevant information.  We also requested a second prescription to take with us incase we had to buy more.  We put both bottles into small zip-lock sandwich bags and both myself and my wife took one bag each in our hand luggage.  We also put the epi-pen along with a duplicate prescription in a zip-lock bag and had in our hand luggage. 

What documentation should we take with us?

In addition to the duplicate prescriptions we obtained a letter from our GP outlining the medical condition our son has and the required medication.  We had to pay £25 for this.  We took photocopies of all our prescriptions and made sure that we both had copies in our hand luggage.

What information should we tell the airline?

Approximately two months before we travelled we emailed Virgin special assistance at special_assistance@fly.virgin.com where we outlined our son's issues.  We had a very nice reply back.  They double checked that we had requested a nut friendly meal for both the outward and return flight.

Will this affect our travel insurance?

We took out travel insurance with Tesco travel insurance and this did not complicate or change the premium for us.  We were asked the standard questions of which we were able to say "No" to everything.  At the end of the questions we explained about our son's allergy and because it did not answer "yes" at any point it was not considered an issue.  We definitely think you should mention any issues like this even if it is not flagged up by the questionnaire. A simple visit to the ER for a child could easily cost more than $2000.

Our experience of the flight

Outward travel through Gatwick was simple and we experienced no delays at security.  With the liquids being in 100ml bottles and the Epi-pen clearly visible we were not stopped or even questioned about it.  The Virgin crew came and checked which child was having the nut friendly meal and these were served separately.  The staff were very careful about checking with us at every food serving.  The only downside to the nut friendly meal was not being able to have the children's meal.

Coming back from America

We had no problems at all coming back through the TSA security checks at Orlando airport. The TSA agents didn't ask us for any documentation and were very happy for us to carry through the medicines in our hand luggage.

Final thoughts

We were pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to take our son into America even with his Epi-Pen and his medication.  I do think the key to this is preplanning and having everything you need with you.

Check list

• Eli-Pen packed in hand luggage in a zip-lock bag
• Liquid medicine in bottles less than 100ml
• Spare prescription and photocopy 
• Doctor's letter
• Email airline

This is based on our experience and research.  It is always worth discussing this with your own doctor.

An extra bit of Disney Magic happened at Animal Kingdom

I am a firm believer in the old saying of treat others as you would like to be treated yourself.  We made a real point of always saying "Please" and "Thank you" whilst we were in the parks.  It was obvious from a number of cast members reactions that this is not always the way that guests treat cast members.

Whilst we were at Animal Kingdom we caught the end of the end of the "Flights of Wonder" bird show in Asia.  Being an avid photographer I put my camera into high speed shutter mode and took lots of photos of the birds in flight.

As we were leaving the show I simply said "thanks" to the cast member and told them how much we had enjoyed the show and how I was pleased with the photos I had taken.

The cast member then told us to wait behind if we had a couple of minutes to spare.  It turned out that they were about to do some training with one of the younger birds and needed a family to simulate a small audience.  We were then treated to a small private training session for about five minutes.  It was really good to see how the training was carried out, but also to feel special that we were able to see it privately. 

You never know when an extra special moment of Disney Magic is going to happen, and we certainly didn't set out aiming for this to happen!

I do feel that cast members do appreciate good manners in the park and especially when guests say thank you after a ride or an experience.  

Have you had a moment where you have experienced an extra special bit of Disney magic? 

Florida Rain - August 2015

According to the Orlando Sentinel nearly 16 inches of rain fell in Orlando during August 2015. 

As we were gearing up for our vacation we were watching the news coming out of Orlando that July had already been a very wet month with lots of flooding in different areas.

Looking back over our 17 days in Orlando, it did rain nearly every day.  Much of the rain was the normal afternoon thunderstorm which dries us quickly.  As we got toward the end of the holiday the weather definitely turned very wet and I had a couple of driving experiences which were scary!

I was definitely not prepared for how quickly and how heavily the rain can fall and cause localised flooding whilst in Orlando. There were a couple of occasions when we decided to stay in the parks for "one last ride" which meant rather than leaving before the rain came we found ourselves leaving during a very heavy storm.

We did get wet, on a couple of days we got vey very wet.  

We did have some quite scary driving experiences and saw at least two accidents caused by people driving too quickly in the rain.

Did it spoil our vacation? No!

We did seem to see quite a few people leave the parks as soon as the first drop of rain fell.  We know that we got it wrong twice and probably should have left, but on most occasions we got it right!

A positive experience with TSA security at Orlando International Airport

We had been advised to allow plenty of time for security checks at Orlando International Airport so decided to join the line two hours before departure.  

At first glance the security line looked huge and we wondered if we would ever get to the end of it.  After a couple of minutes an officer came up to us and asked if we would like to join a shorter line at another entrance.  We thanked him and joined the other line.  Our passports and boarding passes were checked and we joined the next line for the screening.  

Again this looked like a very long line and we wondered how long it would take to get through.  We were getting slightly anxious as a number of passengers were being very vocal in the line.  We patiently waited our turn and quickly moved to the screening area.  The actual screening took a matter of seconds and we were though the line.  The only small confusion being an officer asking me to take off my Sweater, which my wife had to remind me meant my jumper!  The officer was perfectly happy with my sons Epipen and small 75ml bottle of antihistamine. I decided to carry though my DSLR, lenses, iPad, iPhone as part of my hand luggage.  I simply left all of this in my bag which was scanned.  If you are bringing a laptop you will need to take it out of your bag.

I appreciate that a large proportion of the screening takes places long before you arrive at the airport via flight lists etc but we found the whole process very painless.

The whole experience could not have taken more than twenty minutes and at all times we were treated politely by all the officers.  I definitely got the impression that if you were calm and polite and followed instructions the process is simple and there is nothing to worry about.

Before we travelled we had read the documentation suggesting that all suitcase locks as TSA compliant.  We followed the instructions and made sure that our suitcase and bag straps were able to opened by TSA if needed.

When we arrived at Gatwick we saw a couple of cases which had been opened by TSA and had to have the locks forced.  

When we got home we found neatly placed inside our case a "notice of baggage inspection".  This was my son's bag so we wonder what might have triggered this inspection or if it was just a random sample.

Top Tips.

1. Read the TSA advice here before you travel

2. Be polite and wait patiently in the line

3. Delays were caused by people taking more than 100ml through their hand luggage - don't do it!

4. If you are going to lock your suitcase use a TSA approved lock

Canadian Lumberjack Show - Epcot

We recently saw the Canadian Lumberjack Show at Epcot.  This is a relatively new show which has replaced the previous Off-Kilter show at the Mill Stage in the Canada Pavilion.  This engaging show sees the blue team pitched against the red team in a contest of skill and strength.

We watched most of the show and would have stayed longer if it hadn't been for our FastPass+ booking.

This was a very engaging and funny show with a good sprinkling of humour mixed in with the physical competition.  Depending on the time of day there is limited shade in front of the Mill Stage so can get vey warm.

CityWalk Hot Dog Hall of Fame - Trip Report

During our recent vacation in Orlando my sons became obsessed with eating hot dogs.  Everywhere we went all they wanted was a nice hot dog, so an obvious choice for us had to be the CityWalk Hot Dog Hall of Fame at Universal Studios.

Check out this link from Universal Studios CityWalk.

Do check out their website here with menu details.

Current opening times are Sunday to Thursday 11am - 10pm and Friday to Saturday 11am - 1am.

They are a quick service restaurant with plenty of outside seating in a nicely themed ballpark style area.  The food is priced in the $9 - $14 range and we thought that it was definitely very good value for money.

Our experience was really positive, it was very clean and tidy, service was excellent and the food was freshly prepared quickly.  Ordering the food was very efficient and we were talked through all the different options and toppings available.

I had the legendary 2 foot long dog with extra pulled pork.  It was beautiful, tasty and so well presented!

This is definitely a place to eat and I would thoroughly recommend it.

Lake Buena Vista Resort Village & Spa - Room Tour Summer 2015

We have just come back from a great holiday in Orlando where we stated at Lake Buena Vista Resort Village & Spa. They are located very close to Disney and about 25 mins drive from Universal Studios so provide a great location for visiting all the parks.  

The condo was very clean and well equipped and we had great service from the staff there.  If you are looking for a good location not too far from the airport and close to all the parks this is an excellent choice.  

There is plenty of parking both covered and outside.  The complex has a great pool with pirate slide and a very nice poolside bar area.

We hope this room tour gives you a flavour of the condo. We would definitely recommend staying here.

Check out their website here http://www.lbvorlandoresort.com

We will be adding a more in-depth review and trip report later.

Wizarding World of Harry Potter - Diagon Alley - Trip report

We recently visited the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios and loved every second of our visit.  Diagon Alley is amazing and Escape from Gringotts was an awesome ride.  The attention to detail in the theming is stunning.

Click on any photo to see full size.