Quicker to walk perhaps!

We arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare. Wandered down to the gate half a hour before boarding. 90 minutes later, we were still sitting there.
We had a passenger on a stretcher who needed to be set up in his own set of seats first. This accounted for most of the delay.

Once we did get on board, the pilot moved us away from the terminal only to then say that he was having trouble starting his number 4 engine. Another 20 minutes later, we are moved back to the terminal to allow the engineers better access to see where the problem might be.

They finally find that the starting motor on engine 4 is seized and needs replacing. Cue a further hour's delay whilst a replacement part is found and the necessary engineers are brought over.

We finally took off just over 3 hours late.

Journey back was quite rough as we flew along the east coast of the US. They are experiencing severe ice and snow storms there at the moment and I guess we were getting the edge of it.

Still, unlike the flight out, the inward flight was 150 minutes shorter due to the jet stream.

Poor guy waiting for us at Gatwick (with our lost door key!) had been there since 7:30 that morning. We got to him just before 1pm.

Time to pack!

We cannot wait to get back to the cold of the UK. I know, lets get up in the middle of the night and start packing !!!!!

We need to be checked out by 7.30 to allow us time to get to our last character breakfact & combined checkout meeting. So as I type this, Linda is nearly finished with all our last minute packing.

We plan to spend the remainder of the day in MGM before returning to the UK this evening.

Can't wait :/ ;)

Epcot

The afternoon saw us in EPCOT. We had a meal package that also allowed guaranteed seating into the Christmas Candlelight Procession festival. This is a sort of carol concert with lots of singers and a 40 piece orchestra. There is also a guest speaker who narrates the Nativity story.
Our speaker was the actress Andie McDowell.
We were glad that we had booked the package in the end. The queue for the reserverd seating was about 3-400 people long. However, the standby queue was even longer! It would be possible to watch from the pathway at the back, but it was far more comfortable on the benches (although not by much!)

All-together a very festive way to end the holiday.

Something different

The temperature was still high today, but the humidity had really rocketed up. Therefore, we wanted a change from the hectic parks this morning.o after breakfast we drove over to I-drive and had a round of golf on one of the many themed crazy golf parks here.This course is themed with Pirates and it is quite easy to lose your ball in the water. Coupled with tunnels and rope bridges, it made an interesting hour's play.After a long struggle I emerged victorious!

Bit o' Shoppin'

Today was our last totally clear day. We decided to spend a couple of hours in the shops.
I was still looking for a couple of Wii games - Guitar hero III and Link's Zapper. Both of which were finally found in Toys 'r' us thanks to a tip from Jason. Just need to get them home now!

Came back for a hour or so in the late afternoon before venturing out again for a meal (TGI Fridays) and then having a wander through Downtown Disney.

Talk to the hand

Despite my attempts to convince her otherwise, Linda insisted on doing the Rapids ride at Animal Kingdom complete with poncho. Needless to say she got some 'chicken' taunts as we queued up from people coming off the ride wet. We did the ride three times, back to back. I, being a man, didn't bother with a poncho. We rode at 11am. My shorts were still damp the next morning!

Ahoy there!

Decided to start the day a little differently this time. We wandered down to the dock at the edge of the hotel and hired a small launch to wander around the lakes in front on WDW.
On our way back in we caught sight of a sign advertising the Segway off-road tour. Sadly though, they are now all booked for the mornings we still have spare (it's not a 7 day thing). Next time, perhaps.