Trip 2: 'hot dog' here we come

deepblue

Mouseketeer
Joined
Mar 25, 2009
Day One - London.
Up at 6.30 am for our flight to London. E was very well behaved on the plane, and actually for the whole trip. She was very excited to go on a plane and also the train to Victoria where we left our luggage (£8 per bag for upto 24hrs).
Got the tube to Leicester Sq and walked over to Covent Garden and straight to the London Transport Museum. I highly recommend this for little kids, esp boys I suppose, who are into vehicles. They have a number of full size buses, horse carriages, trams and trains which you can climb on and pretend to drive. There are smaller models in cases and the usual pictures and information boards you would expect to see in a museum as well. There's a cafe and a picnic area with smaller wooden vehicles as a play area and a Brio table for the smaller ones. Kids (or adults!) get a card to stamp as they go round which cuts out little shapes eg a train into the card.
After this we wandered around and back to Pizza Hut near Piccadilly Circus where we ate a LOT! We took a cab from Victoria Station to the Novotel St Pancras, £16, as we couldn't face lugging the child, pram and the case on the tube at night.
I was very impressed with the hotel. We had to book it as part of our deal on the Airmiles and paid a little extra for the priviledge. The bathroom is oddly enough in the middle of the bedroom, but this meant that it was separated into two areas with a corridor in between. Our bed was at the far end and the sofa-bed for E in the near end, so it was almost like having a suite. There was no bath however. It's a couple of minutes walk to St Pancras Intl with the Travelodge and the Premier Inn just slightly further down the Euston Road.
 
Sounds like you trip is off to a flying start :goodvibes

PS moved this from the PTR thread :thumbsup2
 
Day 2 - Eurostar to Disney
Up early again and walked down to St Pancras. We got some breakfast and waited for the shops to open (about 9am on the Sunday) to stock up on nappies, snacks etc.
Check in was smooth and we were soon on board the train. I had requested a table when I booked and although there were a lot of passengers joining at Ashford we were lucky enough to get all four seats to ourselves despite having only booked two. The journey passed quickly and E fell asleep just before arrival. There was no band at Pancras nor characters at the Disney Express bag drop. Also the lift is closed until 30 June so we all had to pile up the escalator.
We had a reservation at the Steakhouse for Sunday Brunch at 2pm which we made without rushing. It was very busy and the food was delicious. We saw Minnie but she didn't make to our table at all. Gepetto and Eeyore came round later as did the balloon lady but she unfortunately didn't stop for us, probably because E was asleep in her pushchair still. We were able to use our dinner vouchers at face value.
We stopped at the carts before the Park entrance to get a Minnie balloon for E as she desperately wanted one last time. We weren't allowed to use the Shareholder's discount and the balloon kept falling down and getting in the way. We left it in the hotel room the rest of the trip, but she enjoyed it there.
People were starting to wait for the Parade when we arrived so we stopped where we were at the top of Main Street just before the plaza. It was accidentally quite a good spot as the floats came directly towards us before straightening to go down Main Street, if I've explained that well at all. We also got the princess stop but we couldn't really see the back of the floats from where we were. We were second in line, as it were, so we got a good view. I started to get a bit emotional when the music started but managed to get myself back under control!
After this we walked straight on iasm and then up the the Railroad at the Fantasyland stop and went round to Frontierland for our Silver Spur 7.30 reservation. We had been warm in London and were only wearing tshirts under our winter coats and we were freezing. Luckily we had a thick cardi for E so she was warm.
At the Silver Spur we waited ages to order but the food flowed swiftly after that. Everything we had was nice, especially my chocolate cake. We left around 8.30 (park open until 10) and the park was pretty quiet. For the first time we got to see the castle and Main Street lit up.
There was a bit of a queue to check in at the HNY but eventually we got to our room. I'd forgotten how big they are! We were on the ground floor in the corner and had a partial lake view down to Panoramagique. Window was filthy though. There was no bed set for E so we called housekeeping and they must have taken an hour to come. We had unpacked, sorted out and E and I in our pjs before he arrived. He spoke very little English, went away and came back with a cot which E definitely won't sleep in. It was far too late, nearly 11pm, at this point so she came in with us that night. It was fine, but not a great start at the hotel.
 
I always get emotional watching the parade too!! ;)

We also had a similar problem with a bed for DD when we went (i.e. there wasn't one!) so we all ended up in one bed! Cosy!

Our Minnie Mouse balloon drove DH mad on our trip as it kept hitting him in the face :rotfl2: won't be getting one this time...!

Looking forward to hearing more...
 

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