Florida 04/22 – Fun Spot Orlando + Summary
Time to bring this one to a close then. Not been looking forward to reliving the ending through ranty ramblings. Our final day was allocated to mopping up whatever might have been necessary before sadly departing from Florida. It all seemed over in a flash, as with all good holidays. A flash of lightning you might say.
Day 10 – Fun Spot America
With no major cred catastrophes to amend, all that was really needed was the other Fun Spot. The more popular (conveniently located) but less good one.
Their Kiddie Coaster actually has a name to go with the cute train face, so that’s a plus for #1 Sea Serpent.
Feels like I’ve ridden more than 4 of these 395m models by now and #2 Freedom Flyer just became moving for the sake of motion, but at least they have lap bars. The 453m is where it’s at. Looking forward to the 550m being built, especially because it’s supposedly 569m.
The fact that I keep dropping the word lightning may sound like I’m bigging up #3 White Lightning, but I’m really not. Having ridden Heidi mere weeks ago and spent more time than necessary with the Polish equivalent, this is also nothing more than a +1. S’alright.
Not the most thrilling note to end on in the end, all business really. In and out in ten minutes, leaving time for a lazy afternoon of shopping and trudging to the airport with hours to spare.
And then it all went wrong.
We dropped the car off with barely any acknowledgment (which would later come back to bite us) and headed in for the usual rigmarole. Check in, bag drop, food, security. While we were milling around at one point, we noticed the weather looked a bit rough through the glass ceiling. Big rain and a single flash of lightning. The terminal roof was actually leaking in certain places. Thought nothing of it.
As soon as security was cleared we had to head to the little train that takes you to the gate. The departure board here suddenly said there was a 3 hour delay on our flight. That’s nice.
3 hours of abject boredom and post trip blues at a gate later, we hadn’t been given a gate, we each received an email from the airline saying sorry mate, your flight has been cancelled, try again tomorrow. Very nice.
It wasn’t nice that there was zero presence of airline staff at this gate part of the airport to offer any assistance at this point, but I was surprisingly chill about it all. We left the area and took the little train back again, assuming that the only real point of contact with the airline was the check-in desk again. It was.
Having seemingly beaten most of the other poor displaced souls, we queued for a while before being told to stand to one side while they prioritised checking in the flight to London Heathrow (we were London Gatwick) so that they could ‘deal with us later’. I suppose putting us on that one would be too much to ask. It was.
Once they were all sorted, the airline man began to address the small crowd (it was meant to be a nice, quiet flight) with the dreaded ‘nothing they can do’ spiel. Apparently they had tried to rebook us on the Heathrow flight but had been overruled by some big dogs in corporate. Come back tomorrow at the same time for the same flight. Good luck getting a hotel, we can’t help, the airline might pay you back. Goodbye.
Because half of America had just had flights cancelled due to bad weather, the hotel sitatuation was pretty dire. I dived onto booking.com and nabbed the first thing I could find within a 20 mile radius that wasn’t several hundred pounds, but still more than I’ve ever paid for a night’s stay in my life.
Suddenly we had a day to spare, albeit not much of a useful one, so we considered whether it was worth re-hiring a car. Half an hour not moving in a queue of several thousand people eventually said no, everyone else was having the same idea. Eventually we caved and paid well over the odds for an uber (£50 for 20 mins), finally crashing at the hotel exhausted, yet having done nothing.
Something had seemed familiar in the name of the place I had booked, perhaps it was a subconscious reaction from my inner coaster fan.
Day 11?! – Fun Spot America
So the hotel just happened to be literally on-site at the good Fun Spot.
Which meant a cheeky morning lap on Mine Blower, to turn the mental pain into physical pain for just one glorious minute.
The ordeal wasn’t quite over yet as, upon our dejavu arrival at the airport, two of the three of us were unable to check in. The system had gone wrong and the airline staff were virtually powerless to do anything about it.
Two and a half hours later, after doing nothing but standing at the check in desk in total despair at how much faff it was for at least a dozen staff to put two people on a plane they were already supposed to be booked on, our patience prevailed. And now we have to run for said plane.
Wait, no we don’t, it’s delayed for two hours again.
Well, at least we’re taxiing now.
Wait, no we’re not, apparently there are two bags in the hold that are unaccounted for.
God damn BA.
Summary
Total states – 1
New creds – 40
New dark rides – 37
New parks – 11
New wacky worms – 0
Best coaster – Iron Gwazi
Best dark ride – Rise of the Resistance
Best park – umm…
Distance travelled – not much
Spites – 2 we knew, otherwise 0/40 (0%)!
Slacker. I’ll be back.