Saturday October 27th
[08:28]
Packing day today. It's going to be hard as we're both knackered from last night!
Linda's moving the cases around and we are trying to get the weight even over all the cases.
Flight is on time at the moment, despite the Hurricane Sandy issue which continues to move up the East Coast.
Once packed we're going to get over to Downtown Disney to check-in then spend a couple of hours in a cinema we think. Both of us are too tired to do another park today!
[17:48]
Sitting in the departure lounge at Orlando International Airport. Our morning has gone roughly like this...
7:00 - alarm goes off
7:10 - open eyes
7:20 - shower
8:00 - start packing
9:00 - first weigh of cases - two almost 30KG (the limit is 23) one 16 one mid 22.
9:10 - reshuffle
10:00 - second weigh - two at 25, one at 23, one at 22
10:10 - reshuffle
10:20 - third weigh - two at 24.5, one at 23.5, one at 23
10:30 - reshuffle
10:35 - give up - just pack it into the car!
10:50 - first cases into the car
10:59 - run back to room in case auto check-out locks our keys!
11:02 - finally close the door on the room and head with the last of the cases to the car
11:20 - Downtown Disney for early check in.
11:30 - Lady doing the case weighing gives Linda the wink at the heavy cases - apparently it's a woman thing!
11:40 - Off for breakfast at IHOP!
After a nice meal at a packed IHOP we headed back to Downtown Disney and went into the AMC 24 screen cinema. Despite Frankenweenie apparently having already started 10 minutes before we bought the tickets, we were sat down in the screen and had watched the last two trailers before the film started. I actually enjoyed it! A Halloween theme and amusing too, despite the black and white.
A quick run around Downtown Disney's shops before we headed back off to the airport.
Car was returned 30 minutes before time with 55 miles left in the tank so pretty good there too.
Loooong queue to get through security, but despite all the crap we're lugging with us, we got through without issue!
[18:45]
Flight about to start boarding so we're off to the departure gate.
[19:25]
No boarding yet - in fact we're due an 'update' to the boarding status at 19:30. Sounds like there's a technical issue with the plane - Jersey Girl - and people are actively working on it at the moment.
[19:58]
The update was... there is no update. Engineers are still working on the issue. It has not been released what the issue actually is either.
[20:51]
Update now is that if the plane has not boarded by 21:15 then the flight won't be going tonight. You can see there are people working on the number 2 (?) engine (inner left wing) which is obviously where the issue must be. I very much doubt that they will get people on the plane within the next 22 minutes... Any longer than that and I think there's issues with how long the pilots have been on duty - there's a limit to how long a pilot can be on duty and obviously this 2 hour delay is fast eating into this time.
[20:57]
Massive cheer just gone up - we will be boarding at 21:15 after all. 400-odd people just all shouted at once!
[22:34]
Oh dear. We all boarded, more to satisfy airport regulations than in any hope of flying. 45 minutes later and we have now been sent back to check in. I guess its a hotel for the night now. :(