Book 'em, Dano

Holiday plans are well underway. Flights and the accommodation (via Ele's colleague's timeshare) have been booked and paid for. We are flying to Atlanta, Georgia, and will be driving down to Orlando. Having never driven in the US before (or on the other side of the road at all, for that matter), I thought I'd ease my way slowly into it with a small 7 hour, 400 mile journey. Seems like the sensible thing to do.

Having been investigating car hire prices, all I can conclude is that they vary wildly. We want a 4x4 so that we are higher up for Jess & Joe, and hopefully have a bit more luggage space. The quotes seem to vary from £320 to £600. We have to be careful to book one that includes all the relevant insurances, though. Still, plenty of time yet.

We are probably going to take Joe's car seat on the plane. According to BA the seat is 18.5" wide, and according to mothercare.com, his car seat is 18.7" wide... I'm sure it'll fit... It'll be much better for him on the plane, because he'll be able to lie back and sleep. He'll also be more inline with the TV screen in the seat back and unable to stand up on the chair, which he'd be doing otherwise. He's usually quite comfortable in his seat, and he can always come out for a bit here and there. It'll also save hiring a seat when we get there.

I also appeared to underestimate the theme park entry cost. I think it's actually more like 2 arms and 1 leg per person. We did look at going to a place called Discovery Cove where you can swim with dolphins, but that costs a staggering amount of money. For us to go in (Joe being free), it would cost about £300, and then dolphin-swimming is another £50 each. So £350 for just Jess to swim with a dolphin. Oh you get lunch and get to wade with some rays and feed some birds, but I can spend £100 per person in better ways, frankly. So we're giving that a miss.

Looking forward to it, but it's still a long way off...