The fairly regular trip to Delaware, with a side of New York City! Pre-travel and Travel Day!

Pre-travel Day – Thursday 13th March

We had a slightly unusual lead up to our trip as Rob was away on a work trip until the afternoon of our pre-travel day.

We had therefore started pre-packing before the actual day which is unusual for us.

Here is the position as at Sunday evening:

On actual pre-travel day I was working from home so that I could make sure the car had enough charge.

I had to have a call at 0800 which was far too early (as I had Peloton to do before that) and then I headed down town to get my hair done.

I walked back home and was back working again at about 1130. I carried on until Rob got back at about 1500 and then we both logged off and finished the packing.

Rob did a quick workout while I finished up our preparation (a bit of cleaning for the burglars obviously) and then we packed the car and headed on our way.

We stopped at Fleet where we got KFC for dinner and added a little bit of charge to the car and then we carried on the short extra distance to the Thistle at T5.

We paid £209 for a king room and parking for our trip (which worked out as 9 nights I think).

We did end up buying a ridiculously expensive drink from the Thistle ‘shop’ which I think was £3.99 for a can of sprite! We headed to bed pretty soon after we arrived as we had an early start the next morning (which becomes a theme for the trip.)

Travel day - Friday 14th March

We had an early start at 0530, we paid our pod charge (£8) and were soon in a pod on our way to T5.

We used the club check-in (as bronze members) even though we were in WTP and we were in giraffe by 0650.

We had our breakfast, which was once again more expensive than it should be (but service was good today) and then we took the shuttle to the B gates.

We boarded about on time, we did have a long taxi though so I’d guess took off at about 10am.

We were provided a snack (pretzels) and drink quickly followed by lunch (I was worried we might get brunch).

Rob had the butter chicken and I had the pasta option. Both were quite good and much better than we have had previously in economy.

Dessert was white chocolate ‘cake’ which was again very tasty.

I then watched Barbie and fell asleep for a couple of hours which was good, I think Rob also had a short nap. We were then given some more snacks (dairy milk little bars.)

I watched some Young Sheldon episodes and then we were given the chicken pastries. These aren’t great but they are at least edible.

We arrived in NYC just after 1300 (due at 1340) but it was a long taxi, we whizzed through immigration by just after 1330 using global entry. Our bags took a little while but we were on our way just before 1400.

We took air train to the rental car place, did the ‘paperwork’ and the car was apparently not ready.

We waited the time we were told (10-15 mins) before someone told us it had been there the whole time. I appear not to have taken a photo of the car 

We got ourselves sorted and the sat nav loaded before heading out where we found there was a lot of traffic in Brooklyn and Staten Island.

It took us 3 hours to reach Wilmington but it was Friday afternoon / evening so somewhat expected.

We unpacked and exchanged various snacks, we had brought a selection of dark chocolate goodies and Jennifer had amazingly remembered to get us some girl scout cookies (which I had forgotten to request!)

We headed to Kid Shelleen’s for dinner, we did have a little wait for a table as it was quite busy but we were able to sit and catch up near the bar while we waited.

I had a chicken Caesar salad, Rob had steak and Tom had Fish and chips (I think these were not as disappointing as some he has tried.) Jennifer, I believe may also have had a salad but her meal did not get documented….

We even managed desserts! Tom had some doughnuts (coffee flavoured?) while Rob and I both had brownies….I had the half portion while Rob went all in. I believe Jennifer had some ice cream.

We walked back to the house and had achieved a fairly good time adjustment thanks to the nap on the flight.

This year's Boxing Day Bargain is San Diego! Day 5 - Hometime!

Time to go home 

We headed to the gym at 0645, I did a 45 min ride followed by a stretch (still after that 20,000 minute target for the year!)

We headed back to the room to sort out our packing before a final breakfast at Arlo at 0900 it appears we both went for the 2 egg breakfast again with biscuit for me and toast for Rob (not pictured).

We sorted out our final bits in the room and then checked out leaving our bags with reception.

Rob and I took the trolley to Mission Valley where there was a post office where we could mail Tom’s t-shirt to him.

View back toward the hotel from the trolley stop - with a nice daytime view of 'stabby alley.'

There was also a Best Buy and Target so we obviously needed to fit in a quick visit while we were in the area!

With the help of google maps we found the post office (only open for 1 hour today as it was New Year’s Eve. We secured packing materials and sent the T-shirt – we were hoping it would reach Tom in time for his upcoming birthday (post visit note – it did!)

Next we went to target where we had a look around but didn’t make any significant purchases – I did get a StarBucks and Rob got a protein drink 

We then walked to Best Buy (which was a few minutes away) before taking the trolley back to Fashion Valley.

At the shopping mall Rob got a slice of pizza from Sbarro (no pic as I was looking for other options).

I then realised that I could have cheesecake for lunch from the Cheesecake Factory so we went downstairs to get some! We did see a guy sat outside the Rolex shop taking his new watch out whilst sat on a bench…..given the proximity to stabby alley we though he was very brave.

Cheesecake secured we sat in the sun and ate them 

We took a final wander around the shops then walked back to the hotel and got an uber to airport.

We arrived at airport at about 1500, we dropped off our bags using the bronze check-in which got our bags tagged as priority (not that it usually makes much difference).

Rob and I sailed through security via tsa pre, and the others followed reasonably quickly via the standard route.

We all took a quick look in the shops and then got a drink and snack then waited to board.

We boarded pretty much on time and the flight wasn’t full so after takeoff I asked if I could move so Rob and I ended up with 3 seats each and so had little beds for the flight.

I had the cold tray as part of dinner and then went to sleep where I managed quite a few hours of sleep which was good. Rob also managed to get some sleep but the others said they had been uncomfortable (even though they had 3 seats between the 2 of them).

I didn’t bother with breakfast – we all know that they tend to be awful and so I’d rather stay hungry and get something after landing.

We were due to land about 30 mins early but we had to hold so landed pretty much exactly on time 1230.

Based on my photos I can see that we were exiting the airport to go on the pods at about 1315. Not too bad, as the last few times it has taken us at least an hour.

We arrived back at the pods to rain (as expected) and luckily it was only a short walk back to the cars.

We had a fairly smooth drive home, we didn’t need to charge and so we managed the whole trip without stopping.

We picked up some bread and milk on the way home and had tea, coffee and toast for a snack on our return!

Oh and in exciting (for me) news I just managed to pass the 20,000 minutes peloton milestone 

This year's Boxing Day Bargain is San Diego! Day 4

Another fairly early start – we woke up about 0600 went to the gym first and then breakfast at Arlo.

Today I had the 2 eggs breakfast but with toast instead od the biscuit and Rob had the carnivore omelette. He said it was nice, but a little bit odd in terms of how it was made.

After we were ready we got an uber to the San Diego Zoo. We bought tickets online outside again as the line was long – really we should just start buying tickets online before we get to the attractions!

We entered the zoo at just after 10 and wandered around without really consulting the map (which with hindsight was a little unwise.)

We did the tiger trail followed by hippos and some more big cats (aren’t you loving the detailed animal descriptions?)

The next section was zebras then polar bears before we took the skyline back to the other side. Rob is not keen on these but made the trip as it was a reasonably long walk.

We saw some birds, then tortoise and some alligators or crocodiles – again I know the details here are stunning but there are lots of photos!

It was almost lunchtime and we decided to get a sundae each - we both had banana splits….probably could have shared!

They were about $15 each so we assumed they would be smaller (theme park prices) but they were quite large but very good and it was warm so definitely a good choice for today.

Next up were koalas, meerkats, donkeys, llamas, camels and then elephants followed by lions.

We then looked at the ridiculously long line for the pandas which I’d guess it was at least 2 hours long. We realised that had we looked earlier you could book timeslots (a bit like fast pass) but we didn’t know about it earlier (see I said it was a mistake not consulting the map!)

Luckily one of the pandas was up on the hill and we managed to see both of them from over the fence (with a bit of stretching). Rob also managed to get a little bit of video  Based on what we saw I am not sure it was worth the long line…especially as there were many rules as to what you could and couldn’t do!

We moved on to the Pygmy hippos and gorillas and decided that we should start thinking about getting some food as I wanted to stay to see the xmas lights.

We managed to get an early dinner at Albert’s which was a nice little restaurant inside the park. It was much better than we expected, I had another salad (you saw the sundae earlier!) and Rob had steak frites.

This wasn’t the cheapest meal but it was a good break from the park – total cost was $85 inc tip.

We then carried on around and saw the flamingos before taking the skyline back to the other side – so that we could walk back and see the lights along the way.

We saw a mountain lion that clearly wanted to eat a small child – it was slightly spooky – she was stalking back and forth – obviously there was a glass fence between us but she really did seem to want to eat the child.

We then saw the lioness  followed by elephants at night and a sleeping jaguar.

We topped off the day with some holiday lights before taking an uber back to hotel at about 1800.

I am sure we watched some more tv and had another earlyish night.