F***ing It Up In Florida - How Not To Holiday In The Sunshine State - Part Two
The First Week - Chase-ing The Banks, Speedy Meals And Frogs In The Pan
You'll have to forgive me for not sticking to some kind of linear sensible format for this. I'm not a proper writer who would keep copious notes each day of their trip to regale you with the minutest of details.
Instead, I have my brain and memory and I'm not sure of the exact day that some of these events occurred, just that they did.
Hence I'm going to lump things in to weekly events and happenings as nothing really came close to needing the detail of the first day of the holiday.
And besides some things went on over multiple days, and even all three weeks.
The third day of the holiday dawned with all four of us in the same continent, which was an improvement on the day before. We decided to head up to IHOP for breakfast and were served by a very cheerful local lady, who clearly listed visiting a dentist way down her list of priorities.
With a mouth of teeth that resembled Stonehenge, she was explaining to us how hot it had been here over the last few weeks, up five or six degrees from the usual temperatures of 31 and 32, and with it the humidity made it feel like it was in the 40s.
She wasn't wrong. On the TV in our first week we watched a report that explained that it had been the hottest it had been in Florida over the past week or so for over 25 years (1994) and furthermore, the heat was set to continue.
Now, I don't know about you, but my internal thermometer goes something like this:-
- 5 degrees and below - Too bloody cold. Stay in and put the fire on.
- 5-12 degrees - Still too cold. Enough to make you moan about the bloody weather.
- 13 degrees - The tipping point as to whether it is warm enough to go for a round of golf.
- 14-18 degrees - "It's getting warmer" up to "Ah, isn't it lovely out today? Not too hot!"
- 19 degrees - Optimal golfing temperature!
- 20-23 degrees - It's warm isn't it? Break out the Solero's.
- 24-27 degrees - Officially too bloody hot.
- 28-32 degrees - Holiday Hot. Very uncomfortable but you put up with it because you've paid a fortune.
- 33-36 degrees - Ok, you are taking the piss now. Danger of bits of me melting.
- 37+ degrees - Fucking Silly. I couldn't care less about the parks, I am staying in air conditioned places and not moving.
The Fisher King
Suffice to say this made things like fishing a bit of a challenge. Blairty though was a braver man than I and he would often head out to the lake with a deckchair and his fishing stuff to fish for 15-20 minutes, or half an hour or so when the temperatures started to drop into the mid 30s.
He was rewarded with over 100 fish being caught over the holiday, plus two turtles. One of the fish was a large mouth bass, which took his smaller blue gill as he reeled it in.
Given that he was sat down in the sun with his cap on (this is surgically attached to him), he developed an interesting tan on his neck and arms and on the top of his knees. He looked like a rejected Jean Paul Gaultier design with his patchy sunburn enmeshed with his cap, spindly white legs in shorts and dark brown arms and face.
After fishing he'd traipse inside hot and bothered, sit in the chair and pass on vital information that we didn't know.
"It's bloody hot out there."
"It's too warm for me now."
I wimped out for the vast majority of the time as it was indeed too hot. I went fishing a couple of times and ended up with two fish. Both came in the single longer session I fished (in the picture above) on one of the rare cloudy days when the temperature wasn't as fierce.
A bit shit considering I'd dragged all the fishing gear over with me.
Blairty's enthusiasm for fishing was greatest at the start of the holiday, especially when he read in the Villa information folder that the resident Gator in the lake had had to be 'rehomed' due to daft people deciding to feed it.
Rehomed is a synonym which means either, chucked into the swamps away from humans, or chucked into the deep fat fryer in batter to be served up with a dip and a cool beer.
He was very happy to sit relatively near the edge of the water and fish after reading this information.
This would change near the end of the second week of the holiday when Katharine snapped something in the water.
Old Alan here wasn't a small 'gator by any means. We reckoned around 7 to 8 feet in length and furthermore, there were at least two smaller alligators spotted in the lake at various other times too.
Alan's presence had a notable effect on Blair's fishing habits which became less frequent and also lacked a chair as he didn't fancy sitting around looking like a par-boiled ready meal that's been sun-dried for a few weeks.
That said, he racked up over his ton of fish so he was a happy man. Anyway, I digressed a bit there, so let's get back to IHOP.
Hop Back to IHOP then To Shop
The orthodontically challenged lady handed us our bill (great value for money for brekkie as always) and I asked for a lemonade to go.
She brought me what looked like a bucket with a straw sticking out filled with enough ice to make the Titanic hide and lemonade cold enough to freeze testicles at three feet.
We then headed to Lake Buena Vista Factory stores to have a look around as we hadn't been for a few years.
It was then that we noticed something. For a Saturday morning, in mid-August close to the Disney parks, there wasn't much traffic on the road. I put it down to us being out and about early.
Lake Buena Vista still has some major stores, Nike, Tommy Hilfiger and others, but it is looking a bit tired nowadays and there are more 'cheapo' clothes shops than designer retailers.
However, with an order for some trainers for Jess, we headed to the Nike store to see if they were cheaper than in the UK.
For many years, trainers were so much cheaper in Florida than in the UK that we used to bring at least one pair home with us, if not two.
Sadly this is no longer the case in the named stores. On average the trainers were more expensive than in the UK by a considerable margin. The one's Jess wanted were $120 in the Nike store, and she said she could get them online in the UK for around £60-£70. Robbing barstewards.
This was a trend that would occur in almost every store, except for the cheap end of line stores like Ross Dress for Less.
Buy a T-shirt from the Nike Factory store, it would be $40. Get a similar T-shirt from Ross Dress for Less, and it would be $8 dollars, or two for $12.
A pair of trainers from the Nike Factory store - anywhere from $40 to over $300. Pair of Nike trainers from Ross Dress for Less, $18, and I got a pair of Swiss for $21 too.
Suffice to say, we learned quickly that they were the shops to go to if you wanted an item of clothing.
Plus my mum and Katharine took pity on a lady in a shop that hadn't seen much custom. The lady confessed that because of the heat and the rising prices in Florida that things had been 'dead' this summer.
She also directed us to another cheapo shop across the way, in which Katharine bought a pair of denim shorts and was served by the slowest and campest man in Florida.
Where's Everybody Gone?
The empty roads now started to make a bit more sense and over the course of the holiday, we found that she was absolutely right. I have never seen Florida so quiet. One day we drove up the full length of International Drive, and back again, and we barely saw another car.
Restaurants that you usually had to wait to get into in the evening, were empty. Car parks deserted, no queues at the tills. Supermarkets were much quieter than usual. It was like the start of Eight Days Later.
I half expected to see brainless, half-dead, weaponised zombified lunatics roaming the streets. Then I realised it was Florida and a bastion of Trump supporters and they certainly didn't need any more of that type of sub-human.
The Parks were still busy, ostensibly because they have to be. I'm going to get onto them in a bit. With both barrels. Sorry Walt!
We had one wait at a restaurant the entire holiday, and that was literally for 30 seconds and that was at a restaurant which, at its busiest times, trip advisor said had a 1 hour wait at the very least.
All the usually busy roads, the 192, John Young Parkway, Orange Blossom Trail, International Drive, Vineland etc, were largely devoid of traffic apart from during rush hour and even then, things were nowhere near as busy as they were last year and especially back in 1999.
The reason? Well, there is the pressure on people's finances which I think dissuaded a number from going. However, the cost of the flights and particularly the car hire, now make Florida a very expensive holiday.
And then, if you decide to add attraction tickets, you are in a whole new world of hurt.
But I've got sidetracked again, so let's get back to the next little misadventure we had on the holiday which occurred on the Monday evening when we went out to eat for the first time.
Pick A Card - Any Card
With mum and dad being tired after the stress of the journey over, we ate at home over the weekend, but said we'd go out for tea on Monday night somewhere local.
We weren't too far from a restaurant called Smokey Bones. A name that I loved and which conjured up images of delicious smoked BBQ food. So with mum and Katharine agreeing it sounded like a nice place and my dad's hugely enthusiastic "yeah, whatever..." we headed there to catch "Happy Hour", or so we thought.
It took about ten minutes to drive to the restaurant and upon entering, we found it was almost empty with about 5 tables out of 50 or 60 taken.
We were seated and informed our waitress, I can't remember her name, but I am going to call her Ditsy, would be over shortly to take our drinks order.
We perused the menu and after a little while, Ditsy popped over to take our drinks order. My dad, as usual, ordered a beer that they didn't have available but found another to his liking.
Ditsy was nice enough, but it was her first day of waitressing. I think it was the first day she'd done anything to be honest as timing and efficiency were not her strong points.
We waited a while for the drinks before they came out one after the other. We then gave our food order, which Ditsy took and read back to us with one meal incorrect, which we corrected. Hey, give her a break it was her first day! We'd ordered a starter each and an entree.
As we waited for the starters to arrive, we chatted and drank our drinks. And talked some more. We watched Ditsy serve other customers and take payment. Still no starters.
"I'll just go and check on your starters you guys!" she said as she breezed past us.
Five minutes later she came out with a couple of the starters and another waiter brought over the others.
We began to tuck in and I had literally had two spoonfuls of my soup, before Ditsy was back at the table.
"Aannnnnd, here's your entrees..."
Ditsy then deposited the four main courses on the table as we kind of looked incredulously.
"Err, thanks..." I said
We looked at each other and decided to tuck in as fast as we could.
My soup was delicious but also very hot, so by the time I had finished, my main had gone from being barely hot to on the cool side of lukewarm. The ribs were also the consistency of a cowboys' saddle and had the same taste.
I'd barely taken a bite out of the main course when Ditsy returned, naively I assumed she was coming back to refresh our drinks.
"Aaand, I'll just leave that there for you guys..." she said sliding the bill onto the last few centimetres of space left on the table.
"Fucking hell, I didn't realised we'd ordered take away," I said to Katharine as we looked a bit bemused.
"Well, looks like were not having any dessert then!" said my mum dissolving into giggles.
After eating as much as we dared of the cold mains, we got Ditsy's attention and I handed her our Chase debit card to pay the bill.
Now we had opened a Chase account expressly for holiday spends after following advice from Martin Lewis. Not the retired ITV newsreader, but the consumer advice guy.
He'd recommended Chase as the best account for holiday spending as it had the option to earn cash back on what you spend as well as better exchange rates and no fees.
So thinking ahead, I opened an account and we deposited our initial holiday spends in it of £2,000. The idea being, if we needed more, we'd top it up while we were away. We'd also had a small amount of cash between us too (around $700 dollars).
I'd received the card and activated it fine in the UK so it was all ready to go. It was a new biometric card that lacked a signature and instead I confirmed payments with a pin number.
Ditsy disappeared off with the card and came back with the receipt for me to sign.
She handed it to me as she explained how this was her first day etc etc and I noticed that the receipt she'd handed me had 'payment declined' written on it.
"Do you know this says payment declined?" I asked Ditsy.
"Oh no! I didn't! I just brought it over!" she said taking the card back again to the payment machine.
A short time later she was back again.
"Err, we can't get the payment to go through on this card..." she apologized.
"Oh? That's strange. Why's that happened?" I asked.
She gave some vague excuse their payment service not being reliable, so I dug out the trusty HSBC debit card to pay. She disappeared off with that.
A short time later, she was back.
"No sorry, that one doesn't work either?"
"Eh?" I said starting to feel a little panicky again. "I just used it before. What is going on?"
I took the card and slid it back in my wallet and instead picked out the Credit card from HSBC that I used for the car hire.
"This one will definitely work... there's barely anything on it..." I said handing her the card.
"Great, I'm so sorry once again," she said wandering off.
I turned to Katharine.
"Did you think to pick up the dollars?" I asked with my fingers crossed.
"I did but I only took about 40 dollars..."
"I've left my purse at home otherwise we could have used my card!" said my Mum.
In my mind I had visions of the Orlando Police force turning up en-masse storming the restaurant and taking us into custody for non-payment of a lukewarm and unevenly served meal.
"It won't matter, there's nothing on that card and I used it at the airport. It's fine, I'll transfer cash over at home."
Ditsy was on her way back once again to the table.
"Err, no this one didn't work either."
"You are fucking kidding me?" I said without remembering to try and be polite.
I had one last option. A Barclaycard that I had not used for about 3 years.
"Ok, this is my last option, do you want to try this one?" I said handing her the card.
By now my stomach was churning lukewarm ribs and hot soup, combined with anxiety.
"This had better work, or else you'll be in the kitchen doing the washing up for a week," My mum said to me.
Ditsy was soon on her way back and was smiling.
"Yay! This one worked!"
"Thank fuck for that!" I said, once again forgetting I was supposed to be in polite company.
Ditsy apologised once again and again as we got up to leave. At least we were not on the walk of shame for debtors.
Solving the Cash Flow Problem of Sorts
On our way back towards the villa we were laughing about how fast the food had turned up after the starters arrived.
"It was a bit like, here's your drinks... now heres your starters, and mains, now here's the bill, now fuck off!" I postulated as we headed down Poinciana Boulevard.
We decided to go to Twistee Treat which was at the end of the road on the left. There was also a Family Dollar Store there, where we could pick up a couple of bits and bobs. We drove there first.
In the store we picked up a few small items and went the till. I selected the Chase card again and put it in the machine and entered the passcode.
"Beep"
"It says payment rejected..." said the assistant.
"Eh?! There's two grand in that account..." I said out aloud to myself. He reset it and said it could be the card machine playing up. So, I put in the card again and double checked I entered the right passcode.
"Beep"
"No, it's rejected again..."
Fortunately, we had enough cash on us to pay for the items which we did. And we then used the last of the cash on us to get our Twistee Treat.
All the way home I was wondering, what the hell is happening with our holiday money on that Chase card? I thought Ditsy may have just spooned it up as she wasn't blessed with much up top, but the fact the other shop saw it declined too was a worry.
Ice cream eaten, we headed home for a drink and I decided to check out what the hell was happening with my bank cards.
First I contacted HSBC and they informed me that my debit card, as it now has no signature on it, is not usable in some restaurants that need a signature for payments. I have to enter a pin. Fair enough. Would have been nice to know that but hey ho.
As for my credit card, they had put a temporary block on the card as I had spent so much (on the car hire insurance) without inserting my pin, that they needed me to insert a pin again to allow me to spend any more on the card. Again, would have been nice to know. I asked if I could enter the pin at a cash machine and they said yes. Problem solved.
So now just the Chase Card, I contacted them and so began a little back and forth which ran for almost all three weeks.
I'll paraphrase what happened over the duration of the holiday below.
Chase Your Tail - Fun-ds
I've called the chat operator Ships Computer because he was so unrelentingly cheery, he reminded me of the annoyingly happy ships computer in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Me "Hello, I have a new account with Chase with £2,000 deposited in it and today I went to use my Chase card and it was declined at both a restaurant and also a local shop. Can you tell me why my payment was declined?"
Ships Computer "Hello Mr John, we are sorry to hear about the issues you have faced and we'll be on it right away. Our customers are our prime concern at all times and we want to make you happy!"
Me "Great."
They asked me for the details of the payments that were declined.
The chat went silent for a bit and then pulsed back to life as the operator wrote their response.
Ships Computer "Hi Mr John, there seems to be an issue with our payment service provider MasterCard, be assured we are following this up immediately and I'll get back to you as soon as I can with an update."
Me "Well, I'd like it sorted very quickly please as it is embarrassing going into places and not being able to pay for things when you know the money is available. "
Ships Computer "I understand completely Mr John. Rest assured Mr John, you are our top priority and I should have an answer for you very soon."
Me "Good because It's not nice being on holiday with your spends in an account that you are not allowed access too. What would happen if I didn't have other sources of funds? I need access to the funds anyway as it is ASAP."
Ships Computer "I totally understand Mr John and I will be working tirelessly to resolve this issue for you to keep our new UK customer happy."
A few hours passed, or it may have been the following morning, I can't remember when the next message came in.
Ships Computer "Hello Mr John, I have been in contact with MasterCard and it appears that there is an issue with MasterCard assigning the wrong expiry date on some cards which is what is making those cards be declined. MasterCard are going to send out a new card to you at your home address."
I read this and barely believed what I was seeing.
Me "Well that's handy as I am 5,000 miles away from home in Florida with no money because of their mistake. How is sending me a new card going to be any use."
Ships Computer "I completely understand Mr John, just let me work on a solution for you. It is my top priority and it would be a pleasure to do so."
Me "Look this isn't good enough. I need access to the money and I need it today. You keep saying you are going to resolve it, but then you resolve it in a way that doesn't resolve it. So it remains unresolved. That isn't solved, resolved or any other fucking solved. I need access to my money quickly please."
Ships Computer "I totally understand your frustration Mr John, but it is not a fault with Chase Bank, but with MasterCard and I am going to resolve it for you as fast as I can."
Me "That may be the case, but you chose to work with MasterCard not me. Yet it is me that is inconvenienced - not you. That doesn't seem fair does it? If you would resolve it as fast as you can that would be helpful."
Ships Computer "Rest assured Mr John! You are my top priority and I won't stop until the issue is resolved for you. I will be back in touch when I have more information."
I didn't hear anything for a day, but then I received another message.
Ships Computer "Good News Mr John! I contacted MasterCard and explained the situation and they have made a few changes their end and I'm happy to tell you that your card should work now!"
Me "Should work? How can I test it? I'm not going to go and pay for something again only to find it doesn't work."
There was a long pause before the next reply.
Ships Computer "Hello Mr John! MasterCard say to try the card at an ATM or in a shop using the pin and they say it will work. Probably."
Me "Ok I'll try at an ATM."
Now later that day, we went out somewhere, the Florida Mall I think it was, where I put in the card and entered the pin and was able to withdraw some money. I also then tried it in a shop where it worked successfully and in truth, it worked fine the rest of the holiday.
However, the issue didn't quite end there with Ships Computer and it was his own fault.
Ships Computer "Mr John, I understand how deeply upsetting and embarrassing this must have been for you. Is there something we can do to compensate for this?"
Me "I'd just like my card to work to be honest"
Ships Computer "Mr John, that's great to hear and I am sure you'll find it will work. But have a think on what we can do to make this right for you. Let me know what you'd like us to do so we can make it right by you and close this complaint."
Was I reading this right, was he asking me how much compensation I wanted for the inconvenience and embarrassment? I felt a bit put on the spot. I didn't have a clue what to say.
Me "Well, all I can think of is to put some money in the account to apologise for the embarassment and inconvenience."
Ships Computer "That's great Mr John, I'll be back in touch with you shortly to see if we can bring this complaint to a satisfactory resolution for you!"
By this point, I knew my card was working ok, so I wasn't bothered, so I decided to see what they offered and take it. Thinking given that it was worrying and embarrassing, they'd offer a fair amount to me.
The answer came a couple of hours later.
Ships Computer "Hello Mr John, I hope you are having a wonderful day on holiday, I can confirm your card is working now and I am delighted to offer you £5 compensation for the inconvenience caused. Would you accept this and close this complaint?"
A fiver?! A fucking FIVER?! I could only by a one bollock McNugget for that amount! Don't get me wrong, I wasn't expecting hundreds of dollars, but a fiver was taking the piss!
So right there and then, I decided to fuck with them for as long as possible.
I wrote a response which explained how much the holiday cost, how the first few days had been 'ruined' and stressful (which it had been) because of the lack of availability of the cash on the card and how a £5 offer was an insult.
He wrote back offering me £10. Which I once again told them to shove up their hole. He then asked me how much I wanted to close the complaint.
"£500" I told them, showing my working out and the fact that I'd given then a 50% discount on what the ruined days of the holiday had cost me.
Ships Computer then elevated me to his superior who came back a few days later with an offer of £15.
I told Executive Ships Computer that going up in multiples of five wasn't going to work and if he felt the embarrassment and stress felt was just £15 worth, then he clearly hadn't been "stranded far from home with your main source of funds cut off through no fault of your own and unable to pay for items you had just eaten or wanted to buy."
I got passed on to the Super-Executive Ships Computer a few days later who told me it could take up to 14 days to process my complaint and request, but if I accepted the £15 now, it could be in my account within minutes.
I said 'Fine, take as long as you need to process the complaint."
A week or so later, I was offered £25, which I accepted as by then, it was almost the end of the holiday. I applauded them for deciding to move up in multiples of ten from the previous five. The complaint was closed and we spent the £25 compensation on a bonus Twistee Treat.
You take your wins where you get them.
So Martin Lewis, Chase may be good for some things, but they are crap at others. But my word, they are polite.
Air Con Gone
At some point during the first week we were in the villa, I cannot remember exactly which day it was, my mum was reheating something in the Microwave when she opened the door before the timer had beeped.
By a strange quirk, in this particular Floridian microwave, if you did that, it would trip the switch to the microwave so it would not work until you flipped the switch back on.
Only we didn't realise that for the rest of the evening and we went to bed oblivious to the fact that the switch had been tripped.
It was one of those unbearably hot nights, even with the Air Con and in the mornign the four of us got up and were all a bit drowsy due to the heat.
I decided to turn the Air Con down a couple of degrees as the owners had a control mechanism on it that allowed visitors to change the temperature up or down by 3 degrees from the standard 71c.
However, when I looked at the Air Con, it was flashing in Set Up mode.
The Air Con was also set to off.
The internal temperature of the house was also 82f and rising as the sun climbed higher in the sky.
"Errrr... The Air Con isn't working." I said.
"Eh?" said my Mum as my Dad walked over to 'have a look'.
"It's no friggin' wonder we were all so bloody hot last night..." said mum.
I found the number for the person to call in the event of an issue with the Villa, however he didn't answer, so we left a message as directed and waited for him to get in touch with us.
An hour passed. The temperature increased, 82 became 83, 84, 85 and it was starting to get uncomfortable.
"This holiday is like a film in the Saw franchise... Do you think someone is telling us to fuck off home early?" I said out loud.
The house phone went and I answered it. It was Andy, the villa owner, who had been contacted by the chap we had left a message for.
I explained the issue to him and somehow, I managed to set up the Air Con unit by following the prompts and asking him some of the more technical details. As it finished, we heard the familiar click of the unit kicking in.
The only issue was, Andy now no longer had control over the temperature and I could set the temperature to what I wanted. I did warn him of that fact and told him I'd keep it on 72c until he could get it set back up.
I mentioned to Andy about the Microwave going off and he told us about its little foible and that to get it back on, just flick the switch in the garage which we did.
He asked us how we were settling in and whether we liked the villa. I said the villa was beautiful and the pool fantastic, which it was.
I didn't tell him about what had happened to us so far. I only inflict that on poor unfortunate souls like you lot.
Check back for Part Three where we discover the Top Golfer at Top Golf (and it wasn't me), why the Disney Magic is wearing thin, why I have a new laptop, why Blairty won't be going to an Italian restaurant with us again any time soon and lastly the little surprise we brought back with us.
And I'll finish off with my top fives of the best...and worst... of Florida '23.
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