We got the chance to stay in a friend’s house in Stamford Florida, which is not far from Disneyland and all the other parks like Sea world, Busch Gardens and the Kennedy Space Centre. The house itself was beautiful; it had three bedrooms and three bathrooms, utility room with washing machine so we didn’t need to take any dirty clothes back with us. It also has a pool with screening that was directly on to the golf course. The house was an ideal base but you did need to hire a car if you wanted to visit the parks. Driving in America is really easy as long as you remember to drive on the right! If you were going out in the evening it might be best to get a taxi especially if you were planning on having a drink.

We spent time at Universal studios, Busch gardens which was slightly further away, Disneyland and Sea world. We also managed to play some golf with a little help from a golf buggy as it was far too hot to walk. We actually walked to the local supermarket and the staff we astounded that we hadn’t brought the car. The supermarket was about a 5 minute walk from the house but as you know walking is not the done thing in America.

The parks are truly amazing with your every need being met but do be careful when parking your car in the park car park. The sheer number of visitors means that you can easily forget where you parked your car if you don’t make a note of the car park reference number. We did this and spent over an hour searching for our car which being a hire car looked very similar to all the other cars in the car park. The only way we managed to find our car as we had not taken a note of the parking space reference or the licence plate number was to ask a car park attendant.

He simply asked us what time we entered the park and then took us straight to our car, which we were miles from and I don’t think would ever have found it. When leaving the parks in the late afternoon especially in July or August beware of lightning storms and very heavy rainfall. The car parks become a very dangerous place as the volume of water under your feet and the lightning in the air make for a very dangerous combination.

I was recently searching for cottages Scottish borders as I have always wanted to try self catering Scottish borders and you know what I really enjoyed it.