Great "Cheap Holidays & Excursions" Hunt: Orlando

goldbyron

Can I ask re: car insurance? I have hired a car for 2 weeks through Budget who I now understand have nil excess levels therefore I do not need stand alone excess insurance. However the one area where I am not insured is the roof/tyres/undercarriage and windscreen. Can I purchase cover for this alone with a stand alone insurer? Thanks

stephen_Lake

There is massive competition between the theme parks Disney v Universal & Sea world
Do one group of parks or the other for example Disney often sale 14 day passes for the price of 7 days. Universal and Sea world have joint packages at great rates.

Book a villa and share it with your friends mine sleeps up to 10

e-mail me for a quote at weststonebridge1@aol.co.uk

IanatSeaton

RachyRoo wrote: »

Hi Im going to Florida next year and want to know is it cheaper to buy tickets either single days or for all parks from the parks themselves or before we go?
Looking to go to Bush Gardens, Universal, Island of Adventure, Water Park, prob wet and Wild and Magic KIngdom,
Any1 Know of any deals let me know
x

We've been to Orlando six times now, last time was in March/April this year(09). We have always bought our tickets in Orlando and have never lost money. I spent over 30 years as a cost accountant saving money for companies, so I feel sure I have taken everything into account. Online sellers claim they have tickets that you can't buy in Orlando. Well it is true in name only, you can get all of the variations in Orlando but they have different names. If you go in early or late season there are often special offers at Sea World and Busch Gardens whereby a simple one day ticket gains you admission on the following day as well.( ie BOGOF) You never get these on line. This year (again) I bought my tickets in Walmart. In previous years I have used the Tourist Information Office and even the TIC desks in a MacDonalds and a Ponderosa restaurants. The 14 day passes you buy in USA cover the 14 days from the first day you use it to enter a park. Five and six day passes work the same. They also offer a greater range of permutations of parks than I have found online. This year I paid for my tickets with our new Abbey credit card - now called the Santander Zero as recommended by Martin (of course), thus I got the bank exchange rate of the day with no added fees at all. As the GB£ was rising against the dollar this also saved me money.
If it is your first trip remember that a day in a hot crowded theme park is hard work, and you simply can not do a park every day, you have to have a rest at some time, so don't be tempted to buy tickets for every day of your holiday, you will not use them all.
Best tip, when you leave the car park in Busch Gardens, turn left! For some reason my memory of going in makes me always want to turn right on leaving and I got lost on three occasions. Finally cracked it this year. If going to Animal Kingdom, get there early before the gates open, be first in and head straight across the park to the Safari tour, the animals are more active first thing when they come out of their night quarters and look for food in their area. Go late and they are nearly all asleep.
Next tip, try to avoid US Bank Holidays or school holidays as the parks get very crowded indeed. But whenever you go I am sure you will all love it! :j:beer:

terryw

atm_engineer wrote: »

We have gone to Orlando a few times doing the following tricks.
1. Book a fly drive holiday on-line, take the smallest car and DO NOT upgrade. At that point, you are only going to use the flight and NOT their car hire option.
2. Book a hire car yourself via the many on-line car rental deals.
3. Book a villa to match your party.
4. Buy holiday insurance, if your timing is good, this may cover next years holiday as well.
5. If flying from an airport not local to you, book a hotel with an overnight stay at the airport with parking included.

This looks like excellent advice. But have I got this right? You just don't bother turning up for the car that is part of the "fly-drive deal" - is it not part of the terms and conditions that you have to collect the vehicle@

Thanks

winnywitch

hatcheth wrote: »

Regarding Car Hire, whoever we seem to book through we always end up with Dollar!

Some tricks we have learn't:
1. The queue at the dollar desk in MCO is sometimes 2 hours long. If you join their club, I think its dollar express then you can queue jump. I believe its free.
2. Prepaid vouchers with Dollar always state that you must buy a tank of fuel and return empty. The cost of the fule is about 30% higher than the average price and no one ever returns empty - so you lose out twice. However, if you read the terms and conditions, it says "if you accepted to pre pay for fuel" so you have the right to say no thanks. Dollar staff will try to sting you for this, so be prepared to argue. It took me 3 different people to take it off, finally they relented. Saved us about $ 30...
3. When booking your villa, ask if its south facing. It really makes a huge difference having a south facing one vs north..

Stephen

If you book your car hire through Virgin Atlantic, which uses Dollar, you can go straight to the Virgin Holidays desk at MCO. There's rarely a queue. Last time we visited in April 09 there was nobody there at all!!!

We have a villa out there so visit 2 or 3 times a year so we to watch every penny and have found Virgin Atlantic car hire prices very competitive. http://www.virginatlantictravelplus.com/DefaultCar.aspx

Plus you can join their Flying Club and earn points......we all know what points make.....:rotfl:

Lin

keasden

Before you go log onto the internet and browse for sites of the popular restaurant chains such as Dennys, Golden Corral, IHOP, Ponderosa etc etc. Most of them have loyalty schemes where you sign up with your email address and then they email you all sorts of vouchers for money off meals. Just make sure that if asked for your birthday or anniversary, the date you enter happens to coincide with the dates that you are over there.

We did this last year and saved loads. The best value came from the Texas de Brazil restaurant on I-drive. This was by far the most expensive meal I have had in orlando, bit also the most memorable. The voucher they sent for our 'anniversary' was a buy one get one free offer, and as it costs over $50 a head, this was a fantastic saving.

DaveStrong

I found this website very helpful for getting an idea of what to do in Orlando (not just themeparks) compareattractiontickets.com.

New to the forum so can't post a link but they compare lots of large companies.

jackieblack

terryw wrote: »

This looks like excellent advice. But have I got this right? You just don't bother turning up for the car that is part of the "fly-drive deal" - is it not part of the terms and conditions that you have to collect the vehicle@

Thanks

Depends on the company - be careful - some are wising up to people doing this and you may find you are still chrged for insurance even if you don't collect the car :eek:

sgm6670

ScittyPopBicks wrote: »

Wow, what villa was it you stayed at? Would like more info on that, as were a family of 9 we need a good size villa with pool heating! (whitch adds up a chunk of money after many weeks)
:beer:

We have been to Florida tons of times and alway book our villa through: justflorida.com

They give you loads of advice based on what you are looking for in a villa and they are only about £400 a week for a large 4 bed 3 bath villa with large pool and jacuzzi (7ft). I have never been disappointed with the properties we have stayed in.....my favourite villas are at The Manors at Westhaven (just by the Championsgate development). It is a small gated community high on a hill with over sized villas and the villa pool/lanai area is massive. You can see the disney fireworks on a clear night from your villa.

Reality_Check_2

Went to Florida last July. (no such luck this year as we fell pregnant whilst there & now can't afford to go this year with 4 kids!)
As previos posters have mentioned Wal-Mart is great. Booze is sooooo cheap it makes you sick at the thought of how much we pay in this country. ( How can Irish whiskey be cheaper thousands of miles across the Atlantic?)
Anyway, a couple of tips;
*Take your own car seat for baby (Group 1+) Will save you at least £60
*Take juices to the parks
*Admission into SeaWorld automatically entitles you to unlimited access on any other day. (Go to Customer Service desk on left hand side once through ticket desk)
*Don't go to TGI Friday's as it isn't as nice as here.
*Don't take any toiletries with you if you will be staying anywhere near a WalMart as it's cheaper & less hassle!

Enjoy your holiday!!!!!