Orlando/Disneyworld Thread (Part 3)

cabbage

try having a look at https://www.thedibb.co.uk. Personally I am going to buy mine from Travel Republic but they are all much the same. You want a company that's reliable, issue tickets not tokens and don't charge a credit card fee.

blue_monkey_2

KarenG wrote: »

They don't have a supermarket as such but there are a number of "convenience" items for sale which definitely include coffee, milk & cereal. Off the top of my head you can also get things like donuts, waffles, PopTarts, ready meals, juice etc.

Have you thought about doing Gardengrocer or something silimar, where you can order stuff and they deliver it for you?

One of the limo companies offers a free shopping stop too, but I can't remember which one - sorry!

Just got a few minutes to stop in while I cook tea. Do Walmart deliver to hotels? If I ordered for the evening, would they take it to my room if it arrived before we did?

Jem8472

wed2010 wrote: »

Hi Everyone, this is my first post on here, so please be gentle!

I have read some of the pages on here, but am sooo inundated with various bits that I don't really know where to start.

Myself, my fiance' and our (then) 3 year old son are looking to go to Florida next May/June time (flexible on dates) for 3 weeks. 2 weeks in i-drive/that area, and 1 in Clearwater.

The best price I have seen at the moment on V Holidays is £2835 based on the Fifield Inn, and Holiday Inn Harbourside in Clearwater.

Is this about right for this kind of holiday, or should we be doing all this seperate?

We were looking at virgin flights as we've been told there is more to keep kids occupied on a long flight (for a 3 yr old, it is a long time to be sat/confined)

We aren't looking for car hire as neither of us want to drive out there (fiance' has before and doesn't want to again, and it just doesn't appeal to me - would rather trolley ride/bus transfers)

Thanks for all advice in advance.

If its the fairfield inn on canada Avenue thats a great hotel! We stayed there for honeymoon last June. First 2 weeks of June. The first week was nice and slow in the parks but the second week was busier.

Fairfield inn Canada Ave

If it is the Fairfield inn, they did free transfers to the universal parks. Seaworld was an easy trip on either the Lynx buses or the Itrolly. I prefer the lynx buses as they were not as crowded and had much much better Air con than the Itrolly.

I feel thats not a bad price for the holiday but it is always worth looking around.

You need to look at what parks you want to visit, you can find out the rides and stuff on their websites. Universal and IOA is good for thrill rides. disney has some good smaller rides for kids and lot of shows.

I recommend looking on tripadvisors forums for very detailed info regarding planning the holiday. You can find some amazing info with a great level of detail as there are a lot of Locals that post on there.

blue_monkey_2

Me again KargenG, I found this via Google: http://www.tiffanytowncars.com/rates.html We can get this: http://www.tiffanytowncars.com/van_rates.html for $70 and they stop at a grocery store for 30 minutes for free as well. I think we will go for that and I can then pick up a few essentials. I am taking an empty case to lug the shopping around in too as we are going to 3 different resorts.

KarenG

blue_monkey wrote: »

Just got a few minutes to stop in while I cook tea. Do Walmart deliver to hotels? If I ordered for the evening, would they take it to my room if it arrived before we did?

I'm almost sure Walmart don't - but I see you've solved it another way

You can save a fortune by getting your own shopping - just as an example, you can get a multi pack of water (24 bottles for a few dollars) whereas they cost $3 each from Disney.

KarenG

wed2010 wrote: »

Myself, my fiance' and our (then) 3 year old son are looking to go to Florida next May/June time (flexible on dates) for 3 weeks. 2 weeks in i-drive/that area, and 1 in Clearwater.

The best price I have seen at the moment on V Holidays is £2835 based on the Fifield Inn, and Holiday Inn Harbourside in Clearwater.

Is this about right for this kind of holiday, or should we be doing all this seperate? Feels a little bit high to me but you will pay a premium to book through VHols. I'd recommend doing it separately but sometimes for a first time visitor it's nice to have the security of a package?

We were looking at virgin flights as we've been told there is more to keep kids occupied on a long flight (for a 3 yr old, it is a long time to be sat/confined) Can't say I agree with this. In fact I would argue that Virgin are not the best at keeping young ones entertained, but it does depend on which aircraft you end up on - on the Orlando routes you mostly don't get the better planes Yes you do get a free Virgin backpack, which kept my children occupied for approximately two minutes! The stuff in there nowadays just isn't anything to get excited about. They do show CBBC or similar on a continual loop though so that can be good. My children prefer the US carriers as their setaback entertainment tends to have interactive games, more channels etc. I would highly recommend though that you take stuff with you to keep him entertained. With luck, he'll sleep for a bit too. To be honest, I never found the flights with a 3 year old to be too bad.

We aren't looking for car hire as neither of us want to drive out there (fiance' has before and doesn't want to again, and it just doesn't appeal to me - would rather trolley ride/bus transfers) Having spent a week in Clearwater I would have found it quite boring for a week without a car. Not saying you can't use the trolley buses to get around, but you will be quite restricted. Many many people do Orlando without a car with no problems though so I don't think that will be a problem for you

Thanks for all advice in advance.

HTH

I did have a thought - are you going through VHols so you can get the free shuttle bus from Orlando to Clearwater?

Three weeks is a perfect combination with two for the parks and one at the beach

vivatifosi

blue_monkey wrote: »

Just got a few minutes to stop in while I cook tea. Do Walmart deliver to hotels? If I ordered for the evening, would they take it to my room if it arrived before we did?

Hi blue,

What we've done for the past couple of years is to take food with us in our cases. We take breakfast cereal (must not contain fruit), biscuits and odds and sods. Then when we get to OKW we can get the rest of what we need (milk, fruit juice etc) at the on-site store and don't have to worry about getting to a supermarket. We always declare food on our forms and it never really holds us up, you just can't take any milk, fruit, veg or meat products.

Depending on what size accommodation you've booked, you'll get some things at DVC resorts too - a small amount of tea bags, a filter coffee, some Coffeemate and some sugar to get you settled in. You'll also get washing up liquid, and in the larger accommodations you get laundry detergent (though we take our own as the American stuff is harsh enough to rip my skin off). You can also pre-order a food package via DVC for delivery to the room.

The nearest supermarkets to OKW are Goodings at Crossroads (a one mile walk from the Marketplace down Hotel Plaza Blvd but very expensive), Winn Dixie on Apopka Vineland (turn left on Hotel Plaza Blvd and its under a mile on the right). There are a couple of Walmarts in the vicinity but they are harder to describe how to get to. Goodings delivers, but I don't know whether the others do. See:
http://www.goodingsdelivers.com/

Edited to add: milk at Disney is the same price as at the supermarkets, juice and bagels are the same price (but is a premium brand, you can save money with own brands at the supermarkets). KarenG is definitely right about about the waters - they cost a fortune at the parks, though you can fill up water bottles for free at the water fountains (near most loos) and can ask for iced water with meals instead of a soda or the bloomin awful and very expensive Daisani.

vivatifosi

blue_monkey wrote: »

Me again KargenG, I found this via Google: http://www.tiffanytowncars.com/rates.html We can get this: http://www.tiffanytowncars.com/van_rates.html for $70 and they stop at a grocery store for 30 minutes for free as well. I think we will go for that and I can then pick up a few essentials. I am taking an empty case to lug the shopping around in too as we are going to 3 different resorts.

I've used Tiffany before blue, they were great. Mears are good too. For a no-cost option, see if you can sign up to the Magical Express for the journey back to the airport.

blue_monkey_2

vivatifosi wrote: »

I've used Tiffany before blue, they were great. Mears are good too. For a no-cost option, see if you can sign up to the Magical Express for the journey back to the airport.

Thanks for all the advice on food, this was a little worry because DS likes his milk before bedtime but I know they do milk as we got that before when we stayed one night at Jambo House. We are staying at Hilton Grande Vacation Suites first, which is near Seaworld, and they reckon that nearst stores are 2 miles away so I'll probably get them to stop at Circle-C near Wet n Wild (if it is still there!!) and get some odds and ends. I am definately taking my own detergent. We have the 2 kids with sensitive skins so we get to take quite a lot of luggage as well so that is OK.

I've promsed DS we can go on the Magical Express, we get that included (well, I say that we have to pay $95 for the use of buses at OKW so I guess you have to pay that too, because it is TS). When we went in 2007 he got a little set of Disney Buses which are miraculously still going, one is the Disney Cruise bus, one the Disney bus that goes to the resorts and the other is the Magical Express and today he has been going on going on that. There is no way I am getting out of that, LOL.

I've emailed Tiffanies and given them a list of places we want to go to date and asked if can book them now - get that out of the way. I'll use them for our hotel transfers as well this way.

I looked at booking Chef Mickeys for DD birthday meal and cannot get the time I want and there is more than 5 months to go. Eek. If you want to book those get in there now and make reservations.

vivatifosi

blue_monkey wrote: »

I've promsed DS we can go on the Magical Express, we get that included (well, I say that we have to pay $95 for the use of buses at OKW so I guess you have to pay that too, because it is TS).

Wow, I've never heard that before. We don't have to pay for directly for the use of buses, though its in our annual dues. If you get a chance, take the boat from OKW to Downtown Disney, its quite a serene journey.