Orlando/Disneyworld Thread (Part 3)

y2afuk

Currently staying at the Crowne Plaza downtown Orlando. It's good if you are attending Orlando Magic games. 15min straight walk to arena. One bus takes you to Universal Studios for $2 each way. Although it does take an hour on bus.

vivatifosi

Have a lovely holiday BM!!! In the words of the Lion King "It Is Time" (well almost)

superflygal

Hi peeps!

We are going to Florida next month. Nothing booked yet, as our flights are thru my work. Also still waiting for DS's passport Has anyone stayed at watersong villas? This is £858 for 13 nights. Seems very good value. Or can anyone recommend a villa they thought was particularly amazing?

We are taking MIL. We went to Mauritius last Nov for DH's 40th at a massive cost of £5500. It was a disaster, as MIL was not allowed on flight (passport prob) Then when she finally arrived she was ill for whole time. We are doing this trip to re-celebrate and want it to be special.

We want to do 1 day at Disney (for the kids) and are just going to pay on the door. Has anyone got any idea how much tickets are for a 1 day, pay on door entry? I really do not want to spend £1250 on 14 day tickets, as we would only go once, twice at most. 3 adults 2 kids aged 3 and 4. We want to visit Sarasota, Everglades and Kennedy Space Centre.

Also, any good car hire companies (Who include insurances and taxes)??

Many thanks folks.

SFG x

vivatifosi

Hi Superflygal, firstly, hope it goes much better this time!

With Disneyworld, you have to remember it is four different theme parks, not one and decide which ones you want to do.

We book our car through Alamo. It isn't something I'd normally recommend as I know that there are other options, but DH works for airline so we fly on IDs and I'm guessing you are in same situation. They do industry rates and you can change bookings around if dates change. Make sure that's what you get though, don't bolt yourself in if you need flexibility.

Current gate prices for 1 day tix for Disney are $90.53 for adults and $84.14 for children 3-9. Under 3s go free and 10+ are treated as adults. If you do consider going to the other parks then it's worth getting a multi-day park.

If you are only going to one park, start early and get in for a nine am start to max out the value. Queues are always shorter first thing, so try and ride the children's rides first.

deb1home

We are just back from a fantastic holiday, we stayed at the Ramada (ok not the best hotel I have ever stayed in but also a long way from the worst!), we bought our tickets for Universal from Maple Leaf tickets and collected them from their Kissimmee office (as recommended through MSE) and we certainly saved time and money - especially time as the queues at the gates were HUGE. But we also decided to try our luck and buy tickets for Disney from one of the vendors on route 192, there are loads selling there but for most of them you have to take a timeshare or sales talk to get the discount which we definitely didnt want to do but there is one vendor who just sells tickets at discounted prices (about $30 less each ticket for a one day pass) so we decided to give it a go (please read whole thread before you come to any conclusions). We paid $58 each (as opposed to over $90 on gate prices) prices vary depending on availability and length of ticket, you can only buy on the day and you need to be there at 0830 in order to ensure you get the tickets but you can go the day before and he will keep tickets for you, these are tickets that other people have bought and not used the whole time on, you pay a $20 pp deposit to ensure you bring back the unused (if any) part of the ticket. The (lovely) young man selling them takes you through the routine for using them and three of our five tickets worked without hassle, unfortunately the other two didnt and we were all asked to hand our tickets in where they were voided and we had to pay full price BUT we went back to the seller and got all our money back. We talked to other people who had purchased through the vendor and no one (other than us) had a problem, all had gone through without hassle, so if you are looking to save and willing to take the risk then he was well worth it as even though we were unlucky we were the exception and we got all our money back without hassle.
So if you go try it for an ardent MSE fan - he is on route 192 next to the IHOP phone number (407) 925-2743. He also buys unused tickets but I dont know how much for as we didnt have any to sell. Also he only takes cash but let me again say that we got ALL our money back when it didnt work. You can also buy slightly discounted tickets from Walmart, not so much discount but still about $5 - $9 off each ticket.

Now if you are going to Florida and plan to do the parks - In Universal we did the Harry Potter thing, we took the guide book advice and went there first thing, we queued for hours (and it was worth it) but because everyone said to do it early we did so (oh and Butterbeer is the best thing ever) however later that day the queue was a fraction of the size so it doesnt always pay to follow the advice of others or the guidebooks! There is a sneaky way into HP if you want to know how you can PM me, we did the Olivanders wand thing too - really not worth the wait. Over an hour to get in for a less than five minute thingy - where they pick one person to have a 'wand select you' and the person chosen was totally unimpressed and was quite rude - spoiled it for the rest of us. We rode all the rides we could as singles as the lines are far quicker and invariably we got to ride together anyway, well at least two or three of us on the same ride. Dudley Dorights ride was the best ride of all, but you will get very wet.

In Disney we went to guest services and I explained that one of our party has a disability (she is deaf) we were given a guest assistance card and got priority on every ride, we skipped all the queues - only wish I had done the same thing in Universal, so a disability doesnt have to be a mobility one to avoid the queues (the first time we went back in 1995 they meant to give her the script on the Spaceship Earth ride in Epcot and gave her the evacuation proceedure instead and as an apology gave us all free five day tickets for our next visit) but they didnt offer us the assistance ticket then, the assistance ticket was a god send.

Have a wonderful holiday, we havent been to Florida for 8 years but it wont be that long before we go again as this really was a perfect holiday. Plus (and quite bizzare) we went to the tea cups in Disney and an Australian gap student who worked for me over four years ago was now working at Disney and was the one who let us on, it was one of those double take moments but it was wonderful to see her. She loves working for Disney and says the people are fantastic, the job is crazy but she absolutely loves the work. Now how do I get a job working for Disney.........:rotfl:

HardyRexion

Hello,

I am taking my Wife and 11 year old daughter in July for 10 nights.

I've worked out we have 8 days to visit parks, leaving the last day for packing, relaxing and shopping.

The Parks we wish to visit are:

Sea World (where I proposed to my wife 10 years ago
Busch Gardens
Universal Studios
Universal Islands of Adventure
Magic Kingdom
Epcot
Hollywood Studios
Aquatica.

Now I really am doing this on a shoestring. I got this holiday for £2200 in total(Flights with meals and extra luggage + Accomodation), staying on International Drive.

Not a bad price for during the School holidays.

I've scoured around for cheap tickets, looking at ways of getting the above parks at best value as some tickets are serious overkill.

I've looked at these 2 tickets at orlando-ticket-deals.co.uk

Disney 5 day premium @ £235

Orlando 5 Park Combo ticket @ £174

for a total of £409 each for all the parks we need to do.

Is this the best price I could hope for? Cheaper than buying in the US? I'm registered with quidco but only get 2% on a 14day ticket, that with the discount is still more expensive than £235.

Apologies for a long winded post but I really need to make sure I'm doing this the best possible way.

Thank you :beer:

HardyRexion

ahh having said that I've just found the 14 day ticket for £229 at

americanattractions.co.uk

Is this an ok site to purchase from?

no.1swimmum

Hi HardyRexion - planning a trip to Disneyworld can be both exciting and fraught with anxiety especially when on a budget. Well done for the great price on your flights and accomodation. Are you planning on hiring a car whilst in Orlando? although it can add to the expense it really does make getting to the parks alot easier but you will need to factor in the parking fees that they charge.
I am planning our 12th visit to the world, I have just ordered our 14 day tickets from www.americanattractions.co.uk - they have some good prices for tickets at the moment although they do charge for use of a credit card. There 5 day Disney pass is £228 and the five park combo ticket is £171 and if you spend over £400 you get a £5 discount so we have split our order into 4 ordered over a few days and saved another £20 with free delivery in 14 days. Hope this is helpful for you

northwest1965

HardyRexion wrote: »

ahh having said that I've just found the 14 day ticket for £229 at

americanattractions.co.uk

Is this an ok site to purchase from?

We use these, pretty good reviews on 'The Dibb'
http://floridaescapes.co.uk/tickets

HardyRexion

Thank you for that, Im now able to save £15 buy ordering my tickets in stages. :beer:

Now one last thing, what's the best method of getting a visa for America?