orlando... just flights and car hire

nannytone_2

my daughter has been offered a 5 bed villa, 10 minutes away from disney, for £500 a week during the school summer holidays ( so an opportunity not to be missed)
she started looking for flights with the major airlines and the cheapest has come back at £999 per person.
she is reluctant to go for one of the 'deals' as she is concerned about being scammed.
does anyone know of any reputable smaller airlines that do good flight/car hire deals?

meer53

Book flights and car hire separately. Flights alone in the school holidays will be around 800-900 each. The smaller airlines won't go to Orlando. We use Charter Travel when we go, they use Virgin Atlantic. Never had a problem and the price has always been good. You can get cheaper flights if you go indirect but thats a pain if you have young children.

You can get villas for less than £500 per week if you look around, it's a pretty standard price. Most villas are within a short drive of Disney too.

nannytone_2

thanks.
this is a 5 bed villa. all en suite with pool, jacuzzi free international phone class. luxury villa in a gated community.
i think its what could be described as ' all singing and dancing'
they are going as a group of 3 families, all sharing the villa, so it works out really good for them

meer53

nannytone wrote: »

thanks.
this is a 5 bed villa. all en suite with pool, jacuzzi free international phone class. luxury villa in a gated community.
i think its what could be described as ' all singing and dancing'
they are going as a group of 3 families, all sharing the villa, so it works out really good for them

Thats good. We've never been lucky enough to share the cost !

All the villas we've stayed in have pools, jacuzzi etc and most are on gated developments. It's the norm in Orlando really. We've been 5 times and have stayed in a different villa every time. They're all very luxurious and i hate coming home each time we go In the last one we stayed in (West Haven) the en suite bathroom was bigger than my bedroom at home ! The second and third bathrooms were bigger than my bathroom at home too !

Your daughter will love it

nannytone_2

if she can find reasonable flights

vanilla_twist

We used to have a villa and frequently flew into Stanford Airport using tour operators who offer flight only. Alot cheaper and worth a look. Instead of driving down I4 which is congestion filled that time of day we used the toll roads which are usually clear. Maybe an hours drive but probably around 30-40 minutes from Orlando International to the villa. Could be a saving of £200-500 per person so worth a look.
Not sure of the airlines using sfd but Thomas Cook, Thomson and Monarch do I believe.

Definately hire the car seperately though a cashback site with full insurance and don't get conned into an upgrade on arrival. If they offer an upgrade at a price it is probably the only car they have for you anyway.

Hope they all have a fab time and tell them to use all the coupons for meals and the small attractions and crazy golf they can find.

V x

steve1500

Direct to Orlando (MCO) from the UK are Virgin & BA. BA is from Gatwick. Virgin do some regional airports as well as london

Thom Cook Thomson & Monarch go to Sandford.

Aer Lingus via Dublin to Orlando,

As already mentioned car hire through TCB but would first use a comparison site

jpsartre

nannytone wrote: »

she started looking for flights with the major airlines and the cheapest has come back at £999 per person.
she is reluctant to go for one of the 'deals' as she is concerned about being scammed.

Scammed by whom? If she books direct from the airline, the risk of being scammed with respect to flights is pretty much non-existent.

jackieblack

We saved quite a bit (about £100pp IIRC) by flying into Tampa rather than Orlando on our last trip to FL.
If the villa is around the davenport area, the difference in drive time is only around 20-30mins form MCO and about the same as from Sanford

bagand96

steve1500 wrote: »

Direct to Orlando (MCO) from the UK are Virgin & BA. BA is from Gatwick. Virgin do some regional airports as well as london

Thom Cook Thomson & Monarch go to Sandford.

Aer Lingus via Dublin to Orlando,

Thomas Cook now use Orlando International (MCO) along with BA and Virgin. Thomson still use Sanford (SFB). Monarch don't operate long haul anymore.

Norwegian operate direct Gatwick - Orlando International too.

There'll also be many options flying indirect with a number of American airlines which may save a few ££.

meer53

nannytone wrote: »

if she can find reasonable flights

Flights in the school holidays will be at a premium so the only cheap flights she may get are indirect. Flights tend to get booked up months in advance, we booked July 2013 to go July 2014.

Our flights went up from £899 each in July 2013 to £1250 each by June 2014.