Orlando Florida/Disneyworld (Part 2) *CLOSED*

disney_cjd

little_dumplings wrote: »

Gosh, Disney, are you getting flooded? Hope you're all okay!

Nah, actually its OK where we are. Its been over Kissimme and Haines for most of today and there has been rain and some wind but nothing like a crappy November day in the UK.

The Yanks LOVE a drama and are not happy if there is a crisis that they can then solve. We were asked if we wanted sandbags by the local fire brigade I said not but I will take some sand to fill in some cracks in the driveways pavers

I will keep you all posted if anything happens, just take the septics with a pinch of salt .

CJD

spaceman5

little_dumplings wrote: »

How hot was it spaceman? Is it shorts day and night?

when we was there most of the time it was upper 80`s, some days it would creep into the 90`s but most of the time it was between 85-90, so yes we wore shorts all the time, even at night in bed, i only slept under the top cover of the bed, and that was with the air conditioning on set at a low temperature, hardly any rain, i think it only rained 3 times whilst we was there, a couple of days they was showers that lasted only 10 minutes or so, but the last thursday before we left, was quite a miserable day all day, but then there was a storm in the area, HTH Dave

spaceman5

little_dumplings wrote: »

Does anyone know whether it's cheaper to prepay for a hire car in the UK, or wait until we get to Florida. Dollar rent a car do a prepay with petrol included, but a friend said she was charged again for petrol when she arrived there. Has anyone had any bother with Dollar? I would need to go with Dollar as the friends we are going with are sticking with them, and I need to drive behind them to find the villa!

we used dollar, had no choice really, we travelled through travelcity direct, and that is who they use, no problems with them, mind you if you do use them, expect to be asked loads of questions about upgrading when u go to pick up the car, we was and fell for it, mind you the car the had reserved for us was a astra type car, and they managed to upgrade us to a ford edge, which was a brilliant car, lovely to drive, and a sat nav, which was a godsend, for only the equivalant of £125, so it was not too bad, mind you they did con us with the the toll pass card, telling us we would save so much money going through all the tolls, making out there was so many, the only tolls we drove thru was 3 on the way from sanford to our resort, and 3 on the way back, so i would probably give that a miss, bit of a con, HTH Dave

EDIT: by the way it only costs the equivalant of £25 to fill up over there, and they have the cheek to complain about high gas prices, lol

little_dumplings

Thanks Dave, yes, that's helped. My friend also warned me of the 'upgrade' patter by the rent a car companies. I won't fall for the 'toll ticket', thanks for that tip, we too are travelling from Sanford. In two minds whether to pay for the petrol in the UK, even though it's cheap there, they may charge a fortune for it at the airport. I'll deffo book the car tho from the UK, then it's paid for and one less thing to worry about!

Not looking too forward to melting in the heat...but can't wait to eat Froot Loops again!!;)

little_dumplings

Would you recommend a sat nav? I've never used one before! Staying in a villa in Calabay Parc and planning to go to Disney, Discovery Cove and Seaworld...not much further.....are they easy to find? Mind you, I also want to find some Ugg boots, so all malls aswell hehe

disney_cjd

Re Car Hire

I think it is cheaper if you are not getting it as a package to prepay for it in the UK. Companies like USRENTACAR and YESCARHIRE (see much earlier post I did on this). The thing is that you can get a good package with extra drivers all thrown in.

As for petrol. the prices have dropped a little to about 3.75 now for mid grade. We are still filling up once a week though as the problem as you all know here is a) their cars all drink petrol and b) its a vast distance to get anywhere! So you end up doing 16 miles round trip just to go get some milk.

I have no bloody sympathy for them mind you, if they all wanna drive about in F150 that do 20 to the gallon thats up to them! No one is stopping them buying a focus!!

disney_cjd

little_dumplings wrote: »

Would you recommend a sat nav? I've never used one before! Staying in a villa in Calabay Parc and planning to go to Disney, Discovery Cove and Seaworld...not much further.....are they easy to find? Mind you, I also want to find some Ugg boots, so all malls aswell hehe

Do you have a TomTom in the UK or know someone with one? You can buy the US Maps for most TomToms for about 35 quid from TomTom.

If not you can buy one over here for about 150 bucks. Sometimes that is cheaper than taking the option from your hire company, the problem is though that you need it most times to get from the Airport to the villa! So you have not bought it yet!

The other thing I tend to suggest is that you use Google Maps and do the directions. Its by far the clearest one I have used and you can do the trip from the airport to the villa etc before you leave the UK and they are pretty easier to follow.

Cheers
CJD

ceebeeby

Arghhh, only 2.5 wks to go and still haven't got any disney tickets (I know, I know - I asked the same question months ago, but very daftly didn't follow it up - now I have too)

Can anyone recommend best buys. We want at least 7 days.

Tx so much

little_dumplings

ceebeeby wrote: »

Arghhh, only 2.5 wks to go and still haven't got any disney tickets (I know, I know - I asked the same question months ago, but very daftly didn't follow it up - now I have too)

Can anyone recommend best buys. We want at least 7 days.

Tx so much

Just bought mine tonight from attraction tickets direct but use their price promise quoting prices from tickets4fun.com. Spaceman also suggested travel city direct, they're cheap too. I also got a free 'kids eat free' card when I asked. You can haggle with most of them!

spaceman5

little_dumplings wrote: »

Would you recommend a sat nav? I've never used one before! Staying in a villa in Calabay Parc and planning to go to Disney, Discovery Cove and Seaworld...not much further.....are they easy to find? Mind you, I also want to find some Ugg boots, so all malls aswell hehe

if you plan on doing any major driving, then yes i would say get a sat nav, mind you make sure if they offer to program your destination into it, they do it right, the dipsticks at dollar put our resort into it, me and the wife thought we had been conned when we arrived at a petrol filling station about 4 miles away from our destination :rotfl: , Dave