Advice needed, want to go Jan 11,non drivers + more

[jesuslovesyou]

Hi

Could we have some advice please !

We want to go Jan 11 on a budget, we are non drivers so we want to stay on idrive or Disney.

Been quoted £2200 today from Going places for 2 weeks staying at a budget place on idrive.
2 adults,13yr,6yr,1yr old. (5 in rotal)

Is this a good price ?
Any better places to get a quote from?

How much is travel to parks on idrive?
Any tips for making life easy as non drivers?


Probably will have more questions !
Thanks.

 

[wayneg]

Depends which hotel & airline.
For a package you probably won't get much cheaper. Who is it with?

Just looked on Virgin holidays for you, Fairfield Inn is a good hotel, includes a nice breakfast, free internet. Thats £2,500, Virgin flights into Orlando international.

Can't really offer much help on holidays without a car, its not somewhere we would go without one but many do. With Virgin Holidays it would cost about £2,880 to stay onsite in a value resort but then you get transport to everything Disney including transfers from and back to the airport.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

Hi m8

Where is the Fairfield Inn ? Dont think thats very doable without a car? How did you get that price?

My deal was with First choice at the orlando continentsl plaza, if you book this weekend it comes up at £2088

How much spending money would you recommend? (per day)

 

[wayneg]

I priced it up on http://www.virginholidays.co.uk/
Its on Idrive but I am not good with that part of Idrive, don't like it at all but many do. I just saw they had shuttles to the parks.

There is another Fairfield Inn at Lake Buena Vista, we have stayed there 3 or 4 times, great place but maybe not so good without a car. Its difficult to imagine a holiday without a car when you have never done it.

thats hotel you got quote for does not look great, although Tripadvisor is not very reliable you can read between the lines and get a feel for the hotel. http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Hotel_..._Continental_Plaza_Hotel-Orlando_Florida.html
What would worry me is its rated #236, thats very low down the list.

This is the Fairfield rated #8 http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Hotel_...ando_International_Drive-Orlando_Florida.html

 

[disneyangel]

I am just back and would recommend that if you plan on a lot of disney days -you look more at the I-192 area or lake Buena Vista if offsite

I-drive is better for Universal or Seaworld.

This year these was a good Disney onsite deal if you went after 3rd Jan where you got vouchers to spend on site depending on resort you stayed on.

Thia January was very quiet in the parks and we found it very cold (and we know cold we live near Edinburgh) so waiting about for hotel transport to get to I drive may be a bit of a bind (although to be fair we had the worst weather they've had in a number of years). The 192 hotel area seemed to have lots of hotels that offered shuttles and would be nearer if you decided you wanted to get a cab back early.


feel free to ask any more questions
Upside was we got to do lots as the parks were really quiet so you wouldn't need to factor in much queueing time.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

Hi
Thanks for the help, The Virgin website wont find any holidays for me with my dates !
Does it have shuttles to all parks?

 

[jesuslovesyou]

Hi Disneyangle , We want to do both sets of parks, so do you think idrive would be best ?
We would do more Dsiney as we would have 14 day pases, but would maybe do 8 days of that.

Where abouts did you stay? May I ask roughly how much spending money did you take?

Thanks

 

[wayneg]

Hi
Thanks for the help, The Virgin website wont find any holidays for me with my dates !
Does it have shuttles to all parks?

Do you keep getting this result? Sorry, your search returned no results
There are no results for this reason...
Virgin are having issues with their site, keep trying it eventually gives you results. I got prices fro Kissimmee, LBV, Disney and Idrive for your dates.

Everyone spends different amouts in Florida, we are a family of 3, average spend is $100/day for food, drinks, snacks, tips, tolls, petrol and bring a few bits home. Other familes could double that, a meal can cost us anything from $20 (for us all) upto over $100.

 

[disneyangel]

We stayed in a villa in Daveport so you would need to drive to get to it or I would have recommended it for you.

We spent roughly $50 -100 per day on food (some days we ate breakfast in the villa and some nights we had snacky dinners as we'd had big lunches)

We had a few more expensive character meals that we had pre-paid and a nice meal out at a steakhouse.

Lots of offsite diners like chillis and applebees had two adults dine for $20 dollar deals so we took advantage of them .

There were also a lot of offsite places that offered free dining for kids which would be great for you. ( IHOP on certain days Houlihans (that we didn't try but saw adverts for).

If you are only planning 8 days at Disney I'd also recommend MYW tickets they are much cheaper than ultimate passes. We bought 7 day passes for around £130 each compared to over £200 for ultimates . Disney weer advertising that it was only $3 to add extra days to these. Downside is you can't park hop but with the shorter hours we didn't find this a problem at all.

We asked people to give DD(7) dollars for Christmas so she took $100 of her own to spend. We spent a few $'s on some things to bring home (sweets etc for friends) but we are not big shoppers at all.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

Thanks for the replys , we were thinking £100 spending money a day so I think that will be enough as some are saying $100.

Im leaning towards the Fairfield inn at present.

I found a price of £2600 for the budget Disney hotels, but Im worried food ect will be much more expensive in-resort.

 

[wayneg]

Food is more expensive onsite without doubt, You have to add up what you might spend in transport and compare to extra food costs.
Personally I am not a fan of Disney value resorts much prefer somewhere like Fairfield Inn but I always have a car.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

If we stayed in the resort it would save money going to Disney, but would probably cost more going to universal ect
I would of thought the food would be twice as dear?

 

[2Tiggies]

Thanks for the replys , we were thinking £100 spending money a day so I think that will be enough as some are saying $100.

Im leaning towards the Fairfield inn at present.

I found a price of £2600 for the budget Disney hotels, but Im worried food ect will be much more expensive in-resort.

Yes, food is significantly more expensive on site. One way around this is to get a cab to a nearby supermarket and do a good shop for basic things that are hugely overpriced in the parks - like water, bread, milk etc. Your challenge would be that you don't get a fridge in the values and it would cost you $10 plus tax per day to get one.

If choosing an off-site hotel, have a look for the ones that offer free shuttles to the Disney parks. There are plenty, but not all the hotels offer this service and some charge a small fee for it.

Also, if you are doing Universal as well, consider splitting your stay in 2 hotels, staying nearer to Disney for the "Disney portion" of your trip and likewise for Universald (somewhere on I Drive, north end). The distance between Disney and the Universal parks is deceptively vast.

 

[2Tiggies]

Just saw Wayne's new post - we must have been posting at the same time!

About the value resorts, I really enjoyed our stay in one of them. Is this your first trip to Disney? You may find that you spend very little time in your room in which case it may not matter. I tend to like to be up and about all the time and we never spend much time in our room - usually to change, shower and sleep and that is about it. I see you have a little one with you though and this may be a consideration. Also, value rooms are relatively small - add in a crib and you won't be comfy to spend a whole lot of time in there. Hope I'm not confusing you - just trying to be objective. It's a lot of money, a long way to go and an experience you will remember forever - you want to make the best decision you can to suit your needs at the time.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

Hi 2tiggies,

Yes its our first trip , done DLRP 3 times and go again in 7 weeks.

How many miles is it between the 2 ends where the parks are?
The hotel we are now looking at Fairfield inn (thanks wayne ) says its 20mins to Disney, we expect it to take around an hour though on the buses ect.

Dont think 2 hotels is an option as it would bump up the cost by a good few quid wouldnt it?

 

[2Tiggies]

Hi 2tiggies,

How many miles is it between the 2 ends where the parks are?

Dont think 2 hotels is an option as it would bump up the cost by a good few quid wouldnt it?

It depends. It is just a case of getting the right deal. I have my Virgin Holidays brochure here and it seems to be a bit more detaild than the website (which is painfully slow for some reason tonight). Some of the hotels actually offer shuttle services to both parks in which case you would want to try for midway between the two. If you give me 10 I will page through and see which ones they are.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

You are a diamond !

 

[2Tiggies]

Okay there are a few. You may want to think about picking up a Florida VH brocure from your local Travel Agent just so you can flip about it and see. I like my paper. They also have little maps giving you a rough idea where everything is although they are not accurately to scale.

Just a mention, I have never stayed off site so I can't give you any feedback on the I Drive accommodation. I do believe you can expect a bit more space and you will get a fridge, microwave, kettle etc in the room which will help you cut costs by allowing self catering to a large extent. You could then pack food to take with you when you go out. Disney do allow you to bring food and drinks in now.


I-Drive hotels:

QUALITY INN INTERNATIONAL
5 minutes to Universal (Free scheduled tranportation)
20 min to WDW (Shuttle bus, local charge - don't say how much but one or two others with similar distances suggest the same is roughly $5 per person round trip to give you an indication)

RODEWAY INTERNATIONAL:
Exactly as above

EMBASSY SUITES HOTEL:
10 min from Universal
20 min from WDW
Shuttles to universal and WDW are free and they mention that the IDrive trolley stops right in front of the hotel, which is really great if you want to get out and about to shop or whatever - I trolley is dirt cheap!

The above are all three "stars". There are others of higher grade are significantly more expensive, so I didn't list them. There is a lot of info to play with. Once you have picked or narrowed your choice on hotel/s, post a question on here and get opinions from people who have actually stayed there.

Don't know if this is actually any help. Shout if you need anything else.

 

[2Tiggies]

Just found another one in Lake Buena Vista:

NICKELODIEON FAMILY SUITES

This could be fun as is is also themed. It is 5 min from Disney and 20 min from Universal, etc. Free scheduled transportation to both. It is slightly less expensive than the Disney value resorts.

By the way, when they quote a certain no. of minutes to get to Disney, that is how long it takes on average to get to the entrance. You can then expect to be driving/riding for anything up to another 20 minutes to get to the park of your choice. It is something to keep in mind if you need to be anywhere for a certain time so the general rule of thumb is to allow at least an hour.

 

[jesuslovesyou]

Thank you for your hard work


The Embassy suites look good coming up very expensive though..