Trip to multiple parks...

[ARAITHEL]

My daughter, who is interested in pursuing a caree in marine biology is turning 13 in January. She will be 13 on the 13th of January in 2013. We are looking into taking a trip to orlando to visit the parks for thus special occasion. We have been to WDW multiple times and would like to visit the parks while we are there, but want to focus most of our 5 nights and six days at universal and sea world.

We love staying on Disney property. Do you suggest staying off property? Staying on WDW property and renting a car? or is there another option that might be *** effective. We are also on a budget and would like to do the trip as inexpensive as possible, while keeping it convenient...

 

[kathy884]

She'll probably enjoy SeaWorld most. That's our family's favorite park too. I personally don't see any advantage of staying onsite at Disney if you are spending a great deal of time offsite. We typically like to get a condo rather than a hotel room and stay somewhere in Lake Buena Vistana such a Cypress Pointe or Sheraton Vistana Villages that is really close to Disney, but not onsite. This option is typically best done with a rental car too.

Something else you might want to look at are SeaWorld's junior high and high school aged camps. My son really enjoys those. Most kids who attend have huge love of marine mammals so make great friendships with other campers right away. My son has done the camp in Orlando twice and once in San Diego. His first two years were as a Junior High student. It's such a great camp. Here's a link

www.seaworld.org/adventure-camps/swf/resident/camps/career-camp-7-9.htm

If you do stay onsite, definately get a rental car. We once had freebie accomodations at the Contemporary for four nights (DH convention), and for our three days enjoyed Disney resort and looking around at other Disney properties one day, went to SeaWorld one day, and did a resort day with a mini trip to Gatorland one day. So if you really like the onsite Disney experience, this is quite possible.
It does, though, take some driving time just to get offsite, and I find that for a budget trip especially offsite gives you more for your money (food, souviners, everything is just less expensive offsite). This usually works best for a full week stay, but I often rent a two bedroom condo offsite from an owner for less than what it would cost me to stay at a Disney moderate hotel room.