DisneyWorld Orlando Travelogue:Nov 2009

amar64 · Post by **amar64** » Fri Apr 23, 2010 3:46 pm

LI,

This is an excellent travelogue, the best I have come across. Kudos to you to take all the pain to write it down. Ofcourse writing is an art and not everyone cup of tea.
I have taken printout of your travelogue for carrying with us.

We are going to Disneyworld from 11th-18th May with my daughter aged 14 yrs. How is the rush this time of the year? We will be staying in Sheraton Vistana resort. Any feedback on this resort.

We plan to do Magic Kingdom, Epcot centre, Animal Kingdom and MGM- 1 day each. Universal studio & Island of Adventure- 1 day each. This will leave me with 1 day spare. Which of these parks will require more than 1 day to cover all the items.

We plan to go to Kennedy space centre one day.
How do we go from Orlando resorts to Kennedy space centre as I will have a car. Do I need to rent a car or there is some buses to Kennedy space centre?

Grateful if some members of the forum help me out.

Thanks in advance.

amar64 · Post by **amar64** » Fri Apr 23, 2010 4:13 pm

Hello all,

Is there a similar thread with travelogue with trips to NY, Boston, Niagara falls and Washington DC? I would love to read and require info about it. I am planning a trip to East Coast also after Orlando.

farfromhome · Post by **farfromhome** » Fri Apr 23, 2010 4:19 pm

amar64;282118LI,

This is an excellent travelogue, the best I have come across. Kudos to you to take all the pain to write it down. Ofcourse writing is an art and not everyone cup of tea.
I have taken printout of your travelogue for carrying with us.

We are going to Disneyworld from 11th-18th May with my daughter aged 14 yrs. How is the rush this time of the year? We will be staying in Sheraton Vistana resort. Any feedback on this resort.

We plan to do Magic Kingdom, Epcot centre, Animal Kingdom and MGM- 1 day each. Universal studio & Island of Adventure- 1 day each. This will leave me with 1 day spare. Which of these parks will require more than 1 day to cover all the items.

We plan to go to Kennedy space centre one day.
How do we go from Orlando resorts to Kennedy space centre as I will have a car. Do I need to rent a car or there is some buses to Kennedy space centre?

Grateful if some members of the forum help me out.

Thanks in advance.

Yes, this is an excellent travelogue provided by LoveIndia

Also look at this thread for more details like planning for Disney World.

http://www.r2iclubforums.com/forums/showthread.php/8416-Help-with-planning-Orlando-Disney-world-trip?p=233643#post233643

When to go:

Here are the attendance levels from allears.net (http://allears.net/pl/attend.htm)

Disney states:

The Lowest Attendance --

* January (except New Year's Day) until just prior to Presidents' Week in February
* The week following Labor Day until the week prior to Thanksgiving
* The week following Thanksgiving until mid-December

More Moderate Attendance:

* After Presidents' week in February through early March
* Late April through early June (except Memorial Day weekend)
* Columbus Day Weekend (October)
* The first part of Thanksgiving week

Highest Attendance:

* Presidents' week in February
* Mid March through Late April ("Spring Break")
* Memorial Day weekend
* Mid June through Labor Day
* Thanksgiving Day and weekend
* Christmas week through New Year's Day

farfromhome · Post by **farfromhome** » Fri Apr 23, 2010 4:22 pm

amar64;282122Hello all,

Is there a similar thread with travelogue with trips to NY, Boston, Niagara falls and Washington DC? I would love to read and require info about it. I am planning a trip to East Coast also after Orlando.

Please look into this thread. There's one more I believe. I'll post it later.

http://www.r2iclubforums.com/forums/showthread.php/11315-Boston-Niagara-Falls-New-York-and-Washington-DC-trip?highlight=niagara

farfromhome · Post by **farfromhome** » Sat Apr 24, 2010 3:50 am

amar64;282122Hello all,

Is there a similar thread with travelogue with trips to NY, Boston, Niagara falls and Washington DC? I would love to read and require info about it. I am planning a trip to East Coast also after Orlando.

You can look at this thread too for your East Coast trip.

http://www.r2iclubforums.com/forums/showthread.php/11671-Travelling-with-10-month-to-NY-Niagara?highlight=sriradh

direstraits88 · Post by **direstraits88** » Sun Apr 25, 2010 7:00 pm

amar64;282118LI,

This is an excellent travelogue, the best I have come across. Kudos to you to take all the pain to write it down. Ofcourse writing is an art and not everyone cup of tea.
I have taken printout of your travelogue for carrying with us.

We are going to Disneyworld from 11th-18th May with my daughter aged 14 yrs. How is the rush this time of the year? We will be staying in Sheraton Vistana resort. Any feedback on this resort.

We plan to do Magic Kingdom, Epcot centre, Animal Kingdom and MGM- 1 day each. Universal studio & Island of Adventure- 1 day each. This will leave me with 1 day spare. Which of these parks will require more than 1 day to cover all the items.

We plan to go to Kennedy space centre one day.
How do we go from Orlando resorts to Kennedy space centre as I will have a car. Do I need to rent a car or there is some buses to Kennedy space centre?

Grateful if some members of the forum help me out.

Thanks in advance.

Sheraton Vistana is decent if you can get into their newer apts. It's 10 min drive to disneyworld. Make sure to rent a car otherwise it's difficult to commute to these parks without wasting time otherwise. If you are coming from london, i'm not sure about the logistics of renting.. And universal studio is atleast 20 min away..

Note, you can never cover any single park in one day.The heat will sap your energy.

I'm not sure how much a 14 year old will enjoy Magic Kingdom/Animal Kingdom. But if it's just one trip to disneyworld, you may as well see them all. BTW, you may need a day off in the middle to just cool off. These are physically exhausting day visits unless you are in great shape.. And universal studio offers 7 day pass for the price of 2 days ( i think like $99 for each individual).. So maybe you can use your free day to go back there and spend some time out there.

Try to get to the parks early when they open at 8:30 AM. Make use of the Fastpass to reserve time slots for popular rides in disney parks. You can only reserve one every hour. So you should plan accordingly.. If you have a car, you can go back for 2-3 hours in the afternoon to rest and return to the park again at 6pm since they are open till 10-11 pm usually and ends in a fireworks display.. I like the fireworks in Epcot better.

You may want to consider hitting one of the disney water parks instead of animal kingdom. They are fun for older kids. I'm not sure if you have those in England.

Epcot is the biggest and require lot of walking.. Your 14 old kid may find it interesting.. Get comfy walking shoes, Caps and sunglasses. Take water bottles with you to the park and some snacks too. IF you are vegetarian, good luck with food..

direstraits88 · Post by **direstraits88** » Sun Apr 25, 2010 7:05 pm

amar64;282122Hello all,

Is there a similar thread with travelogue with trips to NY, Boston, Niagara falls and Washington DC? I would love to read and require info about it. I am planning a trip to East Coast also after Orlando.

DC and NY, take the red bus tour. You can hop off/hop on and cover each city in a day.. DC is just monuments and museums.. Air and space museum is our favorite. In niagara falls, there's nothing but the water falls. Make sure to go over to the canadian side and stay a night. The views are great from the canadian side. There's a boat ride called maid of the mist which takes you close to the water falls.

Boston should be similar to NYC. Just experience the city.. Nothing much there to do unless you've family to visit.

You can take the train from DC to NYC to experience it and compare it with the Eurorail :)

amar64 · Post by **amar64** » Tue Apr 27, 2010 8:12 pm

Hi Desipardesi,

Thank you very much for all the info and your advise which duly noted. Regarding renting a car at Orlando, my understanding was that there are buses (coaches) running from Various Disney parks to the various hotels. Is it good idea to use these buses???

What about Universal studios, do they have any bus service to the hotels. I saw on net that the distance from Sheraton Vistana to Universal studio is 16 miles.

I was only planning to rent a car to go to Kennedy space centre from Orlando. Now I may have to rethink about it.

Which is the cheaper car rental agency? Is it advisable to rent a car from the resort (Sheraton Vistana) or rent it at the airport?? Right now I have arranged for the resort to pick me up from the airport and drop me back costing USD55 each way. Grateful if any one can advise about car rental.

I am planning to go to all the 4 Disney parks + 2 Universal studio park + 1 day Kennedy space centre in 8 days. I will have 1 extra day. As suggested should I drop going to Animal Kingdom instead go to water parks. I know it is going to be very hectic 8 days.
This will be followed by 10 days trip to NY-DC-Niagara- Boston-NY.

amar64 · Post by **amar64** » Tue Apr 27, 2010 8:22 pm

desipardesi;282699DC and NY, take the red bus tour. You can hop off/hop on and cover each city in a day.. DC is just monuments and museums.. Air and space museum is our favorite. In niagara falls, there's nothing but the water falls. Make sure to go over to the canadian side and stay a night. The views are great from the canadian side. There's a boat ride called maid of the mist which takes you close to the water falls.

Boston should be similar to NYC. Just experience the city.. Nothing much there to do unless you've family to visit.

You can take the train from DC to NYC to experience it and compare it with the Eurorail :)

Thanks for the info about East coast. I will be driving there for 10 days starting from NY-Was DC- Niagara- Bos- NY. As suggested I will take the red bus tour in NY and DC to move around the place.

FFH thanks for your thread it made my life easy.

One of my relatives has been very kind to lend me his car for the whole time. I would like to know if I need to take any form of insurance or the car insurance will cover me also. I am not sure about it and neither is my relative. Any inputs will be of immense help.

Which is the better GPS to use for travel as I have very little idea about the routes/roads. Will need to depend on the GPS.

direstraits88 · Post by **direstraits88** » Wed Apr 28, 2010 6:09 am

amar64;283205 my understanding was that there are buses (coaches) running from Various Disney parks to the various hotels. Is it good idea to use these buses???

What about Universal studios, do they have any bus service to the hotels. I saw on net that the distance from Sheraton Vistana to Universal studio is 16 miles.

I was only planning to rent a car to go to Kennedy space centre from Orlando. Now I may have to rethink about it.

Which is the cheaper car rental agency? Is it advisable to rent a car from the resort (Sheraton Vistana) or rent it at the airport?? Right now I have arranged for the resort to pick me up from the airport and drop me back costing USD55 each way. Grateful if any one can advise about car rental.

I am planning to go to all the 4 Disney parks + 2 Universal studio park + 1 day Kennedy space centre in 8 days. I will have 1 extra day. As suggested should I drop going to Animal Kingdom instead go to water parks. I know it is going to be very hectic 8 days.
This will be followed by 10 days trip to NY-DC-Niagara- Boston-NY.

Why pay 110 dollars for just ride from Airport to Hotel both ways ? Rent a car from the Airport. That's the cheapest and best. you can rent a compact car fo < $200 for a week. Checkout Orbitz.com. Not many hotels will have rental option and Vistana is a vacation home and not a hotel. Majority of car rentals are only near airport in U.S.

If you book car rental using visa platinum, it'll cover insurance too. If you've amex card, you can sign up for their rental car insurance before you book the car rental. Use the amex card for car rental and for a flat fee of $20, it will cover complete insurance for the rental car. THe car rental will try to sell you a 19.99 per day insurance. THey make most money with this..

Make sure to carry a GPS and you won't get lost.

The free pickup/drop to disney park is a joke unless you stay in Disney resorts. Other hotels will provide service once in the morning and again at 9 pm. So you spend lot of time just waiting for a ride. And for some reason, you want to come back soon, you have to take a cab which is not easily available.. In USA, you need to have a car always (except in NY city).

You can use the car to visit Kennedy space center too.. Just have the addresses printed ahead of time and use the GPS to reach destination.