The Three Amigos Hit Florida - October 2012

[wakeuplaura]

Wednesday 30th November - 310 days to go!

Well, I believe the time has come to begin our pre-trip report for our trip to Florida next October. This trip has been a long time coming, and a long time planning, but some bookings have finally been made the the wheels are in motion!
So over the next 10 months, I plan to update my pre-trippie frequently, letting you all know about the plans we make along the way. I'd love to hear advice from everyone, so please contribute whenever possible!

I better start off by introducing us!

I'm Laura! I'm 22 (23 in December) and I work in a cinema and am a full-time student in my last year studying for a Web Design Degree! I've previously visitied America 6 times, and Orlando/Disney 4 times. I LOVE Florida holidays and am theme park mad! My favorite ride is Spidey and I am most excited about the WWOHP!



In the photo above, I am with my boyfriend of 2 years, Tim. Tim works with me at the cinema and is in his second year studying Computer Games Development. He's visited America once (Aspen) and is looking forward to his first Florida Adventure! Tim and I visited DLP in January and he LOVED it. So we are excited to see his face when we first get past that magical rope drop! Tim loved Space Mountain best at DLP and is most looking forward to Mission Space!

Finally, to complete the 3 little pigs...we have my best friend Clare!



Clare and I have been friends for over 10 years and are not as close as ever. She has been to WDW 4 times *correct me if I'm wrong clarithy!* and can't wait to go back! Clare currently works as a Healthcare Assistant AND a Pupil Support Assistant for a Special Education School. Clare recently moved into her own flat, so this is also a huge piece of excitement for us over the next few months! Clare LOVES Disney and although I'm not sure what her favourite ride is and what she is most looking forward to, I'm sure she'll fill me in soon! Clare and I are also food mad, so can't wait to try out lots of new and yummy food while we are there!

SOOOO... !

Now that you know a bit about us, where to start?

I would say that we first began discussing the possibility of a Florida trip around the beginning of 2011, but we always sort of thought it was a bit out of our price range until we were older. However, I believe it was around the saving up time for our yearly trip to T in the Park (WHICH IS BEING SACRIFICED THIS YEAR TO FUND DISNEY! ) that we realised that if we added what we have spent on T in the Park in the last two years, we could easily have a cheapy trip to the land of the Mouse!

Our research began, and I'd like to say that soon after we booked...However, as Tim would soon learn, that would not quite be the case!

We started off looking at cheap package holidays that were around £900/£1000 each and included flights, villa and car. We would, of course, have to add park tickets onto this, and we believed we would be budgeting the trip at under £1500 in total, with just our spending money left to find.

On Clare's last trip, she didn't bother with renting a car but expressed that she had to miss the fireworks at the end of the night on several occasions due to having to catch the last bus home. This was NOT an option for our vacay!

Accommodation!


We then started to look at prices for hotels vs. villas and tried to work out what we could afford.

I should add at this point that we originally planned to go as a foursome, with one of Clare's good friends, Kirsty. This was mainly as the villa price and car hire price would be cheaper for us all, making the holiday much for affordable!

I later suggested the idea of renting a villa for two weeks but possibly adding a couple of nights at the Universal Resort to get queue jump benefits, and we also considered a couple of nights at Disney as a treat. We worked out that this could cost us as little as £150 each, so this was added to our plan!

We made our first visit to our local travel agent, Ramsey World Travel (look them up if you are from Scotland! they are brilliant!) who priced things up for us. Turns out I had stupidly missed a few things out in my pricing plan, and the price per person was shooting up to around £2000 each!

After a few re-doings of the plan, and further research, we discovered the DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH that is the Walt Disney Travel Company. Free Disney Dining Plan? and $150 Disney spending money? Could we pass up such an amazing deal? The answer was NO! We toyed with different ideas... We booked some nights at the Grand Floridian. We cancelled them. We switched the booking to Hard Rock Hotel. We worried was this the right date? We decided upon Animal Kingdom Lodge. We worried this was too expensive. Then a major factor hit our plan...

Kirsty would no longer be able to come.

This changed things a lot as room prices etc, were no longer divisable by 4, but now by 3!

However, this change in our plan far from hit us off the path, but rather connected us to the Yellow Brick Road!

After around 2 weeks of final planning and setting dates in stone, we were ready to book! and book we did!

Our final POA is as follows:

Saturday 6th October 2012
Travel from Scotland to Wales, where Tim's Mum stays.

Sunday 7th October 2012
Get dropped off at Manchester airport where we are flying with Thomson to Sanford airport!
Arrive in Orlando and check into the Hard Rock Hotel for 2 nights!

Tuesday 9th October 2012
Check into the Port Orleans French Quarter for the remaining duration of our holiday!

Sunday 21st October 2012
Travel home from Sanford aiport to Manchester airport

Monday 22nd October 2012
Arrive back in Scotland

SO THERE YOU HAVE IT!

So far, we have booked:
Flights
Accommodation
Disney Tickets

We have still to book:
Universal Flexitickets
Car Hire
HHN Tickets
Cirque Du Soleil Tickets
ADRs

So what do you all think?
Have we chosed the right things?
Is it a good time of year?

I will update this pre-trippie as the weeks go by and post further information on WHY we have chosen the things we have chosen, and how the planning etc is going!

LAURA xxx

[clarithy]

we also upgraded from qsdp to ddp for £10 pppd which is £120 PP

[Guest]

Great start to the pre trip report, looking forward to keeping updated with your reporting. Its great that you also got the free dining.
I just missed the dining by 1 day so if i want this i'll have to pay , unless disney come up with more offers

[Guest]

i wish i was that organised! we are also traveling on the same dates next october (6th-20th) so might see you there!

[PIGLET38]

Sounds like a good plan. We will be there October next year and have everything booked - just need to save like mad now to pay for it! Looking forward to seeing your photos.

[wakeuplaura]

I'm still not able to upload any pics and its really annoying me!

How can I be expected to convey the full experience of my pre-trip without aesthetic imagery!

Does anyone know when I will be able to upload pics?

xx:angry:

[wakeuplaura]

NOW WITH ADDED PHOTOS!

and theres more to come!

[MissVincent]

great start - looking forward to more!

[clarithy]

Happy new year everyone

[WileyCoyote]

A great start - you look set to have a really good time- love your pics