Booked Florida but NOT Disney?!

[Jendita]

Past couple of trips we haven't been to Disney. We normally just visit universal and maybe Seaworld this time too.

This gives us time to get a theme park fix but also some relaxation time!

[Sweets]

In 2016 we did a no Disney trip. Stayed at HRH for 2 weeks and visited SW and DC etc in addition to Universal/IOA. We absolutely loved it. My son was 15 at the time but he doesn't do coasters or extreme rides and we all absolutely loved it.

I didn't miss Disney because it wasn't a Disney holiday. It also gave me an excuse to book a Disney trip for this year

[JoJo88]

We’re about to head off on our 4th non Disney trip, and haven’t so far regretted missing Disney out. Our first non Disney trip was when the boys were 11 & 8, so similar to yours. We did a week in Clearwater and a week at Universal. Since then we’ve done a mix of beach/hotel/villa, sometimes no parks at all, and we’ve loved every holiday and can’t wait for the next 😊

[Kathleen74]

We did our first non disney trip this year. We had the Discovery Cove ultimate ticket and did the dolphin swim as ds is now 6. We loved DC, couple of visits to Seaworld inc evening shows/fireworks, a day at Aquatica and Busch gardens. We had a villa so enjoyed pool days too. We went to Anna Maria island and Haines city for 4th July fireworks. We also did a bike ride at Celebration. We were too busy to miss Disney! There is so much to do in Florida and you can't do it all in 2 weeks. We are probably going to do Universal next year as ds will be tall enough for more rides-never been with kids and going to book a universal hotel to take advantage of folp. So 2 years without disney- looking to go back in 2020.

[nickdg]

There is so So SO much more to Florida than just Disney :-) I'd get the Seaworld/Busch pass that lets you have 14 day access to all of their sites so you can visit the water park a couple times, even just for 1/2 day visits. Maybe add GatorLand to your list too as I'm sure your boys would love it!

[Mibbs]

Yup, we go to Orlando most years, we haven't done Disney Parks for the last 3 years, last year we only done the Universal Parks.
This year we are only doing Discovery Cove, Sea World & Aquatica.
Our son will be 14 next month and isn't fussed on Disney any more, he says hes too old.
We just love Orlando so spent lots of time driving to various places we haven't visited and spend time relaxing by the pool and shopping

[neatfrk]

My family is pretty much 'everything other than Disney' at this point.

We enjoyed Universal so much last time, next trip we are only doing Universal and KSC (which is great!).

Disney is just too complicated these days. There are a plenty of other options around - all with much lower level of planning stress.

[Rescuer]

We are just back from our first supposed non Disney trip. We did discovery cove, SeaWorld and universal.
We ended up doing 1 night at Disney as they released disney after hours for our dates. It was around $120 each and you had access to MK from 7pm then the event was on 10pm -1am. It was amazing and everything apart from 7d was walk on and even then 7d was like 15 minutes because they had had technical issues. It’s the same price roughly as a 1 day ticket but you accomplish much much more.
Historically they have also had this event in February and might be something you could consider. We all loved it including my ds who is 10.
We are going back in April for 9 nights and purely doing universal as we now have annual passes.

[boltyboy]

We have done Disney to death during previous holidays, this year no Disney. It's so expensive we decided to give it a miss but decided to go to Busch, SeaWorld and Aquatica. Total spends on tickets just under £400, plus more time to spend round the pool relaxing.

[Ninnybobs]

With boys of that age, magic kingdom may not be of interest, but I’m sure that Hollywood studios or Epcot would appeal.
We haven’t been to Disney for 5 years (10 visits), but if it was my first and possibly only trip to Florida, I would be doing at least one disney park