First time planning - Aug 2020

[RatLady82]

Hi, so me and the other half are planning to head to Orlando next August and we hae started looking and costing up. We’re looking at 2 weeks and have earmarked a total budget of around £8000. It’s just the two of us but we want to get in as much as we can as it’s somewhere we’re not sure if we will get to again.

[Squidgyness]

£8k for 2 people is certainly doable. What type of holiday are you looking for? Disney onsite, Universal onsite, I-drive, villa? That will affect the tips people can give you.

I'm planning a trip next september too, and I would advise holding off on booking for a little while as the prices seem a tad elevated right now.

You say it's not somewhere you are sure you will get to again but rest assured that's what a lot of us said before our trips... then the bug gets you!

[hbmip_disney]

£8k for two people is definitely enough as we are going this August and have done 2 weeks for 5 people for just over 10k. The price will massively differ on whether you want to do just disney or universal, both, or also sea world and aquatica, Busch gardens and other attractions.

[RatLady82]

So basically, we really want to do Universal, Busch gardens and as much of the Disney stuff as we can.
In terms of hotel, we’ll be looking at doing that fairly cheaply as we can as we aren’t planning to spend a lot of time there.

[gemma-lou]

I said ours was once and am now booking our fifth.
The last two weeks of August is cheaper than the first two weeks, we are going tui from Bristol as we are from southwest, at the moment a fly drive is £999pp, for 20th August for 14 nights.
The Avanti resort is a beautiful resort and is bang in the middle of Disney, universal and sea world just behind you, there are plenty of restaurants around you too. you can book your tickets direct with attraction tickets direct, pay £25pp deposit and chip away at it and receive real park tickets in the post days after clearing the balance. You could book the avanti through travel republic and again pay £15 deposit for 10 days do Disney Busch gardens sea world etc then book universal hotel for the remaining 4 (or 11/12 avanti and 3/2 universal) hard rock, royal Pacific or portafino resort have express passes with their hotels so you skip the main queues to the rides and get early access to Harry Potter an hour before park opens.
This is what we will be doing next year. We have stayed previously at the enclave suites, onsite at Disney, at the avanti and last year clarion inn lake beuna vista and then down to Miami. Out of all hotels I loved avanti the most.
With a fly drive with tui the car is included but not insurance so you may find it cheaper with Andy at Florida car hire. He looked after us and was cheaper with car hire including insurance than insurance bought through Tupi etc,

[RatLady82]

Just looking and as I’m a teacher, the latest we could go is the 13th August next year. There’s a £500pp difference between the 13th and the 20th August!

[mozzman]

definately get the free dining plan and stay onsite if you intend to do alot of dining experiences at $59 each you can soon zip through what you saved on a hotel outside of disney,weigh up what things you want to do and do a costing.

[FlorayG]

£8,000 will do you easily especially if you don't want an upmarket hotel. I stayed with my mom at the Yacht Club and we had DDP total cost for everything including spends was about £7,000 for 2 weeks in 2017. Obviously a LOT more expensive in school holidays but for an example next August All-Star Music is £1,876 and the Beach/Yacht Club £10,500 for the same dates. Just an example of spending variables...