Wanting to go next year

[Guest]

Hi All,

I've been to Florida 3 x now but that was with my soon to be ex wife.

I'm looking to treat my sister who has been my rock over the past few months to a holiday out there again next year, preferably October.

Given that all my previous visits the holiday was planned for me and now that isn't the case I would love some pointers on where to look.

I know we used to book through Kenwood travel but the cost was quite expensive. 21 days, flights, villa, car hire, tickets and spending for 5 was costing about £14K.

Now it will likely be My sister,neice, daughter and I and will be looking for 14 days.

Your help is much appreciated.

[Guest]

Sounds like the start of a plan 👍
We’ve always packaged it ourselves, and I believe it’s generally considered to be cheaper to do that.
Until the last couple of trips we booked the flights directly, booked the villa through HomeAway - as we went to the same street ☺️, booked car hire with Alamo Brits so you can do skip the counter, bought tickets from a Dibb recommended supplier.
We didn’t book a villa this time as we got a good onsite deal , but If I was booking a villa now there are some stunning Dibb villas.
Make sure your travel insurance covers you for a non package holiday - end supplier failure. Also consider that if you want cover for all of you it may be worth taking out a policy just for this trip - if you are travelling under different policies which are not linked if something happens to one party eg illness, the others won’t be covered to stay with them. We had this issue when we had a big family holiday.
Happy planning.

[Mazascouser]

Price up a few packages first, this will help you with your budget planning. Then up look DIY, don’t forget Dibbers villas. Happy holiday planning.

[Loobylou_82]

I always start by looking for flights first on skyscanner, can take months of looking before i see a price i like and book. But black friday on the 23rd Nov and Boxing day sales all to come. Happy hunting.

[Beddy666]

If wanting to go via a travel agent... try floridaholidayplanner.com -Alex is great he saved me and wife 50% for the same bits on Thomas Cooks price. So much so we are travelling with his services again in May. Recommended to friends and everybody has been very happy with the service.

[Bats]

I would go through Discount Florida Car Hire for your vehicle needs (recommended on here multiple times and a Dibb advertiser).

We used this company for the first time a couple of weeks ago, chose Alamo as our rental agency and did 'straight to garage'.

Great comms from them and much cheaper than Alamo Brits who is the company we normally use.

Also look at renting DVC points if you want to stay onsite as this can sometimes work out cheaper than any package on offer.

Lovely thing for you to treat your sister, I'm sure she will be thrilled.

Happy divorce!
Joa