Tips please Orlando Oct 19 Universal

[321zerobaby]

Thinking of going to Orlando in October half term, children have got 2 weeks off. Massive Harry Potter fans (15 & 12), desperately want to go to Universal studios.

Where to start? Any of you been and could give me a few pointers? BA or Virgin? Have 10k for absolutely everything, can it be done?
I'm already confused with people talking about driving but have to pay for the parks, or staying closer and get the bus in.

Thanks very much for any help.

Sorry forgot to mention DH, there will be 4 of us.

If you stay on site then you have the advantage of extra hours in the park. We found the books WDW with kids and Beyond WDW with kids really helpful as well as the touring plans in the back it helps you to find places to stay etc. There is also a great website/facebook group called the Dibb. Personally we use momondo or skyscanner to find the cheapest flights (clear your cookies each time) and usually stay in a villa with its own pool. Sunset Lakes is a good area. You will need to get booked up though as many people book the flights and villas a year in advance. start with the books, it will all be a lot clearer!

I would recommend the flight centre when shopping around for flights. On all my holidays I search and book my own, but each time we've been to the states they've found me cheaper flights than I could find online (obviously have a shop around first). When we took ours to Disney as teens we had a villa with a pool and hired a car, it gave us a lot of flexibility and gives you the chance to go to places like Busch gardens and Kennedy space centre, which you'll have time to do in a fortnight. You can book villas online through trip advisor/homeaway holiday rentals. One tip re the car hire, before you go take out a car hire excess policy online, we paid about £12 for it whereas if you take it out when you get there to pick the car up it'll be much more.

We went in 2014, we had a much smaller budget, and did it on a shoestring! so I am sure you can do it really well for £10k.

We went with Virgin, food on the flight was really disappointing, so perhaps buy sandwiches/snacks to take on the plane.

Harry Potter land is lovely, but stay away from the Butter Beer, I have forgotten how many teaspoons of sugar they are in it, a rep in our hotel did tell us. Lots of kids throwing up in the locker room after drinking it and then going on the rides. 🤮 grim.

We stayed in a motel, but a villa would have been better I think, we were on a very tight budget. Kids really enjoyed it, we took snacks and sandwiches into the parks, had breakfast in our room in the mornings, visited budget restaurants in the evening,sweet tomatoes was great, very fresh salads and soups etc and very cheap, used the I ride buses.

Have a lovely holiday.

Thanks very much for the tips, all noted. Will get the books and have a read, I just find it all so overwhelming, probably because its a lot of money, we'll only do it once, so I want to do it right first time.

I’m so jealous! Can’t wait to go again but it’ll be a couple of years at least

There’s so much to consider and I’d advise research, research, research.
I haven’t been since 2008 so can’t speak about HP as haven’t seen it.

Deciding where to stay, if you’ll need a car etc depends of lots of things.
How long are you going for?
Do you only want to see Universal or Disney and other Orlando attractions too?
Are you happy to stay in accommodation with shared pool or would you prefer a private pool for rest days?
Do you want to eat out for all meals or would you like to cook for yourselves?

Another good book is ‘The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World’. Even if you don’t do Disney it has lots of info on Universal and travel to Orlando in general.

Universal has 2 theme parks and HP is in both linked by a rail system, hogwarts express, which is an attraction in itself. Staying on property (and some property partners) entitles you to express pass which is the queue-skipping pass but I find the cost of accommodation extortionate so would never opt for this however if you plan your trip right and decide to do the universal parks two days in a row you could stay on property for just one night which entitles you to 2 days express pass.

As I said, lots of variables. It really depends on what suits your family. You’ll have a blast with a budget of 10k.

Oh and I highly recommend you tuber ‘The Tim Tracker’ for comprehensive, up-to-date, fun videos of all parks in Orlando and Tampa. He and his wife Jen upload daily vlogs and cover so much, accommodation, food, water parks, prices, merchandise, tip and hacks. They’re great.

Are you planning on doing Disney or just Universal?

We've just come back from a Universal holiday. If you stay at Hard Rock Hotel, Portofino Bay or Royal Pacific you get free express (skip the line) passes for the duration of the stay. These are a godsend! Especially as October will be a fairly busy time owing to Halloween Horror Nights.

I would recommend joining thedibb.co.uk forums for all the hints and tips.

It can be done for £10k but you may have to be mindful and budget accordingly. I know it sounds like a lot but don’t underestimate how much a holiday for 4 people for 2 weeks in Florida will cost!
Price up all the big stuff up, flights, hotel, theme park tickets, ESTA’s, car hire (if needed) and a daily food budget (can vary massively depending on where you want to eat) and see what you will have left over for extras.

Happy to stay in a hotel, shared pool, don't want villa or cooking, will eat out. Sweet tomatoes is fine, I prefer salads/ vegetables over fast food, which I know will be difficult! Just Universal, not Disney. I believe there might be a universal and Sea world ticket? My son loves sea creatures, doesn't like roller coasters, but the rest of us love them.

Somewhere with 2 bathrooms would be good, or at least 2 loos!

So maybe some of the time in a Universal hotel, perhaps some others on I Drive, would that bring down the cost?

Thankyou for the website and other books to look at. yes I agree, 10k sounds and is a lot of money, but a few friends recently have said its more like 12k.

Hi there, we went Oct Half term last year and had 10 nights at Royal Pacific Hotel onsite at Universal, we had booked club level room which gives you tea coffe soft drinks, all day, breakfast continental type and evening snacks and alcoholic drinks. Excellent value for our family of 4. Hotel cost us £2900 from Expedia, flights with American Airlines indirect via Charlotte £1591 for all 4 of us. Universal 14 day tickets inc Volcano Bay £845. So you can definitely do it for 10k.
We have been before but this was our longest stay at universal. We didn’t hire a car as the fee to park at a Universal Hotel was $25 per day! So we used the Lyft app for airport journey both ways, and trips to the malls (at least 6 trips) and spent $220 total which saved us money on car hire, fuel, parking costs. If you need any other advice you are welcome to PM me. Hope this helps.

You can easily do it for £10k, probably for half that if you don’t want luxury. The Universal on-site hotels are really nice and an easy bus ride/walk to the parks. You can pop to the parks first thing, do rides when queues are short and come back for afternoon by the pool and pop back for a few more rides in the evening! Volcano Bsy is absolutely brilliant, if you’re happy to stay at Cabana Bay (one of the cheaper hotels) you can walk straight into Volcano Bay’s side entrance, no faffing about waiting for buses in wet costumes! Cabana Bay also has family suites if you want separate rooms.
If you buy a Discovery Cove day pass you get 2 weeks unlimited entry to SeaWorld and Aquatica; there’s a shuttle bus service from Universal. Everywhere else easy to get around by Uber, probably less hassle then driving.

We are just back from combining a 5-night cruise from Miami with Universal...we probably spent £2500 in total for 9 nights including the cruise....although we did pick up very cheap flights with BA at £550 for both of us by using some Avios too.
We opted to stay on International Drive - most hotels have a free shuttle service in to and out of Universal (between 7-10am and 5-8pm) - shuttles in the morning get booked up so make sure you book the day before if you are planning on using them, although we used Uber's at around 6-10 Euros dependent on how busy or what time we went in or came out of the parks.
We opted for Annual Passes (preferred) which cost around £305 - £400 dependent whether you have 2 or 3 parks (the 3rd being Volcano Bay)- there was an offer for 6 months extra for free - making the passes 18 months which we felt was too good to miss because we will manage to get back and the passes include free parking at Universal.
Universal will have their Endless Summer Resort hotel open by then which will be very affordable especially if you are a larger family (4 of you).
In terms of car hire, I did hire a car from Miami up to Orlando when we got off the cruise and would recommend - www.discountfloridacarhire.co.uk/ - They are brilliant and very friendly and helpful - you can also hire a Sat Nav FOC from them...but if you are just planning on staying around Universal - Uber works really well and there are restaurants galore on International Drive - would definitely recommend The Olive Garden for one night where the food is amazing - but go easy on what you order because - they include free salad/soup and breadsticks which are like Garlic Bread. Drinks and food in the parks is fairly expensive - my DD is a massive HP fan so we had breakfast in both the Three Broomsticks and Leaky Cauldron and it cost around £17 dollars each - note you get 10% off if you are annual pass holders on virtually all the shops and eateries in both the Universal Parks which really helps - we saved around 50 dollars with the 10% off - a bottle of water is around 5-6 dollars in both the parks.
Ollivander's gets very busy in the Studios and be prepared to buy interactive wands which virtually everyone buys at 55 dollars each. The best HP ride is in Islands of Adventure and the queues get very busy so my advice would be - do the ride early or later in the day and single rider queues are about 1/2 the waiting time and worth it - although on the HP ride single riders miss some of the rooms - so you need to do one normal queue to enjoy the full ride.
Maybe worth fitting in a 3/4 night cruise whilst you are over there - can go from Port Canaveral and they can be very inexpensive and you get to chill for a few days too.
Personally, I don't think you need the Express tickets when you are over there for 14 days - we didn't and we were there during Mardis Gras which was very busy on the day we left.
We have been to Orlando before and stayed in a villa on Windsor Hills but this was when we were doing mainly the Disney Parks - but villas can be cheap.
Also, recommend the Dibb site.