Florida questions !

[Twix42]

Hi, Florida first timers here...I have lots of silly questions that Google is overwhelming me with unhelpful answers ... We will only be in Florida 1 week. SO:

Is it possible to just buy 1 day tickets for the parks? How? At the gates?

All we want to do is the main Universal park and possibly the new one with Nintendo stuff. Not Disney MK. Possibly Epcot, but it's not priority.

We also want to do the Kennedy Space Centre, what the best way to organise that?

All tips are very welcome!

Thank you....its so overwhelming with 14 day passes etc....

😃

Haven't been recently and things may have changed but I remember buying a day pass for Islands of Adventure and it was more expensive than the 14 day one. You could always buy on the gate.

When are you planning on going?

Single day tickets on the gate can be 130-200+ USD so depending when you're visiting, it's cheaper to buy a multi day ticket.

There's two universal main parks - Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure, the new one Epic universe is opening soon ish. The new universal park has only released single day tickets to pass holders currently, although I've heard this is changing and general single day tickets are out soon.

The Kennedy centre is a full day itself! Are you hiring a car?

You can buy at the gate or use a site like Undercover Tourist (it may have to be the US version, I can't recall).

Will you be hiring a car? It's very straightforward to drive in the US, and that will be the simplest way to get to Kennedy.

Yes you can buy 1 day tickets to Universal and Disney, this is where I bought mine from last year:

https://www.orlandoattractions.com/tickets/universal-orlando-1-day-tickets

Get a "park to park" ticket which lets you go to both Universal parks in 1 day and I would definitely recommend fast pass if its only 1 day.

I think the only way to get a pass for Epic Universe (the new park) is to get a 14 day ticket, which lets you have one day at Epic
but the way the tickets are priced a 14 day one isn't much more than a couple of days - we had 4 days at Universal last year and had the 14 day tickets

Kennedy space centre we just turned up and paid.

Yes you can get 1 day passes.

Best way to get to Kennedy is to drive - it’s an hour and bit from Orlando.

Yes to getting a hire car.
We'll be there 1st week of July..

Only a week sadly...

We did just over a week (8 days) when we were there and split our time so that the first four days we were at Universal last year, staying at a hotel that gave us fast passes.
Then we did 4 days on international drive with a hire car, visited Cape Kennedy and also Wild Florida animal park, which I would recommend. DD got to pet a sloth - and was honestly as excited about that as she was about universal- and we did an airboat ride

You can buy Universal tickets before you go, or once you’re in Florida. The tickets available in the U.K. are good value for 14 days but you may get something better value for 4 or 5 days from Undercover Tourist or the Universal USA site. You can get a 4 park ticket that allows access to Universal Studios, Islands of Adventure, Epic Universe and Volcano Bay (the water park). Definitely get your passes before you go to the park to save queuing.

We also went just one day to Universal. We bought tickets on orlandoattractions. Multi-day tickets are relatively cheaper, but if you’re still only going 1 day then a 1 day ticket will still be cheaper.

If you’re really into space stuff , plan to leave early to get to Kennedy space center in time. When we visited they already cloes at 5 … We didn’t manage to see everything in 1 day. But we couldn’t squeeze 2 days into our schedule.

On dates, we’ve done both October and Easter and much preferred Easter as the weather is more reliably good. With Scottish school holidays you can usually manage to avoid US spring break.

If you would consider car hire, you have more flexibility on accommodation and price. It may be a bit dated by now, but we enjoyed staying at Vista Cay by Millenium in a great apartment or townhouse on several occasions. Everyone had their own bedroom and it was great to have an air conditioned home from home. Its a short drive from Universal. It’s one of those developments with a communal pool (important as villa pools are often under cages and there’s nowhere to sunbathe) gym and gardens with huge supermarket, pizza place etc next door for snacks, eat in meals and water.

The advantages of such a set up is that you get the opportunity to have lazy days away from the madness or even half days by the pool with parks in the afternoon or evening.

You do have to weigh up the advantages of car hire eg zipping along to the Florida Mall for some shopping or even just to ‘Olive Garden’ on Idrive for dinner against the car parking charges at the parks.

We stayed at Hard Rock hotel in a club floor room once. It was expensive , we really had to eat out all the time and we were all crowded in together in one large room but it was certainly convenient for walking to the parks. But - I missed Vista Cay.

Never mind the accommodation being dated @EvelynBeatrice 🤣 your advice is about 6 months too late for this OP!

Ha! I was too overcome with nostalgic longings for lovely holidays of previous years with young kids to notice any dates!!