Florida Travel Forum

We, 5 adults and 2 children, are travelling from UK to Florida in June 2008. Need to buy attraction tickets but there are so many variations I am very confused!! Am I better to buy before travelling, if so any idea of the cheapest place to buy from, or wait 'til we get there? Also, would like to eat out at authentic places, fed up of touristy restaurants etc. Any help would be appreciated.

Hey!

I hope you will have a car. Stonewood Grill and Tavern is my family's favorite restaurant in Orlando. The atmosphere is upscale, yet the the prices are reasonable enough to dine there a couple times a week. The food is excellent, the bar area is lovely. I can guarentee you that you won't find any tourists there, even though it's only 5-10 minutes from International Drive in the Dr. Phillips neighborhood. Another restaurant I recommend is Thai House on East Colonial near downtown.

I've never purchased Disney tickets through another vendor. However, Universal/Islands of Adventure purchase the tickets directly from their website www.universalorlando.com, they always give hefty dicounts if you purchase online.

Enjoy!

Coupons and promotions are to be found everywhere, all the time and also available locally.There are so many attractions. Deciding on everything ahead of time is unnecessary in my opinion except for peak-season travel. Once you get acclimatized to local conditions and collected lots of coupons, you will be better able to decide on which ones to use.

A flexible and leisurely plan works best for first-time visit, just add a few extra days to a minimal must-see and take advantage of opportunies as they arise.

If you're confused about tickets the best thing to do is work out exactly where you want to go. No point getting a 14day disney pass for example if you want to visit seaworld, universal, busch gardens etc as well as you will just run out of time and not get value for money. If you post on here where you definately want to go and i'l try and help you work out best ticket!

Assuming you are planning to stay in Orlando or near Disney World, it would not be possible to cover all the items here, so I have used recollections to come up with a suggested list for planning purposes for Florida,Orlando and surroundings (the list is not exhaustive)

Disney World – minimum 2 days

Epcot Center – minimum 1 day

Local shopping and other smaller attractions – minimum 1 day

Sea World – minimum ½ day

Universal Studio minimum ½ day

Car is needed for following trips –

Round trip to Kennedy Space Centter minimum 1 day

Round trip to Gatorland – minimum ½ day

Round trip to any beach on Atlantic Ocean – minimum 1 day

Round trip to any beach on Gulf side – minimum 1 day

Round trip To Miami / Ft Lauderdale – minimum 2 days

Round trip to Tampa, Busch Gardens – minimum 1 day

Round trip to Naples, FL – minimum 1 day

Round trip Key West – minimum 3 days (recommended 4 days)