Welcome to the third post in my WDW Series - this time I'm talking about tickets! I think this will likely be the last of the 'informative' posts - from now on they'll be a bit more fun, like what I'll be taking with me, my park bag etc. But I thought I'd like to do this post to help anyone out who's booking their first trip, or are looking for ways to book excursions in Florida that don't involve Disney. Also, quick disclaimer - this post is not sponsored in any way and all views expressed are my own.
Now I didn't actually do too much research in terms of tickets, I mostly looked at three different sites:
Disney Holidays - the official Walt Disney travel company
Now what you book, really depends on many factors - different sites and different tickets will suit different people in varying ways, depending on what you want out of your holiday. For example, if you want to book all inclusive - hotel, flights, dining plan, Disney hotel and tickets, it's probably best that you book it as a package through Disney. If you're going on holiday to Orlando, and are only going to Disney for a couple of days, you'll probably want to get some kind of day pass. We're staying off-site, so were looking to buy our tickets separately to the flights and hotel. In an attempt to keep this post as waffle-free as possible, I'm going to tell you what we've booked, who with, and why we chose to book those specific ones.
So we booked through Attraction Tickets Direct, purely because for what we wanted to book, it was the cheapest option available. We are spending the majority of the holiday in the parks, with the exception of a couple of days, and we also needed to consider that we're going to Universal. So after checking out different prices and comparing a lot of options, we booked the 14 day combination Disney and Universal ticket, meaning we can go to any Disney park or Universal on any day during the holiday. I decided to book this, as it was the cheaper option over booking a 14 day Disney ticket, and 2 day tickets to Universal for the specific days we wanted to go. We got the same great deals that Disney are currently offering - 14 day tickets for the price of 7 day ticket, up to £100pp off the price of the tickets, and free Memory Maker & Fast Pass+. But we also got an extra - free with our booking we were given tickets to Cirque Du Soleil La Nouba at Disney Springs, for any show of our choosing during our holiday, which was such a lovely bonus. I guess you will either be lucky, or you won't in terms of what offers are around at the time - we hit it very lucky with ours!
(www.attraction-tickets-direct.co.uk)
Another big deciding factor in where we bought the tickets from, and something that you would definitely need to think about was a deposit system. As far as I could see (I could be wrong!), if you buy from Disney directly you would be charged for the full amount for the tickets/holiday at the payment stage, which unless you've been saving for months is quite a lot to have taken out of your account in one go. ATD offer a £20pp deposit system, so we actually only paid £40 for the tickets, and can pay off the balance up to 30 days before the holiday in installments of any amount that we like - you simply call them and say you want to pay £X amount off the balance. With ATD you also get sent the physical park tickets, so you don't need to faff around waiting to exchange a voucher once you get to the parks - you can stroll straight on in! The tickets are also delivered in a nice little ticket wallet, which is great for keeping everything altogether.
So to sum up in terms of booking the park tickets, you need to consider:
• Are you wanting to book a package with everything altogether?
• Do you want to visit any other parks - Universal, SeaWorld, Busch Gardens etc?
• How many days do you want to spend in the parks in total - is it worth getting a 14-day park ticket?
• What extras and offers are available across the different sites?
• Do a quick comparison of prices across the different sites.
Finally, I thought I would quickly talk about some of the other excursions that ATD have on offer. I was really stuck with what to get Cameron for Christmas, seeing as he bought the holiday for me. So I thought it would be really nice to book a couple of activities that would really appeal to him, and that didn't involve Disney for whilst we're in Florida. It was so easy booking these through ATD - once I've paid off the balance of the booking, all we have to do is turn up at the pick-up points with our tickets/booking confirmation and we're set! I bought a day deep-sea fishing in the Gulf of Mexico and Florida reefs, which includes transport to and from Clearwater Beach, lunch overlooking the beach, the rod, reel, bait and fishing license, and finally the day fishing! All we need to do is make our way to the coach point at a certain time in the morning, which will be easy as the points are all super close to our hotel, and we're set! The second excursion I booked is one that definitely appeals more to me than fishing (that was 100% for Cameron!) which is a night-time airboat creek tour which will last for one hour through the Central Florida Everglades! Let's face it - you can't go to Florida and not go looking for Gators 😝 We're booked in for 9pm to do this tour, so we'll be spending the day in the parks, and heading out in the evening.
(Picture credit: Groupon)
Details for the deep sea fishing can be found here.
Details for the night-time creek tour can be found here.
They offer so many great excursions, some of which include the Kennedy Space Centre, swimming with manatees, complete shopping experiences, Clearwater Beach, Miami tours, airboat safaris, Gatorland, 2 day getaway to swim with dolphins at South Beach, 2 day Miami getaway, balloon rides, sports tickets - and so many more! If you've got a trip coming up I 100% recommend that you see what they've got on offer and if there's anything that appeals to you whilst you'll be on holiday! The trips come under the £20pp deposit system, so you won't have to pay them off until 30 days before you travel, which is bonus 😊
I hope this post has been of one use to you, and you've enjoyed reading about how and what we've booked! Next up in the series is my Travel Pouch Essentials - including a very special pouch that I've purchased especially for the holiday!
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