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Florida Vacation Diary June 09

Posted by Anthony on Monday July 20th 2009 at 15:30.

This is a bit late - it was exactly a month ago tomorrow that I set off for Florida, but better late than never huh. On June 22nd I went for a week long trip to Florida with my friends Hannah and James, this is what we got up to and some tips on how to get the most of your trip if you go there.

Monday

Headed to Heathrow to catch our flight with Northwest Airlines to Minneapolis/St. Paul. Found there was no free wifi at Heathrow or Minneapolis :( Then from Minneapolis got another flight to Orlando. By the time we arrived we'd been awake for almost 24 hours so were crazy tired, but still had to get our luggage, get the car, find the hotel and check in. On top of that it was my first time driving in America, sitting on the left to drive, and driving an automatic.

The car we rented was from American Car Rental. I'd like to mention here that our experience with them was great! I was a bit worried about choosing them because I couldn't find any reviews of them online and no-one seemed to mention them. I had to go with them because I'm only 19 and this is the only place that would let me rent a car. We got picked up from the airport by the free shuttle from ACR. The signs outside ACR actually said 'Advantage Rent-A-Car', adding to my nervousness having chosen this company. The lady at reception was very nice and friendly although the service was a bit slow. The car we got was a 2009 Honda Civic and was a lovely car, a huge step up from my 1997 Rover 214 I drive at home. So if you're under 21, or even under 25 and looking to rent a car in Orlando then I recommend American Car Rental. They're not the cheapest, but if you have no other option like me then they do the job well.

After getting in the car, figuring out how to start it and remembering to turn the lights on halfway down the road... (<_<) we headed for the hotel. We were staying in the Baymont Inn and Suites on Canada Avenue. The directions from Google Maps and the woman at the car rental place were very simple - straight down Sand Lake Road and Canada Avenue is on the right. But we managed to miss it anyway. After doing a couple of laps round international drive and universal boulevard we whipped out the sat nav and got there. The hotel was very nice considering the price - £25 a night. The guy at the check in desk wasn't the friendliest (granted it was 1AM) but we got our cards and headed up. After a little rest (it was now 2AM) we headed out again looking for a Walgreens. Got totally lost even with Sat Nav and ended up on the Turnpike somehow... but we eventually found one and stocked up on some American goodies (mmm... mint Oreos and Mountain Dew).

 

Tuesday

Even though we were very very tired none of us slept well on the first night, so getting up wasn't the greatest even though we were in one of the greatest places on earth. We got a really nice breakfast buffet at Sizzler then hit the Florida Mall. Even by this point we had fallen in love with the place. Everyone is so much nicer than in England, everything's cheaper and not to mention the amazing weather. After some browsing we went to Wal-Mart to see what all the hype is about and went to Best Buy as well. I'm a fan of Guitar Hero and was amazed to se the entire wall full of Guitar Hero stuff in Best Buy, they must have had every piece of kit you can get! Shame the games wouldn't work in my Xbox 360 back home.

With a bit of shipping done we went to Downtown Disney which is quite a nice place. If you can't afford to go to the parks like us then you can still get a taste of Disney for free by going here for free. It's a lot bigger than I was expecting, we got a free boat ride from one end to the other. If you can't stand that much of Disney like James then downtown disney is about enough for one holiday.

The day was finished off with a game on Mini Golf at one of the Congo River courses on International Drive, which included some mysterious ball vanishing.. twice.

Wednesday

We set off for a relatively long drive to the west coast. First stop: Anna-Maria Island. It took about 2 hours of driving, we broke it up halfway with a stop at Westfield Shopping Center in Brandon. After finally getting to Anna-Maria Island we sat down on a thin strip of beach on the north of the island and enjoyed the lovely hot weather our pale English bodies have never seen the likes of. After chillaxing here for a while we got back on the road and headed north across the Sunshine Skyway bridge across the Tampa Bay (enjoying some great views on the way). Our next stop was Sand Key County Park in Clearwater. There's some changing rooms here so we got changed and had a good swim in the sea. Of course we had to brag to our friends back home using Facebook about how good it was there. Protip: setup Facebook Mobile and you can update your status by just texting it to 32665.

See the route we took by downloading the Google Earth file. This was plotted during the day by my Windows Mobile phone running the program Noni GPS Plot. It's a good little gadget to play with if you're into that sort of thing.

By the time we were ready to leave Clearwater it was around 7pm so the roads around Tampa were quite busy, on top of that there was some construction work. But it didn't take too long and we were back in Orlando in 90 minutes. We went to TGI Fridays for dinner which is only about 250 meters down the road... so of course we drove (it is America after all).

Thursday

Today we went to Universal Studios for the 1st day of our 2 day, 2 park ticket we got for $84.99 each + tax at UniversalOrlando.com. The website says bring the credit card used to book and ID. We had both but weren't asked for either. The first ride was Shrek 4D because it was the closest. After this we decided to fork out for the Universal Express Plus passes which was an excellent decision. For only $27 (price varies per day) you get to skip the line once on each ride. We only had to wait 5 to 10 minutes maximum on each ride, no more waiting outside in the heat. Our favourite rides were The Simpsons ride and The Mummy. The Beetlejuice Rock & Roll show was also pretty good as well with some songs to suit everyone's taste.

During they day they were doing some test runs on the new 'Rip Ride Rockit' roller coaster due to open soon, it was strange to see it going round with no screams from anyone. There was a helicopter hovering overhead during the day and some footage of the roller coaster was shown on the local news later that night.

After we'd done all the rides we went to the Hard Rock Café and had some more great food (I'm seeing a pattern here) and splashed out for the photo they take of your group when you go in.

Again we got lost on the way out of Universal even though it's very very close to the hotel.

  

Friday

On Friday we went over to the east coast. Only an hour or so and we were at Cocoa Beach. It was a lot better than I remember it when I was 7. After a bit more relaxing on the beach it started to rain so we kept going to our next stop - Kennedy Space Center. My dad didn't recommend going there because they've gotten rid of the free section outside so you have to pay the admission to see anything now. But we went in anyway seeing at it was only $20ish. There aren't that many attractions there so young kids probably wouldn't like it. However the shuttle launch experience is very good, and the tour of the complex is also good if you're interested in it. From the observation deck we could see the Endeavour space shuttle on the launch pad which was due to launch before our trip but was delayed. (It eventually launched on July 15th) we also caught a glimpse of the Delta IV rocket which was supposed to be launching the day we were there. The launch was cancelled due to bad weather.

At Kennedy Space Center I got given a $1 bill that had written on it "Track this bill at WheresGeorge.com". So I went on the site and found out about it. I thought this was a great idea - it's a website where you put in the serial number of the bill and you can say where you picked it up and the condition of the bill etc. Then you can see where the bill has traveled all over the country. Because of this I'm now actually making a similar page myself. I'll put my link on a £5 and people can come to this site to track where it goes in the UK. Keep checking the blog if you're interested.

Back on topic, here's Friday's Google Earth route.

Saturday

We went back over to the east coast today. First up to Daytona beach. You can park on the actual beach for a cost of only $3 for the whole day. Not only is it the best place to park (it's hard to find a space anywhere else) but it's also good for the fun of driving in the beach. Watch out though, certain sections are restricted to 4 wheel drive vehicles only because of the soft sand. Most of it is open for any car though.

The rocket that was supposed to launch yesterday had been rescheduled for today between 6:15 and 7:15. We went down the I-95 to a place just outside of Titusville to watch the launch...

 

 
An hours drive to see the rocket for about 20 seconds before it disappeared behind a cloud. Was it worth it?... totally!
 
Back up to Daytona for the evening. They have a fireworks display from the end of the pier every Saturday at 9:45. There's a shopping/restaurant complex called Ocean Walk Village that has some nice restaurants and overlooks the Daytona Bandshell which has free concerts most weekends. There's a big parking garage at Ocean Walk Village, I can't remember how much it costs but we learnt, after about 10 minutes of searching for a machine to pay, that you pay as you drive out. The firework display is a great way to end a great day.
 
 
 
Sunday
 
On Sunday we went back to Universal Studio for our second day. Again we got the Universal Express Plus pass which costs another $27, but as I said it's definitely worth it. Protip: You can use the express pass twice on the dueling dragons because it's two separate rides. So you can skip the line for fire, then skip the line for ice. It's a great ride, even though having never been on a roller coaster where your legs dangle below you it felt like they were going to hit everything as you go past...
If you're looking for a snack in the park. The shop in Seuss Landings does some amazing cookies that you should try!
 
After another long day at the park, we went back to the hotel for a dip in the pool to relax on our last full day there :(. The pool actually closes at 11pm, but the same person on reception who was quite grumpy when we first arrived had cheered up and said we could go in the pool anyway as long as we weren't too loud :)
 
 
Monday
 
Our flight back to Minneapolis didn't leave until 18:30 so we still hade quite a bit of time to do some more exploring. Checkout time at the hotel was 11am so once we'd packed up we went to Wal-Mart to stock up on some American drinks and food to take home. 6 bottles of Mountain Dew and Sierra Mist for $2! It breaks my heart to think that I was paying £17 for 12 cans of Mountain Dew from AmericanSoda.co.uk :( and it tastes better from a bottle. (Although American Soda is still the cheapest way to get it in the UK).
 
Once we'd got as much as we could into our suitcases we went to the Mall at Millenia. A very nice upmarket mall, but a bit out of our price range. There was an Apple store though so we could get a bit more Facebook time. Once we were done there we had some more time to spare so we went down International Drive and stopped off at another of the Congo River golf locations to see the alligators.
 
Then the time came to reluctantly return the car that had served us well and been so comfy and easy to drive all week. I was worried that they might complain about the amount of sand that we'd managed to drag into the car, I'd wiped off the sand that was splashed down the side from driving on the beach. The American Car Rental lady looked it over and everything was fine. I'll say again, if you're under 21 and looking to rent a car in Orlando then they're the place to go. Without a car our trip would have been nowhere near as amazing as it was. (I actually only considered Florida after I found out we could get a car). Orlando is great. but the beaches and coasts are even better.
 
We got the free shuttle from the car rental people back to the airport. Orlando Airport has free wifi, so I ended up playing a game on MSN where Alex would tell me where to go in the airport and I'd take photos. A pretty fun way to wait for the plane if you're nerdy.
 
We flew to Minneapolis/St. Paul airport with no problems. I spent the $1 that had the tracking website written on it at a shop in the airport so I can help it on it's way, I added 1,500 miles to it's journey. When we got back to London we landed in the middle of an English 'heatwave' which at any other time would have made us happy. But having just got back from the 35 degree temperatures in Florida it felt like nothing.
 
 
Overall it was probably the best holiday of my life. The others really enjoyed their first trip to America as well. Now we can't wait to go back, hopefully next year :D
 

 

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A most awesome read! Very funny and informative :-) It was THE best holiday i've had too! In the USA with my best mates! You've put a lot of work into this writing etc...very cool of you. Damn, we should still be there, not here in UK ....so yeah hopefully return next year then! :-D

Hannah Smith
on Tuesday July 21st 2009.


Great blog of the trip! The MSN picture game was quite humourous, if a little pervy! LOL. America next year is it? Hmmmm....

Alex
on Tuesday July 21st 2009.


I lived with some Irish and British students at one time and they were also obsessed with Mountain Dew, what's that about? Great trip report and great advice for car rentals for people under 25, good to hear you had such a great time.

Stacy
on Tuesday July 21st 2009.