After our 9 hour flight we arrived in Orlando mid-afternoon. We took a short and cheap Uber ride and arrived at our accommodation in Lake Buena Vista, which was about 10 minutes’ walk from the entrance to Disney World. We stayed at the Clarion Inn Lake Buena Vista and for what we needed it for it was perfect. We were there during the recent hurricane and the hotel did everything to make sure we were comfortable and informed about the weather. I would recommend Lake Buena Vista to anyone thinking of going to Orlando, as it is close to all of the theme parks, has lots of restaurants and shops and is a short taxi ride from things like the Florida Mall and Discovery Cove.
Next, we went to Disney’s Animal Kingdom, this was my favourite park out of the ones we went to. It is full of exciting rides, shows and food for you to enjoy. We watched a Lion King show which was brilliant and did a safari through the parks wildlife reserve, you can book fast passes for both of these. This park recently opened up a Pandora world from the film Avatar and has two brand new rides. These rides get very high wait times and the queues are mostly outdoors so if you are travelling with young children and visit in the hotter months I would give these rides a miss, unless you can get a Fast Pass for them. You can easily spend a full day at this park and if you’re not too tired by the end of it I would suggest staying to watch Rivers of Light, this is the show on the lake located in the Asia section of the park. This takes place at night and is a light show projected onto the water. Disney puts on a show at all of their parks at night which involves things like fireworks and music so keep this in mind when visiting.
On our third day, we visited Disney’s Hollywood Studios. I loved this park as it has some really great rides such as Rock N Roller Coaster and The Tower of Terror. The crowd levels were much smaller here too. There is something for everyone. There are performers in the streets who interact with the public and if you like Star Wars there is a Storm Trooper parade that goes down the centre of the park every couple of hours. This park has lots of shows on offer too which are amazing and definitely worth watching. I would recommend the Indiana Jones show, even if you didn’t enjoy the films it is a brilliant show and is not what you would expect at all. All the shows in the Disney parks are included in your ticket so you do not have to pay any extra to go and watch them, so when the heat gets unbearable or you have another hour before your next fast pass they are definitely worth checking out.
Our final Disney park was Epcot. Epcot is set out around a large lake called World Showcase and has 11 different countries set out in a circle. This is an amazing park as you can walk from France to England in a matter of minutes and each area is themed so well that you would think you were really there. If you have small children you definitely have to do the Frozen ride, it is quite hard to get a Fast Pass for this ride if you are visiting during a busy period and the queues are quite long if you don’t have one but it is a lovely ride and is definitely worth it for little ones. As you can imagine, there is a variety of food here from all over the world. They also have an event called the Food and Wine festival that was running while we were here so there were even more countries represented, each offering delicious food. We made our way around the world showcase ordering a small dish from each and it was fantastic. One of our Uber drivers told us that Orlando locals like to play a game at Epcot called “Drink around the world” were you buy a shot or small drink from each country around World Showcase. Obviously, it is a game for adults who have some extra dollars as Disney pricing is pretty high, but it still sounds like a good way to spend an afternoon in the park.
The final thing we did was Universals Volcano Bay. This is a very new water park with huge slides and nice little beaches and wave pools. Perfect for a day to relax and cool off from the sun. We didn’t do parks like Sea World or Busch Gardens as we didn’t want to over face ourselves. There is so much to do in Orlando and one visit to each park just isn’t enough.
It was a holiday of a lifetime and I am already planning my next trip as I loved it so much. If the parks aren’t really your thing, there are still plenty of things to do in Orlando such as shopping and eating, and with beaches just a short drive away you have a variety of options.
See our USA multi centre holiday page to visit Orlando and the US.
