I’m kind of loathe to write this report as there’s really not a lot to say about the Florida parks that people don’t already know, there won’t be any pictures that people haven’t seen a thousand time before, and I tend to prefer to write about places that people might not have been to, but I suppose it’s a place to give opinions and stuff.
Unlike some people, who shall remain nameless – let’s call this person Gordanarichy – I’ll try not to take five years to get it done. I’m also not going to go into great detail about what each ride is or does since I’m assuming that most people know already.
There will probably be quite a lot of comparing and contrasting getting done given that I’ve now been to every Disney and Universal park (#bragging#suckit), so I’m sorry if that gets a bit annoying, but I think it’s natural. While this was an amazing trip, I’m not going to kiss everything’s arse and pretend that everything was wonderful because there are some definite flaws across the parks. Anyway…
Day 1 – Arriving
Ugh. Hong Kong to Orlando is a ballache. I got a good deal on price (about £600 return I think), and went Hong Kong-Seattle (12 hours), Seattle-Detroit (4 hours), Detroit-Orlando (2 hours). In terms of travel time, there really wasn’t too much that was a lot better, with nothing direct at all, and the slightly quicker options cost a hell of a lot more.
I would MUCH rather do this trip from the UK, but since I’ve only got school holidays to work with, I figured that Chinese New Year would be a good time to visit Florida since it’s not a holiday in the USA or Europe. My only other alternatives would be the summer or Christmas holidays, which just isn’t happening.
Because of a lack of car/driving license, I decided to stay at a Disney hotel for the first few days to make it easier to get to and from the parks. I made the horrendous mistake of using their free shuttle service from the airport. I think they call it “Magic Express” or something equally twee. I should have just paid $20 for a transfer service. Despite being very quiet, it took ages for a bus to arrive. Check in at the hotel, All Star Music Resort, also took forever because the staff/computer system were so bloody slow and there were only two people on the desk. There were literally two couples in front of me, and it took me twenty minutes to be seen by someone.
I’d landed at around 10:30pm and got through immigration and collected luggage very quickly. I actually got into my hotel room – a hotel that was about a twenty-minute drive from the airport – a few minutes before one in the morning. This is after 24 hours of planes and airports. Not a great start!
I was put in a room overlooking the pool area and very close to the food court, reception, and shuttle buses. Here are a couple of pictures that I took on the first morning from outside my room:
I’ll talk more about the hotel later; this is already getting too wordy and I know that most of you are just scrolling through for pictures anyway. First park coming up next.
Unlike some people, who shall remain nameless – let’s call this person Gordanarichy – I’ll try not to take five years to get it done. I’m also not going to go into great detail about what each ride is or does since I’m assuming that most people know already.
There will probably be quite a lot of comparing and contrasting getting done given that I’ve now been to every Disney and Universal park (#bragging#suckit), so I’m sorry if that gets a bit annoying, but I think it’s natural. While this was an amazing trip, I’m not going to kiss everything’s arse and pretend that everything was wonderful because there are some definite flaws across the parks. Anyway…
Day 1 – Arriving
Ugh. Hong Kong to Orlando is a ballache. I got a good deal on price (about £600 return I think), and went Hong Kong-Seattle (12 hours), Seattle-Detroit (4 hours), Detroit-Orlando (2 hours). In terms of travel time, there really wasn’t too much that was a lot better, with nothing direct at all, and the slightly quicker options cost a hell of a lot more.
I would MUCH rather do this trip from the UK, but since I’ve only got school holidays to work with, I figured that Chinese New Year would be a good time to visit Florida since it’s not a holiday in the USA or Europe. My only other alternatives would be the summer or Christmas holidays, which just isn’t happening.
Because of a lack of car/driving license, I decided to stay at a Disney hotel for the first few days to make it easier to get to and from the parks. I made the horrendous mistake of using their free shuttle service from the airport. I think they call it “Magic Express” or something equally twee. I should have just paid $20 for a transfer service. Despite being very quiet, it took ages for a bus to arrive. Check in at the hotel, All Star Music Resort, also took forever because the staff/computer system were so bloody slow and there were only two people on the desk. There were literally two couples in front of me, and it took me twenty minutes to be seen by someone.
I’d landed at around 10:30pm and got through immigration and collected luggage very quickly. I actually got into my hotel room – a hotel that was about a twenty-minute drive from the airport – a few minutes before one in the morning. This is after 24 hours of planes and airports. Not a great start!
I was put in a room overlooking the pool area and very close to the food court, reception, and shuttle buses. Here are a couple of pictures that I took on the first morning from outside my room:
I’ll talk more about the hotel later; this is already getting too wordy and I know that most of you are just scrolling through for pictures anyway. First park coming up next.