Pet Friendly hotels near Disney World

August 31st, 2010

If your idea of family vacation to Disney World includes even the family dog or family cat, you’ll need to find a pet friendly hotel in the Orlando area. To assist your search, we’ve created a list of pet friendly hotels and their respective fees. Remember, the only alternative is boarding  your pet at the kennel at Walt Disney World, which is more expensive than most hotel fees.
Pet friendly hotels in Orlando include:
•    Best Western inside Walt Disney Word. Guests at Best Western in Walt Disney World can bring a max 2 pets, no more than 80 pounds each, for a small fee $10.00 per day.
•    Holiday Inn Sunspree Resort in Lake Buena Vista allow pets of a smaller size, with their max weight at 30 pounds per pet. Sunspree charges $40 per night for a maximum of two pets and a seven night maximum stay.
•    Holiday Inn Maingate East in Kissimmee has new property that  allow pets 40 pounds and smaller in its standard double rooms, for a fee of $10.
•    Seralago hotel in Kissimee allows pets in its standard deluxe rooms, for a fee of $40 per pet, per stay.
If you’re considering a vacation home in Orlando but you’re wondering which ones allow pets, Emerald Isle Resorts in Kissimmee allows certain pets, just call ahead to check before you make your reservation. Remember, if you plan on traveling with a pet, your airline will likely charge you extra, and be sure to pick up after your pet when you’re walking them on the property of any vacation resort area.



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Most Popular Hotel Amenities

August 16th, 2010

We surveyed 435 guests coming through orlandovacation.com asking them this simple question: when looking for a hotel, what was the top three amenities you found to be attractive? The top 10 answers are listed below. Some will surprise you.

A picture of a Disney Good Neighbor Hotel Swimming Pool

1. Location…proximity to Disney World. This was mentioned by 44% of the respondents as one of the top three amenities they were seeking.

2. Free hot breakfast…21% of the respondents had this one selected in their top three top choices. Interesting…today, hotels are moving away from FREE food.

3. Free Shuttle Service to the theme parks…17% listed this in their top three choices. Again, somewhat amazing, our respondents want this service, but when it comes to going to the parks, you will find that the shuttle buses are running back and forth to the theme parks with only a handful of passengers.

4. Internet connectivity or wifi…Now, this is way up from former years when we did the study. This just goes to show how young families all want to stay connected.

5. Big screen television in the room….This wasn’t even mentioned five years ago. Now look at it, 9% of the respondents had it in the top three amenities they sought prior to making a reservation.

6. Number of swimming pools….With more and more Orlando Resorts spending big time especially in the pool area, there is no wonder this made the list. However as with big screen televisions this was not mentioned five years ago.

7. Refrigerator or Microwave in the room…This slipped a bit as many Disney Good Neighbor Hotels have either added such or have not hi-lighted them in there sales material.

8. FREE newspaper in the morning….This is where it has always appeared around the eight spot. People want the paper, but when you look at newspaper sales, the public gets most of their news from the internet or television.

9. Free Cable Movie Channels…HBO and Showtime were big draws five to ten years ago, now young families are more into their kids and television is not really that important to the family especially when they are on vacation.

10. On site Restaurant and Lounge….this slipped almost off the page. Back a number of years ago, families visiting Disney World wanted a full service hotel with the restaurant and lounge. This was for convenience. Today, younger families are more prone to venture from their hotel to get the bill of fare the family is custom to eating.

Well, there you go 435 people told us what they thought. How does this measure up to what you are looking for as you decide to visit Orlando this coming year?

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Activities near Disney World Hotels

July 12th, 2010

If your family plans to spend more than a couple days in the Orlando area, they’ll be eager to explore exciting attractions besides the most popular parks at Disney. Fans of NASCAR or anyone who fills the need for speed will enjoy a day at Richard Petty Driving Experience at Walt Disney World Speedway, part of the Wide World of Sports Complex in Walt Disney World. For packages starting at $110, you can experience the unforgettable thrill of traveling traveling at 130 miles pher hour in a 600 horsepower NASCAR-style stock car. Novices should consider the Ride-Along package, which includes three laps with a professional instructor. For those who are a little more bold, there’s the Rookie experience and the King’s experience. The Rookie Experience puts you in the driver’s seat for eight laps around the track, and the King’s experience includes two sessions, of eight laps and 10 laps, each.

Obviously, the Richard Petty Driving Experience appeals to thrill seekers and those old enough to drive, but there are plenty of other great attractions   In addition to the Richard Petty Driving Experience, other attractions that the entire family can enjoy, such as WonderWorks. Located in the heart of the world famous stretch of road known as International Drive, WonderWorks is an enormous,82-foot tall museum designed to appear upside-down. Rainy days in Orlando are the perfect time to visit WonderWorks massive layout includes a lazer tag course, a virtual roller coaster, a 3 Story Indoor Ropes Challenge Course and a 4D extreme motion ride which features a flight simulator.

If your family enjoys outdoor adventures, there are several different airboat ride companies around the edges of Orange County, including Boggy Creek Airboat Rides, which is open every day of the year except Christmas, from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. Airboat Rides are a great way to see Florida’s incredible wildlife up close and in person, including alligators.

Please give us a call if we can assist you in making reservations at a Disney World hotel.

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Green hotels in Orlando

June 26th, 2010

Hotels are always trying to find a way to cut cost and with a huge green movement sweeping across America there are hotels which are offering discounts to clients if they want ‘green service’. What is green service? It is where the hotel will only clean your room once every three days, and they will only provide the guests clean towels.

This discount can be quite a bit of savings…a guest can save upwards to $20 a day. Now, I don’t know about you but this is a pretty good amount of savings for a service that is not really that great to begin with. Keep in mind, most guests staying in a Kissimmee hotel are traveling with kids and as you well know kids can mess up a hotel room in about 3 seconds flat. So I would expect this service to really catch fire in the Orlando area.

Kissimmee hotels are not offering this service on stays that are less than 3 nights. Obviously they do not want guests to use their room as party central and destroy it. The thinking is that when the cleaners go into a room they can keep an eye on it and make sure it is not being destroyed. The other thought is that most guests who are staying for four or more nights are typically not using the room to party in.

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POW WOW in Orlando is a big success

May 26th, 2010

POW WOW just concluded here in Orlando, and it was a huge success. Pow Wow is an annual convention where travel professionals from around the world get together and discuss the travel industry as a whole. The key for many vacation destination cities is to host one this great event. Why? Simple, it gives the host city an opportunity to showcase their city to travel professionals from around the world.

Here in Orlando the projected economic impact of having such event is estimated at $4 million to $1 billion. Now that is a lot of money! Many of the local Orlando hotels were able to show the travel professionals first hand why they should urge their clients to come to Orlando and stay at their hotel.

There was some really good news which came out of the convention. The majority of the travel professionals at the convention feel that the travel industry is on the rebound and most of them felt that Orlando one of the leading cities for which will show a drastic rebound in 2011.

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Disney Suite Hotels Coming Soon

May 12th, 2010

Disney executives just announced that the plans are in the works to build an 800 room all suite hotel on Disney World property. Disney will start  construction on the new hotel in late summer, and it should be finished by Christmas 2011.

The suite hotel will be a themed hotel with each room being decorated with a famous Disney movie in mind. You will be able to get 2 and 3 room suites at the hotel. What is quite interesting is that Disney does not have many suite hotels on the property… sure they have a lot of rooms but not many suites.

The suite hotel should not have much effect on the hotels inside and near Disney World. However, it will probably hurt many Disney vacation homes and condos. There are not many places to stay near Disney World other than vacation homes if you are traveling with a large family or group, and you all want to stay together.

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Great Orlando hotel offers

May 4th, 2010

We recently added two new hotels to our portfolio here at Orlandovacation.com, and if you are looking to visit Disney World this summer then you should check out these properties. The first hotel we added was the Royal Plaza Resort located inside the Walt Disney World Resort. This hotel is being offered at $60 a night during low season and $67 a night during high season. This is a 3.5 star hotel with free shuttle service to the Disney World theme parks every thirty minutes. The hotel also offers a Kids Eat Free program, and newly renovated rooms. There is one really neat thing about the Royal Plaza, in all the double rooms there are two oversized double beds and a loveseat which pulls out into a single bed. This is a really neat feature especially if you have two young children who might not want to sleep in the same bed.

The other property we added was the Holiday Inn Sunspree Resort. This property is one of the nicest Holiday Inn’s anywhere in the world. This hotel is located less than 2 miles to Disney World, and they offer free shuttle service to all the Disney theme parks. This hotel boast extra large kidsuite rooms which can accommodate up to 6 people.

Please note here at Orlandovacation.com we want to win your business through outrageous customer service and low nightly prices on Orlando hotels.

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Effects of the Oil Spill and Orlando hotels

May 4th, 2010

I was driving to work today and there is speculation that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico will reach Florida beaches within a couple of days. As you might imagine, there are experts from all over the country predicting what effects the oil spill will have on Florida tourism revenue. Now I am not claiming to be an expert and while I think that the Florida tourism as a whole will take a hit this summer due to this unfortunate event, I do think Orlando tourism might have something to gain. Reasoning for my thinking? Simple, many visitors might actually cancel their trip to the beaches and come inland to Orlando where Disney is our major draw, couple this with the fact that if tourism falls off too much the state and other agencies will start a big time advertising plan.

If you have a vacation planned to one of the nearby beaches this summer, it might not hurt you to put a contingency plan in place just in case the oil spill gets much worse. Keep in  mind, there are quite a few really nice beaches within an hour to an hour and a half drive of Orlando.

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