Teetah
I LOVE IT HERE SO MUCH!
- Joined
- May 17, 2013
AH! I have gotten so far behind!!!!
I think this sounds so fun!!! It's changed so much there, I can totally see doing a date day! The last time we were there, there were probably 4-5 different street performers out - it was so awesome!
An extra vacation day is never a bad thing! Enjoy the RV show - we go to the Boat, Sport and Travel show here every few years and we always have lots of fun looking at the RVs and campers!
To me, this is one of the best things about your trip - still getting plenty of Disney, but not dealing with those crowds!!!!
I must confess...I don't really budget. We do make plans and try to assess how irresponsible we want to be. LOL. For example, while planning our 10 year anniversary Hawaii trip (did I tell you we changed from Ireland to Hawaii???), we are doing AirBNB the whole trip. We were trying to decide on whether to get a super nice place for the last week or go cheap(er). We went cheaper and saved the 1K difference. But, had we decided it was worth it, we would have splurged. We kind of do that with meals. We are both relatively frugal most of the time, so we try to allow ourselves some relaxation in that area during vacation. So we don't start out planning a trip saying, we are going to only spend x.xx, we just make decisions along the way. However, we do a total at the end to see what we spent. Does that make any sense at all??? HAHA!
Good girl on the sunscreen and shopping deals! I am the queen of overpacking and not using half of what I take. I am hoping to be better and plan more thoroughly for Hawaii...we almost never check bags when we fly and we will have to this time, so I want to only check 1 big suitcase. We are also island hopping a little bit and staying in several different places, so I don't want a ton to pack and repack.
I am getting so excited for you!!!! I hope you do a TR!!! If you have any social media where you will be updating, feel free to share!!!
Disney Springs Date DayAfter looking over some of the things we enjoy doing, certain DVC discounts, and things we always think about trying, but never do...we are actually considering having a Disney Springs area Day Date! Maybe even on our Anniversary actually!
I think this sounds so fun!!! It's changed so much there, I can totally see doing a date day! The last time we were there, there were probably 4-5 different street performers out - it was so awesome!
Small Update! Leaving A Day Earlier!We have a very small update! We are going to be heading down one day earlier to WDW. We have booked a one bedroom at a DVC Resort different from the two we are already planning on staying at! The reason we are heading down deserves a little story actually. At the present time we are saving up to purchase an RV. Jeremy works out of town a lot and instead of staying in hotels or rental houses, it would be really nice if he were able to have a place to call his own. The bonus for that is that we will be able to travel a lot more if we have our own RV to stay in since we will save money on hotels AND on top of all of that, we will be able to bring our dogs with us when we do travel. So we had planned on going to the RV Super Show in Tampa in January of 2018, and we will still probably do that. We just found out that there is a Summer RV Show at the same place in Tampa June 8-11. Since we are already going to be in Florida for that time, Jeremy decided to take one extra day off so we can still do everything we were planning and be able to go and look around at the RV show for a few hours on the 8th. We will still be able to make it back in time for our check-in at Beach Club, probably earlier than we were planning on getting there in the first place, which is awesome because that will give us more time hanging out at the pool there!! We are really excited for this other little baby side adventure and can't wait to show you guys where we are staying during the Trip Report! Hint: It is one of the top 5 resorts on our original list! Remember, we are already staying at Beach Club and Grand Floridian! So which one is it, less than a month to find out!!
Now that we are in the home stretch we are playing the waiting game, everything is pretty much budgeted, we are patiently awaiting our new style Magic Bands and are really excited that we have pretty much finalized our plans on what we are going to do while we are there. This is definitely going to be an unorthodox vacation at Disney World and other Florida area, we can't wait to go on it and share it with everyone when we get back! Maybe you guys will see something you have never done at Disney and try it on your next trip! Who knows, but we can't wait to go!!
An extra vacation day is never a bad thing! Enjoy the RV show - we go to the Boat, Sport and Travel show here every few years and we always have lots of fun looking at the RVs and campers!
Animal Kingdom is going to be a mad house I bet with Pandora opening, Rivers of Light etc. Hollywood is a big construction zone at the moment, and then with the new Happily Ever After at Magic Kingdom. We want to visit some of these places on a less busy time of year instead of in June with the heat and he crowds. We are about 18 days out! We keep counting down every day! I have also been checking the magic band tracking number and they finally arrived at our post office in town, so fingers crossed we should have those by the end of today, or at least Monday hopefully! I will keep you guys posted about that!
To me, this is one of the best things about your trip - still getting plenty of Disney, but not dealing with those crowds!!!!
Final Trip Budget! *Fingers Crossed*
So, we have made additions, and gotten rid of things, I have counted up mileage, and looked at restaurants. I have looked for discounts, read over menus to try and figure out what exactly we are planning on eating, calculated tolls, found activity prices, DVC discounts, hopefully this is the final budget, since I have added a few more table service/signature restaurants in the last couple of days. This budget is for 11 Night/12 Days. We are staying at 3 different DVC resorts with points. 2 different 1-bedroom villas, and a studio for 5 nights. 4 hotels on our Florida Key portion of the trip, the map is going to look pretty fun with all of the driving!! So, there are also two of us, and we are not planning on going to any of the 4 main parks at the moment. We are planning on visiting Typhoon Lagoon, and that extra cost is added in. This trip sure looks a WHOLE lot different than when we started planning it, but I sat down last night and crunched all the numbers and hopefully we will have saved up enough for this one! You guys will get to follow along on the TR to see how well we did and if we came in *hopefully* under budget! So, let the final budget begin!!
Day One:
Day Two:
- Breakfast @ Port City Java $10
- Lunch @ The Pickled Palate $30
- Dinner @ Outback Steakhouse $25 (We have a 15% Off Coupon and a $25 Gift Card)
- Fuel $70 (2 Tanks at $35 each)
- Territory Lounge $20
Day Three:
- Breakfast @ Geyser Point Bar & Grill $30
- RV Show @ Florida State Fairgrounds $14
- Lunch $20 (No Idea Where)
- Dinner @ Flying Fish $200
- Fuel $35
Day Four:
- Breakfast @ Boardwalk Bakery $10
- Lunch @ Fish House, Key Largo $60
- Dinner @ Snapper's Oceanfront $100
- Fuel $35
Day Five:
- Breakfast @ Harriette's $20
- Snorkel Tour @ John Pennekamp Coral Ref State Park $56
- Lunch @ Islamorada Shrimp $50
- Hotel in Marathon, FL $225
- Dinner @ Island Fish Company $100
Day Six:
- Breakfast @ The Wooden Spoon $20
- Lunch @ BO's Fish Wagon $50
- Parking $15
- Dinner @ Latitude's Sunset Key $150
- Hotel in Key West, FL $200
- Fuel $35
Day Seven:
- Fuel $35
- Breakfast @ Blue Heaven $40
- Road Snack @ Robert Is Here $15
- Lunch @ Crema, Miami $30
- Hotel in Hollywood, FL $160
- Dinner @ Sugar Reef Grill $100
Day Eight:
- Fuel $35
- Breakfast @ Cafe Club by Les Artistes $30
- Lunch @ Berry Fresh Cafe $30
- Dinner @ Chef Art Smith's Homecomin' $100
Day Nine:
- Breakfast @ Kona Cafe $45
- Typhoon Lagoon $100
- Lunch @ Quick Service $30
- Dinner @ Artist Point $150
Day Ten: Our 10th Anniversary!
- Breakfast @ Quick Service $25
- Disney World Miniature Golf Tournament! $100
- After Tea @ Garden View Tea Room $100
- Dinner @ Quick Service $50
Day Eleven:
- Breakfast @ Starbucks $20
- Aerophile Balloon Ride $20
- Bowling @ Splitsville $25
- Lunch @ Quick Service $30
- Surrey Bikes @ Port Orleans $50?
- Dinner @ The Boathouse $150
- La Nouba $120
Day Twelve:
- Breakfast $20
- Canoeing @ Fort Wilderness $20
- Lunch @ Quick Service $30
- Dinner @ Frontera Cocina $50
TOTAL $3500.00
- Fuel $70 (2 Tanks at $35 each)
- Breakfast $20
- Lunch $20
- Dinner $20
If you have read one of my trip reports before, you will know that I tend to budget on the high side. I would much rather have too much set aside than not nearly enough, I don't want to have to be transferring more funds from savings to checking during the trip. We have a Sunpass on our car...I know we live in North Carolina, but that tells you how much we go to Florida...LOL! For the restaurants, we looked at every menu, some of them didn't have prices so I tried to make educated guesses on those. The good thing is that all of the Disney ones do! So we looked at appetizers, entrees, desserts, and drinks. Basically we figured out in each category what our options were, and from that, I budgeted the most expensive choice. So like at Flying Fish for example, there were 3 options for me of entrees that I would choose, so out of those three, I picked the most expensive and budgeted for that one. So the budgeted amount is basically the maximum amount we would spend at any of these locations. Hopefully, they will all be less than what I think, but if we decide to go all out and get an appetizer, the most expensive entrees from our choices, a dessert, and two drinks, plus tax, and tip, that is where the numbers came from! It definitely looks expensive from where I am looking...LOL, however, we have saved for this trip all year, setting aside money here and there, we wanted to be able to experience exactly what we wanted during our 10th Anniversary Trip! I think the average it comes out to is around $300 per day. That price is definitely inflated a little because of the 4 additional hotel rooms we are needing for the Keys portion of the trip, as well as all of the extra fuel we will be using driving down there, back and to Tampa, and back. normally those costs would have been a lot less. We would have only need about 5 tanks of gas instead of he 8 or so we are going to be getting.
Next, I am curious if any of you budget for your trips? If so, how do you do it? Do you go all out like me and figure out menu choices, and mileage and stuff? Or do you just pick a certain dollar amount and not go over that? The way we do it has worked for us quite a few times and pretty much every time I have come in under budget, which is great because the extra money can always go back into savings, plus it makes me feel better to know that I spent less than I thought I would, instead of the opposite which is more than I thought, and that is no fun for anyone when you come back from a vacation and realize you spent way too much money on it and now have to figure out where that extra is going to come from! So, that is about all for this one! We are like 17 days out now, so getting hyped! With our magic bands arrival yesterday, everything is getting closer!! If you guys have any questions about the budget or anything else, just let me know! Have a great day!
I must confess...I don't really budget. We do make plans and try to assess how irresponsible we want to be. LOL. For example, while planning our 10 year anniversary Hawaii trip (did I tell you we changed from Ireland to Hawaii???), we are doing AirBNB the whole trip. We were trying to decide on whether to get a super nice place for the last week or go cheap(er). We went cheaper and saved the 1K difference. But, had we decided it was worth it, we would have splurged. We kind of do that with meals. We are both relatively frugal most of the time, so we try to allow ourselves some relaxation in that area during vacation. So we don't start out planning a trip saying, we are going to only spend x.xx, we just make decisions along the way. However, we do a total at the end to see what we spent. Does that make any sense at all??? HAHA!
11 Days To Go!!
Less than two weeks away, we are finally starting our packing list and getting things together so we won't forget anything when we go. Yesterday we went and did some shopping for extra clothing, there are some Memorial Day sales going on at the moment so we figured we would take advantage of those. I needed a few new pairs of shorts and some shirts too for the summer. Recently we went thorough all of our clothing and weeded out a lot of stuff that we haven't worn in a long time, things that have been worn too much, and just some other stuff we found, may go in to a yard/garage sale but if not it will definitely go to charity. With maybe 50 things I got rid of, I ended up buying I think 3 pairs of shorts, a dress, a pair of jeans, and maybe 6 shirts. So not too bad, and this will help out a lot on the trip and at home too!
So, at the moment, I am looking through the itinerary and trying to figure out how many outfits I will need to bring with me so I don't overpack, we will also need some swimwear and a few nights of more dressed up attire for 3-4 restaurants we are going to. Also need to throw in casual travel day clothes and things like that. We decided on bringing two camera, our Nikon underwater camera for when we go snorkeling in the keys, and then my Canon t5i for regular photo taking. For video this time, I think we are just going to use Jeremy's iphone since he has so much room on it, and it takes pretty good video, well good enough for vlogging for ourselves anyway so we can make a recap video for my family and the friends that want to see the trip.
Other than that, sunscreen, sunscreen, sunscreen!! Over the past few weeks I have stocked up on all the sunscreen sales at Walgreens with the BOGOs and coupons and stuff so we should be set on sunscreen! Yesterday while we were out I also went to lenscrafters. It was time to order a new pair of glasses, so basically they were having a 40% lenses and frames sale if you purchased one pair, so I went ahead and ordered a new pair of sunglasses too. My current ones have seen better days, and since they are prescription sunglasses too, I definitely needed to update the lenses in the old ones, but it actually came out cheaper to buy a whole new pair instead of getting lenses put in the old ones.
I think that is about all for the moment, next weekend we will start packing. For now, we are going to hide in the house this Memorial Day weekend, we live in a vacation town and the tourists get pretty plentiful starting this weekend. Crowded streets and grocery stores and such, for our little town it swells from about 3000 people to about 25000, so we are really excited to go on vacation ourselves pretty soon!! Less than two weeks!!! So excited! Have a great day and weekend everyone!
Good girl on the sunscreen and shopping deals! I am the queen of overpacking and not using half of what I take. I am hoping to be better and plan more thoroughly for Hawaii...we almost never check bags when we fly and we will have to this time, so I want to only check 1 big suitcase. We are also island hopping a little bit and staying in several different places, so I don't want a ton to pack and repack.
I am getting so excited for you!!!! I hope you do a TR!!! If you have any social media where you will be updating, feel free to share!!!
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