One of the biggest things you need to figure out when you take an Orlando vacation is if your going to do any of your own driving or not. Much depends on just what your going to do when your here. Orlando is a very spread out city, with many points of interest miles away from each other. If you do much sight seeing a cab will quickly cost much more than a rental car.
However many tourist in Orlando do quite well without a rental car, because they don’t go very far. So lets talk about those who would not need a rental car. Lets say you and the family are going to be down here for 7 days. Your a big fan of the theme parks and have almost every day planned out, with each day going to a different park.
You schedule in a day or two to relax and take it easy. So for the most part your whole vacation will consist of staying at the hotel or going to the theme parks. Disney has buses that go right to the airport and whisk you right to your Disney hotel, if your staying at a Disney one. For the other hotels there are many other buses, passenger vans and taxi that operate out of the airport.
So getting to your hotel from and back to the airport is easy. All Disney hotels, and many other ones near Disney have regular buses that take you right to the Disney parks. For other parks like Sea World and Universal Studios, unless you are at a hotel very close to them you will have to use a taxi or van transportation.
Again these are very common and easy to find one. All the parks are within 10 miles or so from each other. So, if all your really going to do is visit the theme parks and spend time at the hotel, I would not recommend you get any rental car at all. Nobody wants to drive in an area they don’t know about, and you just don’t need one.
However, lets say your the type that likes to do more than just see the parks. You want to go to lots of the shopping malls, the nightclubs and so on. Maybe you want to spend a day at the beach at Daytona, which is around 60 miles away. Maybe someone else driving makes you break out in hives!
In that case you really need to get a rental car. Orlando has a very wide variety of cars and SUV’s to choose from. You can even rent passenger vans. The price of rental cars in Orlando is some of the lowest anywhere. I’ll talk much more about that in another post! Heck you can even rent a hummer or exotic sports car, or even a Harley!
So, if your going to just spend all your time going to the theme parks and a few restaurants, don’t bother with a rental car. You’ll save money and avoid the stress of driving in an area you don’t know about. But if your going to go to the beach, do some sight seeing or lots of shopping and nightclub hopping, a rental car is a must.
