I am very impressed with your site. The quality of the design and content makes it a real winner! Thanks again for a great site and a great resource on the net….

For several years I ran tour throughout Florida and the South (Nashville & New Orleans) for an international company conducting and attending to mostly British visitors. I lived in St. Pete Beach.

Tour Marm is my nom de plume and not my company. I am trying to keep some anonymity online so I can discuss what I want, without negative repercussion from the various vendors I deal with in my professional life. You’ll know the ones I really like.

Disney is on the bottom of my list for a multitude of reasons.

If you think having problems with the TV is bad at the hotels, try getting stuck on one of their ships!

if you need advice, I’ll be glad to help you, gratis.

Tour Marm

I understand their policy of only Disney owned stations which means better regulations of what is aired but man there is only but so much one can take. Then again if you are at such ‘magical’ place you wouldn’t want to spend too much time in your room.

The flexibility of going to other parks was something we didn’t consider as first timers. In fact i didn’t even think about it until our last two days there. I’m thinking we’ll have to do some more research next time.

I assume you are very familiar with the Orlando area, is the Tour Marm your company?

There’s a lot more to do in the Orlando area than Disney.

In the past, with some groups I have ‘escorted’ (one doesn’t ‘guide’ there) I have felt as if I was a prisoner in the happiest place on earth! Sometimes, one can get Disneyed-out! One gets locked into everything Disney with those packages.

I personally prefer to stay in a cheaper hotel on International Drive or somewhere else, get the tickets to the Disney parks I really want to see and take the local shuttles or car. I like the flexibility to visit Universal City, Seaworld, Wet n’ Wild, Orlando Science Center, and other non-Disney sites and restaurants. Many of the non-Disney parks are better and you can get discounted tickets. Certainly you can find so many cheap/moderately-priced restaurants outside of Disney. And some of the local dinner/theme resutaurants are hokey, but good fun.

But in defense (gulp) of Disney’s policy to have only Disney channels, there aren’t any other hotels that have all family-friendly television programs in the rooms. So it is probable to come across offensive content which is inappropriate if you have young children or teenagers. Of course, Nickleodeon, Animal Planet etc. might be nice additions.