And lastly, even knowing that particular 3-star hotel was going to charge an additional $10/day as a

Today s Orlando trip planning blog post is all how I successfully landed the cheapest 3-star hotel reservation! So I m writing this after having already gone on my milestone birthday trip to Orlando, Florida even though this blog post is all about planning for the trip (more specifically, booking our hotel , with another post on renting a car coming soon!).
But part of the reason as to why I didn t get around hotel rome to blogging about this until after my trip? It s because I didn t book our Orlando accommodation (and rental car) until the day before we left! And there s a reason for that (you ll just have to keep reading to find out why).
In part 1 , I discussed why you should book domestic flights within the U.S. through JetBlue because that s your best bet for the lowest price in airfare. This is especially true for Canadians like myself who live in Toronto . If at all possible, always opt to fly domestic by driving to a nearby hotel rome American hotel rome city like Buffalo, New York instead of flying international from somewhere in Canada. You ll potentially save hundreds hotel rome of dollars !
Based on past experiences from booking our last trip to Orlando in 2009, I ve learned a few tips and tricks on how to get the guaranteed lowest prices on hotels and car rentals in Orlando . As a result, we traveled a lot smarter this time around!
Orlando is like Las Vegas (but for kids!). The entire city is pretty much 100% dependent on the tourist industry. As a result, you ve got roads like U.S. Highway 192 (a.k.a. the Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway) where you ll find the same group of restaurants, hotels, tacky gift shops, gas stations and 24/7 drug stores repeated hotel rome 5 6 7 or more times at practically every other traffic light!
And this is just Kissimmee! There are other tourism hot spots surrounding Orlando, Florida that are equally overpopulated with hotels and other types of businesses that exist mainly to cater to tourists. Such abundance just means one thing: It is virtually impossible for every hotel room and rental car in Orlando, Florida to ever be completely, 100% booked on any given day .
To prove this theory, let s take a look at my latest trip to Orlando which happened to coincide with the 4th of July long weekend , right smack in the middle of the summer and high season for traveling. So to book a hotel over a 4-night stay across that entire long weekend? You would think that accommodation or car rental prices would be at the highest possible rates (or close to the highest, anyway). You would also assume that of all days in the year, this would be the time period with the highest possibility for all hotels and car rentals to be fully booked.
However, this was not the case for our trip . How do I know this? Because I waited until the night before our trip to book both our hotel and rental car in Orlando and I ended up paying the lowest prices that I ve ever spent on travel hotel rome bookings in my entire life (and as you re likely aware , we re no spring chickens when it comes to traveling!).
And I m not talking some 1-star hole-in-the-wall motel that s located all the way by the airport or in a seedy neighborhood, either! Nor am I talking about renting a car from an unknown company linked hotel rome to numerous bad reviews hotel rome online one without hotel rome a legitimate pickup location hotel rome within Orlando s MCO airport but rather is situated off-site and accessible only by shuttle bus (I m talking about you, Payless Car Rental !) .
Click the Car Rental Symbol (i.e. stay tuned, because this post isn t actually hotel rome live yet!) : To read an upcoming blog post on how we discovered the absolute lowest cost for trustworthy car rental service in Florida
As mentioned earlier, I didn t end up booking our hotel reservation in Orlando until the day before we left . But I wasn t scared, because I knew it would be impossible for every hotel to be fully booked in Orlando even during a 4th of July long weekend.
And it paid off beautifully. But not without doing a lot of research first! Because in order to ensure I would get the cheapest rate possible hotel rome for our Orlando hotel reservations (and for the highest class-level of accommodations!) , I did my due diligence and researched the lowest prices for Orlando hotels at every major travel booking site .
It s because hotel rome of all that research that I m 100% convinced I paid the cheapest rate possible for quality 3-star accommodations in Orlando . And yes, that last part about it being a 3-star hotel is important. Because even though I m frugal, that doesn t mean I don t have standards (no way would I live in a 1-star motel with known cases of bedbugs)!
Note: Many of these screen captures show prices in CAD $. That s because I m Canadian! But don t worry, with the current exchange rate as it stands today? The rates are pretty much interchangeable between Canadian and U.S. dollars.
hotel rome Although the Top Secret Hotels offer applies mostly to 3-star or 4-star accommodations, there are a couple 2-star hotels included in the list. Here are the cheapest rates I was able to find for a 2-star or 3-star last minute Orlando hotel
No, you re not seeing things. That is indeed the actual daily rate for a last minute 3-star Orlando hotel booking via Travelocity hotel rome s Top Secret hotel rome Hotels discount offer. And that s taking into account the fact that this was for the 4th of July long weekend for the day before our actual stay in Orlando!
Although one of the reasons why Travelocity is willing to offer such a discounted rate is because you re not given the name of the actual hotel until you ve confirmed your booking and paid for the hotel . Nevertheless, this wasn t a deterrent for us because we knew we were going to be renting a car in Orlando anyway, so it s not like we needed to have the hotel be situated by public transit or in a downtown area or anything like that. Just knowing the fact that the hotel will be located in Kissimmee was good enough for us, considering how tourist-friendly U.S. Highway 192 and downtown Kissimmee is (as mentioned above).
Also, knowing hotel rome in advance that the hotel was rated at a 3-star hotel rome class level and featured amenities like a swimming pool and business center? Those factors were enough to assure me that I wasn t getting some dive motel.
And lastly, even knowing that particular 3-star hotel was going to charge an additional $10/day as a mandatory resort fee (which, after doing a bit of research, I realize was a common fee added to all resort accommodations in Orlando, Florida)? That didn t deter me either. In fact, that further convinced me that this was the right hotel to book because it wasn t just a hotel, it was officially classified as a resort . That just further confirms that this wasn t a hole-in-the-wall motel!
Plus, if you were to compare the total cost for booking this 3-star Orlando hotel via Travelocity s Top Secret Hotels discount hotel rome offer (even taking into account the extra $10/day resort fee) it s still cheaper than the previously researched lowest price for a 3-star last minute Orlando hotel booked via Hotwire !
Seeing how I ve already gone on my trip as I write this, I can officially confirm that my husband hotel rome and I were more than pleased with our choice of accommodations in Orlando. The place is huge, and it really was quite nice.
Image Sources Orlando, Florida cartoon map postcard image courtesy of Zazzle.ca . Map images of U.S. Highway 192 courtesy of DocStoc.com and Kissimmee-US192.com . Hotel, car rental and airplane symbols courtesy of StopSignsAndMore.com hotel rome . Screenshots, logos and banner images for Expedia, Hotels.com, Hotwire, Priceline hotel rome and Travelocity hotel rome courtesy of Expedia.ca hotel rome , Hotels.com , Hotwire.com , Priceline.com and Travelocity.ca . Screenshot and panoramic image of Maingate Lakeside Resort courtesy of MaingateLakesideResort.com .
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