Flying into Tampa

[bostonRob]

Im looking at flying into Tampa for the first time because prices for Orlando are sky high. Im sure some of you have some experiences with this? Can you give me the good, the bad and the ugly? I get there is about an hour drive.

[Joel0917]

Originally Posted by bostonRob

Im looking at flying into Tampa for the first time because prices for Orlando are sky high. Im sure some of you have some experiences with this? Can you give me the good, the bad and the ugly? I get there is about an hour drive.

we have done this A LOT!!! and have 3 or 4 more fall trips planned into Tampa and then over to WDW. it does seem to be cheaper.

Pro: Save Money
airport seems less crowded than MCO
Getting a rental car is easy. Walk outside to skylink tram. 2 or 3 stops at at rental center. just as easy to return.

Con: the only con to me is the time. *its' at least 1 hr 10 min to Disney. I4 is crazy fast driving there to. Like the autobahn. it's nuts!~
the other con when comeing back is you have to give yourself extra time in case of traffic on i-4 for your flight. so i often leave WDW 4 hours before my flight.
NOw in downtown tampa there are some great little restaurants and areas to explore if you need to kill an hour.

But we do it all the time! I say go for it!

[bakerworld]

Our daughters prefer Tampa airport to MCO. It's smaller and easier to navigate. The car rental they've used was off site and the ride to WDW is clear. The eldest said that because of where it is placed AK is only a 45 minute ride from Tampa where the Main entrance is closer to an hour (I forget whether over or under). The eldest said the first time she drove to WDW from Tampa to meet us at AK she almost drove past AK entrance because she wasn't expected to bypass the main gate and she thought she still had more of a drive. She was following her GPS.

[helenabear]

I did this a ton due to family living there. We'd stop in on one leg of the trip. TPA is much smaller. I tend to rent the choose your own cars and selections are very tiny. Drop off of a breeze though. So is navigating the airport itself.

The biggest issue is planning for the drive between Tampa and Disney. Especially if there is an accident it can easily take 2+ hours. Where normally it's just over an hour. Drivers in Florida are among the worst (and I've driven in Chicago and NYC among others). So on return I would add in an extra hour of drive time and leave 4 hours in advance. The airport negates a need to be there 2 hours early IMO. More like 90 max.

[disneyteach]

We've flown into TPA a few times and are doing so again in May. The TPA airport is fantastic! I definitely prefer it to MCO. Our primary reason for booking there (aside from the fact that we are ending our trip on the Gulf Coast) was that the rental car was at least $300 cheaper. I don't mind the drive from TPA to WDW at all, but I've also never encountered any major traffic problems (knock on wood!)

[Adelard of Bath]

I am flying into TPA this fall, first time. Chose it over MCO because this will be the first time renting a car since the loss of DME and I wanted to have the "small airport experience". At the time I booked, the plane tickets and the rental were the same whether I chose MCO or TPA.

There is always some stress on the travel days, as I'm sure everyone knows. Our airport (Minneapolis) is about 1.5 hrs or so from our house - usually done speeding at 4am because we didn't get out of the house early enough, and then you get to the airport and find out everyone else in the state is getting on the same 7am flight and the line through security reflects this, and I spend the next 45 minutes frantically looking at my watch. This is our usual experience, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. Fast forward to a few months ago, my mom books a trip to Arizona and flies out of our local tiny airport in Rochester MN. (Four gates, unless they bumped it up to six in the last few years). She asked me to drop her off. We drive up about an hour before the flight - and the place is a ghost town. I'm the only car, we pull up right to the front door, which is about ten steps from security, which takes a minute to go through...she calls me on the phone on the other side and says we were like 45 minutes early.

I'm like "this is how *I* want to travel in the future!" Well flights out of our little airport didn't work out this time, but I'm hoping the Tampa airport can give me some of that.

[DVCjj]

Originally Posted by helenabear

I did this a ton due to family living there. We'd stop in on one leg of the trip. TPA is much smaller. I tend to rent the choose your own cars and selections are very tiny. Drop off of a breeze though. So is navigating the airport itself.

The biggest issue is planning for the drive between Tampa and Disney. Especially if there is an accident it can easily take 2+ hours. Where normally it's just over an hour. Drivers in Florida are among the worst (and I've driven in Chicago and NYC among others). So on return I would add in an extra hour of drive time and leave 4 hours in advance. The airport negates a need to be there 2 hours early IMO. More like 90 max.

Re drivers in FL......When we were hecking on our insurance coverage as we were renting a car 3+ months in FL this winter and last winter, both agent and his associate mumbled something like "Good Luck driving in FL". We are in Chicago area all our lives and have driven downtown a million times so we were puzzled by that statement

HOLY COW...we know now what that statement meant. Never, ever saw more lane changing at 80-90 mph in my life and awful drivers. These were not seniors driving 35 mph in a 55 zone. These were drivers of all ages. Plus had to drive in a massive thunderstorm on I-4 and did people slow down...at all? Nope. Literally thought we were goners.
Wow, just wow on Florida drivers. We were shocked.

[Adelard of Bath]

I just now had google maps give me directions, at this instant it says there is a "slowdown on i-4 causing a 27 minute delay" well shucks. So it's 1:44.

Of course that's at speed limit - it sounds like traffic will not be going the speed limit heh

For fun, if you have it take you NOT on i-4, you get times of 2:22 up to nearly 3 hrs.

[johnb]

Originally Posted by Adelard of Bath

Fast forward to a few months ago, my mom books a trip to Arizona and flies out of our local tiny airport in Rochester MN. (Four gates, unless they bumped it up to six in the last few years). She asked me to drop her off. We drive up about an hour before the flight - and the place is a ghost town. I'm the only car, we pull up right to the front door, which is about ten steps from security, which takes a minute to go through...she calls me on the phone on the other side and says we were like 45 minutes early.

I'm like "this is how *I* want to travel in the future!" Well flights out of our little airport didn't work out this time, but I'm hoping the Tampa airport can give me some of that.

I had a similar experience with the Ft. Wayne, IN airport. Work trip. On departure day, someone asked about my flight time and said, "This isn't like flying out of a major east coast city; you can get to the airport 45 minutes to an hour before your flight time and you might be the only one in the airport other that TSA." Not wanting to take any chances, I arrived 90 minutes ahead of time. Until about 30 minutes before the flight departed, I was the only person in the airport who didn't work there.

[helenabear]

Originally Posted by DVCjj

Re drivers in FL......When we were hecking on our insurance coverage as we were renting a car 3+ months in FL this winter and last winter, both agent and his associate mumbled something like "Good Luck driving in FL". We are in Chicago area all our lives and have driven downtown a million times so we were puzzled by that statement

HOLY COW...we know now what that statement meant. Never, ever saw more lane changing at 80-90 mph in my life and awful drivers. These were not seniors driving 35 mph in a 55 zone. These were drivers of all ages. Plus had to drive in a massive thunderstorm on I-4 and did people slow down...at all? Nope. Literally thought we were goners.
Wow, just wow on Florida drivers. We were shocked.

Yeah I have never seen such horrible drivers in my life. It's crazy. Some go insanely slow and others super fast. Not a whole lot in between. I am kind of glad family just moved from Tampa. Driving that stretch of I-4 often annoyed me.