It’s easy to think that planning a trip to the Florida Peninsula on your own is simple. Although in a way it is, it is also true that it is highly recommended to pay special attention to some details so that the trip can be done without setbacks and, above all, organized in an easy, simple, and relatively quick way.
That is why, after our experience, and the special dedication and time we have invested, especially in some parts of the route, such as the Orlando parks, we want to share with you a kind of guide to the things we have taken into account and How we have organized the entire tour.
Throughout the post, you will find all this information, including the things you should book in advance, such as flights, hotels, and rental car as well as information about travel insurance, one of the most important things on a trip to the United States, the route. that we have designed to discover a large part of the Florida Peninsula on your own and of course, relevant data on the organization of visits to Walt Disney World Orlando and Universal Orlando. In short: all the information necessary to prepare a trip to Florida and Miami on your own. Let’s start!
Preparations for the trip to the Florida Peninsula on your own
One of the first things to review before starting to organize your trip preparations to Miami and the best of the Florida Peninsula is when is the best time to travel.
this state in the United States has a temperate climate throughout the year and can boast of having an average of 300 days of sunshine a year, something that has earned it the name of the Sunshine State. Despite this, it must be taken into account that, during the summer months, especially between June and October-November, hurricanes or tropical storms may occur, so if you want to send them, it would be best to skip these months.
Taking all this into account, if we value the stability of the climate, even though it is unpredictable, the best time to travel to Florida would be between December and May, months in which the maximum temperatures are around 25 degrees and the minimum 16 degrees, making the trip pleasant in every way, avoiding the high summer temperatures, and, above all, the possibilities of experiencing a hurricane.
Flights to Florida
Florida has more than 20 airports, the most important, or the ones you will probably value on your trip to the Florida Peninsula on your own, are Miami or Orlando. In our case we have chosen to enter and leave through Miami, taking a direct flight from Barcelona with American Airlines, since for us it was very important to invest as little time as possible on the flight, initially ruling out any flight with a stopover.
This allows us to take a circular route through Florida, without having to make any extra trips to leave or enter the country. In case you do not want to take such a long route, it may be a very good option to enter through Miami and leave through Orlando or the other way around, discarding the western part of the Florida Peninsula and focusing only on visiting Miami, the east coast, and the parks. from Orlando.
Rental car to explore Florida on your own
Although you might consider making this trip by public transportation, after planning time, we believe that it is much more appropriate and, above all, useful and comfortable, to rent a car. This gives you total freedom of schedules and movements and in a route of these characteristics, we believe that this is essential to be able to include most of the places and tourist attractions.
While it is true that in the Orlando parks, you probably will not use the car, since there is transportation between parks included, if you stay at one of the Disney hotels, we believe that, on balance, it is worth having the rented car. In case this option does not suit you, you can always look at the prices to rent in Miami and return in Orlando, and from there, take the return flight, or if you want to continue the route, rent another car in Orlando.
Accommodation
Without a doubt, accommodation is one of the most important points on any trip to the Florida Peninsula on your own. Although there are thousands of options, and above all, if you are not traveling in high season, you could choose once you are there. We always prefer to reserve the hotels in advance so that we can move with more time and not have to think, about where we will stay while traveling.
It is also important to know that the price of accommodation in Florida is not especially cheap and gone are those $50 on average that used to be paid for a double room in a roadside motel.
Currently, we have paid an average of $150 for a double room in mid-range hotels, traveling in December.
Although depending on the time of year in which you travel, the prices may be tighter, we recommend that you review them beforehand to have an average of the budget that you should use for this aspect of the trip.
Travel Insurance
If there is something important before traveling to Florida on your own, it is to take out good travel insurance. This is already highly recommended in any destination, much more so in a country like the United States where healthcare is very expensive and having any setback without insurance can become a mortgage for life.
We will only tell you that a simple visit to the doctor can mean an astronomical bill, without taking into account the tests or medications you may need. That is why we recommend that you pay special attention to this aspect and always hire the best travel insurance in the United States.
Route in the Florida Peninsula on your own
We arrive at one of the most important points in any free route through the Florida Peninsula: deciding what places to include and what to discard since this state is huge and as you can imagine, it has many attractions that could be included.
In our case, having 3 weeks, we have been able to do a fairly extensive route, touching many of the most touristic spots although even so, we have had to rule out many places that we would have liked to visit, due to lack of time.
In the end, this is the definitive route:
- Day 1: Flight Barcelona – Mia
- Day 2: Miami – Palm Beach – Juno Beach – Vero Beach and Jupiter – Cocoa Beach
- Día 3: Cocoa Beach – Kennedy Space Center – St. Augustine
- Day 4: St. Augustine – Drive to Walt Disney World Orlando
- Day 5: Walt Disney World Orlando: Magic Kingdom
- Day 6: Walt Disney World Orlando: Epcot
- Day 7: Walt Disney World Orlando: Animal Kingdom
- Day 8: Walt Disney World Orlando: Hollywood Studios
- Day 9: Disney Springs
- Day 10: Universal Orlando: Universal Studios Florida, one of the places that we could not fail to include in this free tour of the Florida Peninsula.
- Day 11: Universal Orlando: Island of Adventure
- Day 12: Universal Orlando – Tarpon Springs – Tampa
- Day 13: Tampa – St. Petersburg – Siesta Key Beach
- Day 14: Siesta Key Beach – Everglades National Park – Homestead
- Day 15: Homestead – The Keys
- Day 16: The Keys
- Day 17: The Keys – Miami
- Day 18: Miami
- Day 19: Miami
- Day 20: Miami
- Day 21: Miami – Dominican Republic (Santo Domingo). This trip will continue with a trip to the Dominican Republic in 21 days.
As you can see, we include 7 days in the Orlando Parks area, something that you can reduce if you have fewer days, ruling out visiting the parks that you like the least. In addition, we have also included 3 days in Miami and almost 3 days in the Florida Keys, points where the time could also be reduced if you do not want or can make such a long trip.
Route information
The trip through the Florida Peninsula on your own will begin by landing in Miami on December 5, from where, on the 6th, after resting in a hotel next to the airport and picking up the rental car, we will begin this route through the places that see in Florida.
On the second day, we will begin with a 3-and-a-half-hour drive along the east coast of the Florida Peninsula to Cocoa Beach, one of the most famous beaches in the area as well as one of the best beaches in Florida, making intermediate stops in Palm Beach, north of Fort Lauderdale, an area known throughout the country for being the home of many rich families and where many of them have their summer residences. Other stops that we will make before reaching our final destination will be Juno Beach, Vero Beach, and Júpiter Beach, 3 of the best-known beaches on this stretch of coast where we will have our first contact with the most relaxed part of the trip.
On the third day of the tour of the Florida Peninsula on our own, we will take a one-hour tour until we reach the Kennedy Space Center, where we will do a half-day visit (they recommend spending about 6-8 hours) to learn about the history of the center and the space trips carried out to this day.
After the visit, we will head to St. Augustine, in the north of the peninsula, a city with more than 500 years of history that is also the oldest in North America.
We will visit this city on the fourth day of the trip, focusing on its historic center, which has 11 complete pedestrian blocks and a Spanish heritage visible in the numerous historic buildings.
Once the visit is over, which will take us practically all day, we will head to Walt Disney World Orlando, where we will spend the next 5 days visiting the Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios parks. In addition to these, we have included an extra day that we have added to this part of the trip since many readers told us that it was especially advisable to have an intermediate day to rest from amusement parks or even visit Disney Springs.
On the last day (day 9) after visiting Disney Springs we will head to Universal Orlando, where we will sleep that night, and the next day (day 10) we will visit Universal Studios Florida and on the 11th we will visit the Island of Adventure.
As you can see, we wanted to dedicate a day to each amusement park since we believe it is the most appropriate to get the most out of each of them. Another important thing to keep in mind is the importance of booking both accommodation and park tickets in advance, especially if you are traveling during high season, since availability in some cases is limited and prices can increase significantly. considerable.
On the 12th we will continue with the route through the Florida Peninsula on our own, taking a 1-hour tour to Tampa, a city that has a very interesting historic center, where we will spend the rest of the day visiting the city, making an intermediate stop in Tarpon Springs, a town known as the sponge capital of the world due to the worldwide production of this product.
On the 13th we will continue with the route by rental car, traveling 30 minutes to St. Petersburg, a city located in the eastern part of Tampa Bay, known for being one of the most common vacation spots in the area as well as for being the place where the Dalí Museum is located, which can boast of having the artist’s most extensive collection outside of Spain.
After this visit, which will surely take us all morning, we will head to the next point on the route through the Florida Peninsula on our own: Siesta Key Beach, a beach of very fine sand that will serve as an intermediate point on the trip where we will spend a few hours of relaxation before continuing with the tour.
We arrive on day 14 of the route getting up very early since we have to make a 3-hour journey to enter the Everglades National Park, one of the richest ecosystems in all of North America, where we will begin the visit by riding a hydrofoil to see the most virgin of the park, since in our case we will access the park through Everglades City, a city located in the western area, which is the least touristy.
After this experience we will drive through the entire park, making stops at the different visitor centers until we reach Homestead, where we will stay.
We entered day 15 of the route through the Florida Peninsula on our own, getting up early again to begin a 3-hour or so tour until we reached Key West, which will be our base for 2 full days to get to know the entire area of the Florida Keys, an archipelago of around 1,700 islands in the southern part of the peninsula that is one of the most incredible points in the United States, not only for its landscapes and beaches but also for being linked, since the 1930s, to via US 1 Overseas Highway.
During those two days, we will visit Key Largo, Tavernier, Islamorada, Marathon, Little Duck Key, Bahía Honda State Park, Big Pine Key, and Key West, which will be the base we have these days.
After these days in which we surely fell in love with the area, we will travel the US 1 Overseas Highway again, now bound for Miami, where we will spend the next 3 days getting to know and soaking up one of the most incredible cities in the United States.
Read more- 21-Day Excursion to Florida