- Route Plan

  Puerto Rico has been in our radar for years, always thought as a beach destination to go to in winter, and when we had decided to go there in early 2018, a hurricane devastated the island in September 2017 and forced us to change our plans. Finally, in 2023 we are looking to do it for the first quarter of 2024.

  However, the itinerary underwent sudden changes from what we had planned when we realized that flights to Puerto Rico were expensive but to Miami were less than half the price. So, when we considered returning to Miami, we could think about visiting some of the places we have always wanted to see nearby, after having been to Everglades the previous time: the parks in Orlando, the keys, Bahamas, etc...

  Among those places, the one we are most looking forward to is the Orlando parks, and we found that flying to Orlando instead of Miami was a similar price, so we set that as the start of our itinerary.

Our itinerary to Puerto Rico

  When we look at the ferries to Bimini, which are the Bahamas islands that those ferris go to, we see that, as there are no ferries every day, we are forced to spend at least two nights and three days on the islands if we do not want the cheapest option: going and returning on the same day. We even considered this option because accommodation in Bimini is very expensive, but we want to enjoy the destination and we will make an effort to do so.

  When planning two days for Orlando, one for each park we want to see, and three for the Bahamas, the itinerary in Puerto Rico should be moved from visiting the entire island to focusing on what we want to see most: San Juan, El Yunque and the bioluminescent bay on Vieques island, which fortunately are concentrated in the northeast of the country.

 We also realize the importance of Fort Lauderdale, the city from which the ferries to Bimini depart and from where the direct flights to Puerto Rico also depart. If, in addition, the train coming from Orlando stops there too ,we are forced to include in the itinerary two technical stops.

  So, finally, the definitive route plan (number of day and where we'll spend the night), is the following, starting by February 25th of 2024:

1 and 2: Orlando
3: Fort Lauderdale
4 and 5: Bimini
6: Fort Lauderdale
7 and 8: Luquillo
9: Vieques
10 and 11: San Juan
12: Flight

  The total price for this travel has been about 4000€ for both of us, one of the highest budgets we have had and it shows the high standard of living in the areas we'll visit.

- Flights

  As we mentioned above, when we found out that we could fly to Orlando or Miami from Dublin for less than 400€ we knew that the beginning of our itinerary was going to be in Florida. Then, with the itinerary now clearer, we looked at the option of flying to Orlando and back from Puerto Rico and it came out to just under 500€, which was still a much better price than flying round trip to Puerto Rico, which always exceeded 700€. So we bought those flights to set the itinerary we had set up.

  Finally, the return flights bought to American Airlines are the following, by 970€:

02/25/2024   DUB  14:05       DFW    18:00
02/25/2024   DFW  19:34       MCO    23:00
03/07/2024   SJU   12:40       CLT      15:35
03/07/2024   CLT   17:05       DUB     05:00  (+1)

  Our itinerary requires a domestic flight to get to Puerto Rico from Fort Lauderdale, the city where the ferries to Bimini depart and arrive, Southwest Airlines has several daily direct flights to San Juan, Puerto Rico.

  Since we have a fixed date for that flight we bought it immediately by 172,40$ (86,20$ p.p.):

03/02/2024    FLL 07:40       SJU  11:10

  With this, the total expense in flights is 1123€.

- Hotels

  Having the number of nights we have to spend in each place, we go to booking.com to check the options and we immediately notice that the prices are quite higher than usual and, therefore, we will exceed the average cost that we usually use for accommodation.
   
  When looking at accommodation options in the two parks we wanted to visit, we saw that the cheapest ones were already too expensive and we looked for alternatives outside. Among them, La Quinta by Wyndham Orlando Universal area stood out, which even went below 100€ per night, something that is very difficult on this trip. Besides, it includes breakfast and a complimentary bus to Universal. We booked two nights at 70€ each.

  In Bimini, the offer was scarce and everything were over 350€ per night. We were monitoring the options until, a month before we left, House of Love II appeared for a total of 500€ for the two nights. We kept checking to see if better options appeared, but nothing else happened.

   Before going to Puerto Rico we have two nights to spend in Fort Lauderdale, which, for convenience, should be in the same hotel. Here, we are also looking for something that is close to the train station, the ferry terminal and the airport, since they nights just to sleep between arriving by train from Orlando and catching the ferry to Bimini the next morning for the first night, and arriving by ferry from Bimini and catching the flight to Puerto Rico on the second. Among the options with the best value for money we find the May-Dee Suites in Florida. The cost for the first night is 140€ and for the second 180€.

  In Puerto Rico we have been looking for a hotel to use as a base for our trips to El Yunque National Park. The best we have found is the Luquillo Sunrise Beach Inn in Luquillo, which is a town to visit in itself. It is also in front of the beach, so we will combine these trips with relaxing in this place. The two nights cost us 210€ in total.

  We are going to spend our last two days in Puerto Rico in the Old City after returning the rental car, so we have looked for accommodation there and the best value for money option we have found is the Navona Studios, right in the center. The two nights cost us 196€ in total.

  Finally, we look for accommodation in Vieques, since we want to do the tour to the Bioluminescent Bay, which requires us to spend the night on that island. We chose the Seagate Hotel, which we booked on their own website for 140€.

  Therefore, the total cost of hotels is 1506€ which, divided by the corresponding eleven nights, leaves an average of about 137€ per night, which, as we already mentioned, is a very high average. Even so, it is not as bad as it seems if we take into account the prices of accommodation in the areas we're going to visit.

-Rental Car

  We rented a car in Puerto Rico for four days with Ace, with pick-up on March 2nd and return on March 5th, with all insurance by $165.

-Other expenses

  We have several means of transport during this travel. The first will be to get to Fort Lauderdale from Orlando by train. Hemos comprado los billetes con antelación en la web de Brightline por un total de 143$, que corresponden 59$ por persona y 25$ por la maleta. el trayecto es el siguiente:

02/27/2024   ORL  18:50       FTL    21:40

  We also have some sea trips, such as the one that will take us to Bahamas. We bought round-trip tickets from Fort Lauderdale to Bimini from the Balearia Caribbean website for $556.5 in total for the two of us. The routes are as follows:

02/28/2024   FLL   09:00      BIM    11:00
03/01/2024   BIM  18:00       FLL    20:00

  The other ferry we have is the one that will take us to the day we will spend on the island of Vieques. We have bought round-trip tickets for that ferry that leaves from Ceiba. To do this we have had to keep an eye on the https://www.puertoricoferry.com/ website to be able to buy them as soon as they went on sale because they sell out quickly and always at the most convenient times first. The price is $2 per person and another $2 per suitcase, so we have paid $6 for each trip.

03/03/2024   CEI   13:00      VIE    14:30
03/04/2024   VIE   10:00      CEI    11:30

  Of course, we had to tie up the reason we were going to Vieques: the tour to the Luminescent Bay, which we bought long before we had the ferry tickets. We did it with Aqua Sunset Tours, which has it for $65. Since we also got the transportation option to and from the hotel, we paid $180.20 in total.

 And finally, we had to make sure we visited Disneyworld because it is usually full and it is our first visit of the trip, right the morning after we arrived. The problem we found was that they do not sell one-day tickets online from outside the United States and we have to use a sort of broker to buy them. We got two multi-park one-day tickets from Undercover Tourist for $519 in total.

  Detailed plan, then, is like this:

FEBRUARY and MARCH

Day Night Morning Afternoon
25 Orlando Home Flight
26 Orlando Disneyworld Disneyworld
27 Ft. Lauderdale Universal Studios Universal Studios
28 Bimini Ferry Bimini
29 Bimini Bimini Bimini
1 Ft. Lauderdale Bimini Ferry
2 Luquillo Flight El Yunque
3 Luquillo El Yunque El Yunque
4 Vieques Ferry Esperanza
5 San Juan Ferry San Juan
6 San Juan San Juan San Juan
7 Flight San Juan Flight