Traveling in the Time of Covid – Part 3 Uber, Rentals and College Visits…oh, my!
November 10, 2020
My previous two blogs have been about airline travel and theme park experiences during this unique time.
Today, I want to tell you about our experience with less formal travel that we did during our trip to Orlando, Florida.
While we wanted a structured vacation, we also have two kiddos who are rising Seniors and need to do some college visits. One wants to go to school in Florida, and with the status of the world, we knew we didn’t want to expose ourselves more than necessary by planning a second trip to the area. So we packed up one day and rented a car to head to three nearby schools to check them out.
But to get that far, we needed to leave the airport. We wound up using Lyft to get us to the resort and later back to the airport. When we were picked up, we opted to be the ones handling our bags and left our masks on. The driver had her’s on as well and all went as ride share rides go. On the return ride, the drive had on gloves then helped us with our bags. We all wore our masks, and things went well at drop off.
The great thing about staying at Universal is that each hotel has an Avis car rental desk in the lobby. This meant that the person we were interacting with to rent and return the car had to pass the daily temperature check to be at work which made us feel a bit safer. The man was very aware of cleanliness as he wiped down the pen before asking us to sign for the car, and he wiped down the keys before handing them to us for the vehicle.
Once we got in the car, there was a sign saying that the car had been sanitized for our safety. Whether or not it actually was, we don’t know, but it did smell fresh and appeared clean. We brought our own hand sanitizer to be safe though.
Then we headed to Tampa to visit University of Tampa and University of South Florida. We also stopped in Lakeland to see Florida Southern College.
College visit trips are some of my very favorite types of trips!!! And these were college visit number 10, 11, and 12 for me as a parent. I’m fascinated at seeing the different types of higher education out there, what makes each campus unique and learning more about each of my kids through some great conversations.
These conversations include likes and dislikes about the physical campus and nearby area as well as what they need in a community and education, how they see themselves in the future, how I can support them best as a parent and personal cheerleader. We get into DEEP conversations on HARD topics such as safety, school/life balance and mental health.
We generally take the time to check out things in the area so they can become more comfortable with it! So if college visits for yourself or family member are in your future, I can totally help you plan it by helping you find a place to stay, activities and offering you my list of questions that I ask each kid sometime during the trip.
To get planning our college visits, email me at CFulton@WishesFamilyTravel.com and to learn more about me, go to https://wishesfamilytravel.com/carrie-fulton-concierge-agent/