When I started planning a family vacation to Orlando, I knew we wanted to have the full theme park experience: stay at a Universal hotel, visit the new Epic Universe, add a day at Disney, and enjoy the food and attractions along the way.

The result was a six-day vacation that cost $8,620 and required careful planning to get the most for our money.

Our family includes my husband and I, along with our three children, ages 18, 15, and 12. At these ages, our children are old enough to appreciate the trip, enjoy all the rides, and create their own memories.

The final price of our six-day vacation may seem high, and it was. But we also save money in some important ways.

This is exactly where our money went.

Flying instead of driving saved us two days of vacation

The first major decision was how to get from Cleveland to Orlando.

We spent $1,451 on Frontier Airlines flights for our family of five. We could have driven, but the trip would have taken about 15.5 hours each way. That would have meant losing two full days of vacation just by sitting in the car.

For us, flying was worth the extra cost because we wanted to make the most of our time in the parks.

We spent $84 to park at Cleveland Hopkins Airport for six days. We also decided not to rent a car in Orlando and instead used Uber to get around when necessary.

We spent almost $5,000 on Universal hotels and park tickets

Our biggest expense was $4,948 for our stay at the Universal hotel and four-day park-to-park tickets.

We stayed at Universal’s Terra Luna Resort, one of the hotel’s newest hotels. Terra Luna is considered a Prime Value hotel and shares a space-themed design with its sister property, Stella Nova.

The biggest advantage of the hotel is its location. Since we wanted to spend a lot of time at Epic Universe, it was important to stay close to that park.

Terra Luna visitors receive early entry to the park, allowing us to enter Epic Universe one hour earlier than regular guests each day. The free shuttle ride got us to Epic in less than five minutes and the buses came frequently.

Booking two rooms was worth the extra cost.

One challenge with Terra Luna is that the hotel only offers standard rooms that sleep four people, so our group of five needed to book two rooms.

At first paying for two rooms seemed like a big expense, but it turned out to be one of the best decisions we made. We had extra space, privacy, and connecting rooms so we could easily spend time together.

We skipped the Express Pass and still rode everything in Epic Universe

Our four-day park-to-park tickets included Epic Universe, Universal Studios Florida, and Islands of Adventure.

Before the trip, we considered purchasing Express Passes to skip the lines at Epic, but we were able to experience everything without spending any extra money.

Having four days gave us the flexibility to wait for the best times to ride each attraction. We ended up going on all of the attractions at Epic Universe and the longest wait we had was 45 minutes. That was during July, one of the busiest holiday periods of the year.

Our day at Disney cost almost $1,200

We added a day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios for $926 in tickets.

Since we only had one day at Disney, we purchased Lightning Lane passes for $250. The passes allowed us to reserve time for Rise of the Resistance and schedule times for up to three other attractions throughout the day.

The strategy worked well. We rode almost everything we wanted, except for Slinky Dog Dash, which was delayed during our reserved time and never reopened that day.

We spent $767 on food, but we still found ways to save

Food is one area where we decided not to cut back. Part of the fun of going to Universal and Disney parks is trying the themed foods and snacks.

We spent $767 on food and drinks, eating at restaurants like Cowfish, Toadstool Cafe, The Three Broomsticks, Sci-Fi Dine-In Theatre, Krusty Burger, Lard Lad, Café L’air De La Sirène, and Le Gobelet Noir.

One trick we used was to order kids meals when they made sense.

We kept spending on souvenirs low

As for souvenirs, we spent only $37 on three chocolate frogs for our kids.

Our kids saved their own money to buy the souvenirs they wanted, including t-shirts, candy, and stuffed animals.

Credit card rewards and dining credits saved us almost $2,500

Although the total cost of the trip was $8,620, we received $1,920 in travel reimbursements through credit card points. The final cost of our pocket trip was around $6,700.

A special reservation promotion also helped reduce our food costs. Each of our two hotel rooms included a $300 Universal hotel dining credit, giving us $600 to spend on dining at Terra Luna.

The meal credit was extremely convenient and kept our overall food costs down. We use it for daily breakfast, as well as other meals, snacks, and adult beverages at the hotel.

The trip was expensive, but it was worth it for our family.

An $8,620 vacation is a big expense, but the memories we made were worth every penny.

By saving where we could, using rewards strategically, and prioritizing the experiences that mattered most, we were able to enjoy the trip to Orlando we wanted without spending too much and create memories our family will cherish for years.