ORLANDO, Fla. – Vacationing during the coronavirus pandemic is showing some interesting trends.


What You Need To Know

  • Coronavirus pandemic changing vacationing

  • Vacation homes, resorts seeing new trends

  • Many people are choosing staycations

​​We visited a few options to see just what travel trends are happening right now.

Nick Falcone with Rentyl Resorts is an expert in vacation home rental industry told Spectrum News 13 that privacy is Central Florida's new travel trend. We chatted with him at Encore Resort at Reunion in the Four Corners area near Walt Disney World Resort.

“Our call volume, actually, last week, it's the highest it's ever been," Falcone said. “Right now, we're seeing a tremendous amount of traffic from drive markets. A lot of staycations.”

Callison Miller was sitting poolside with her mom at Encore. Miller is a teacher from Colorado.

“This is the first time we've all been on vacation in five years," she said.  

Due to the pandemic, she wanted a resort-like experience, just without the hotel. 

“You wouldn't be as comfortable [at a hotel]. You wouldn't have the opportunity to be like, 'This is our space'...We were in the pool and you were just able to actually relax because you have the room,” she said.

Falcone said Encore Resort at Reunion is at about 25 percent capacity. They make sure guests don't check-in until about three days after the previous guests have departed. That gives staff time to deep clean.

We also wanted to know what properties like Wyndham Orlando Resort or International Drive are doing, having just reopened on June 5. Wyndham tells us that they, too, have a 72-hour "deep clean" policy. 

“Having a sprawling campus at 22-acres really helps in lending itself to social distancing, walking around in our walkable neighborhood," spokesperson Gino Marasco said. "And a lot of the resorts have that in Orlando.”

Marasco added that local hotels are averaging 20 percent occupancy on the weekends. He's seeing reservations from South Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas.​