If you have a scooter of your own, or have rented before elsewhere, you probably know what to consider for your Orlando scooter rental.  However for those of you who don’t own one or have never rented a scooter in Orlando, here are the top items to consider:

  1. Make sure you don’t have to put up with a wet seat!  Florida is hot and summer season is rainy season.  Make sure your rental scooter has a water repellant, vinyl, seat.  Many scooters that are rented have the less expensive cloth seats and while they are sold as more comfortable in the heat, reality is you cannot wipe them dry when caught in one of the afternoon thunderstorms that rolls through (and cools things off a bit) and you end up sitting on a wet seat.  Ick.
  2. Ensure you have enough battery power!  Scooters are built by manufacturers for individual’s, not rental companies and an individual using it for their personal use aren’t driving around huge area’s for 12 plus hour days. If you start out at 8 am to get to the theme parks by typical opening time of 9 am and go till a midnight closing, that is 15 hours of battery power needed.  Make sure the rental company quotes battery usage time.
  3. Size does matter!  The older technology scooters are all very heavy, about 200 pounds.  The heavier the scooter, the larger the batteries needed, the more weight the scooter has to move (person and batteries) which all contributes to making the scooter heavier – it is a vicious cycle.  Older technology, lighter weight scooters which were built with transportability in mind are small, really small.  No extra foot room and if you are larger in height or statue you look like a giant riding on a kids tricycle.  New technology scooters provide room, usually more leg/floor room than the older, heavier scooters and are lightweight.
  4. If you opt for a sunshade, make sure it is portable so you can take it down at night an inside the hotel etc.  Also make sure it is flexible and can adjust to try and block the different sun angles. Florida is sunny, theme park paths go in all directions: north, south, east & west.
  5. Using your scooter basket.  Make sure your scooter basket is on the front.  Rear and/or optional rear baskets get in the way when boarding buses, boats and monorails.

Most importantly, make sure the Orlando scooter rental company has detailed descriptions and videos of the actual scooter model you are going to rent on their website.  Watch the video and make sure that is the best model for you!