Bus Transportation @ the WL

[abordelon]

Hi. I am staying at the WL on July 23rd-July30th. How efficient are the busses? I have stayed at ASMO and POFQ and had no complaints about the service whatsoever during the busy summer seasons.

 

[ZekeKelso]

I've stayed at WL; I've stayed at All-Stars; and many others. In all honestly, I think the best thing you can say about bus service is that all resorts have good bus service most of the time, but poor service on occasions. But, in general, it's about the same. If you are happy with what you've gotten elsewhere, you'll probably be happy at WL, unless you have the bad luck of needed a bus when something goes wrong.

There's only one knock I have on WL bus service - no chains to mark lines for the busses.

 

[abordelon]

Thanks. My husband and I are patient, and waiting 20 mins or so for a bus does not bother us. We visited the WL and noticed that the busses arrived every 10-15 mins. or so. I just wanted reassurance from someone who has stayed there.

 

[CR Resort Fan 4 Life]

When my family and I stayed at the Wilderness Lodge we found bus transportation to be ok, however we also thought the bus for Downtown Disney is the one that took the longest to arrive. At both the Wilderness Lodge and at Downtown Disney. Although I noticed this same problem with the Downtown Disney bus at the Contemporary, so it's not just a problem for the Wilderness Lodge.

 

[BillSears]

I stayed at the WL in September of 2006. My biggest problem was the shared bus system with Fort Wilderness. I know it's not a big deal but I didn't like having to go from the park to Fort Wilderness and then to Wilderness Lodge at night. Sometimes we would also go from WL to FW to pick them up on the way to the parks. It was strange and I never did figure out the reasons for who got picked up first but it seemed WL always got dropped off after FW at night.

 

[Kimberle]

I stayed at the WL in September of 2006. My biggest problem was the shared bus system with Fort Wilderness. I know it's not a big deal but I didn't like having to go from the park to Fort Wilderness and then to Wilderness Lodge at night. Sometimes we would also go from WL to FW to pick them up on the way to the parks. It was strange and I never did figure out the reasons for who got picked up first but it seemed WL always got dropped off after FW at night.

WL also shares w/ GF. All Deluxes' share (except for AKL). The FW stop really isn't out of the way. If you look on a good map, you'll see their locations.

 

[cranbiz]

The reason that WL is dropped off after FW is because of the HDDR.

If the night bus is running from the TTC then that bus goes TTC-WL-FW-WL-TTC.

Don't forget that there is also boat service to MK from WL.

 

[CR Resort Fan 4 Life]

WL also shares w/ GF. All Deluxes' share (except for AKL). The FW stop really isn't out of the way. If you look on a good map, you'll see their locations.

Sometimes in the mornings they also share with the Contemporary. At least they did when I went to the Animal Kingdom last December.

 

[IMDORY]

I've never waited more than 20 minutes for a bus at WL. From what I understand, when using the bus service it is the norm to get your bus anywhere from 1-20 minutes. Usually we waited about 5 minutes.

But of course, once we had to get to Boma for a 9am breakfast, we only left ourselves like 45 minutes to get there and needed to get a bus to MK to switch to a AKL bus-we waited the FULL 20 minutes at WL for our bus! Every minute I was saying to myself in my head-"we should have taken the launch!" and alternated that with "should we try to get a taxi??" It's like a roll of the dice to take the launch or the bus! BTW-we ended up about 15 minutes late to our ADR-they got us in within 5 minutes, no problems...but we did learn our lesson-when transfering to get from one resort to another-you really need to give yourself an hour! We had such quick service on the buses and boats earlier in the week that we thought we could make it in 45 minutes-but you really can't rely on that.

One weird exception of waiting more than 20 minutes...during Christmas week we waited at MGM for a bus to WL for like 45 minutes! This was at like 12:30pm. It turns out that there was such a huge back up of cars trying to get into the MGM parking lot that even the buses were stuck in the gridlock and couldn't get in to get us! I'm a little surprised that there isn't a "special" WDW bus enterance/exit to and from the parks.

Overall, I've always been fine with the WL bus/boat service. One "complaint" I would have is that sometimes you do share a bus with either FW, CR, Poly, and GF. But, then again, Poly, CR, and GF often share busses, BC/YC, BW, Swan/Dolphin share busses and boats...That is fine I guess, but my problem is...you never know if/when you will be sharing and with how many resorts-so you aren't really sure about timing. If you are trying to get to a park for a specific time this would be a bit of an issue I guess. Most times, we had our own bus...but sometimes we would have any combination of sharing. One day direct to Epcot, another day we would pick up FW before we went to Epcot. Anytime we shared with the monorail resorts, it was always on the way back from a park and WL was always the first drop off everytime...that didn't seem very fair to them since WL didn't have to sit on the bus while they were the last to get on(and since they were paying A LOT more for their resort than I was paying for mine! )

It seems like WL gets a lot of "transportation trashing" sometimes...but I don't think it is better or worse than any other resort, somedays you get a break and that EPCOT bus is there right as you walk down...other days you wait a little. Even on the monorail resorts...you could be waiting a bit on that monorail loop. I took the mororail from MK to GF and it took me like 20 minutes! This was with the monorail right there ready to board as soon as we walked up to it-no waiting in line at all-and no "hold" between resorts either.

I think general rules wherever you stay:
1-20 minutes for busses/boats, 1 hour to transfer resort-park-resort.

 

[tigrrgrr]

We just returned from the WL. I was a little apprehensive about choosing this resort mainly because I had heard the transportation was not the best. In all honesty though, we never waited on a bus more than 10 minutes. Most of the time we had it times perfectly that the bus would be there when we were...not sure how we lucked out with that. The trip to Downtown Disney was definitely the longest.
Take advantage of the boat to the MK. It's wonderful!!! One morning we got to the boat dock earlier than they were going to the MK, so the boat driver suggested we take his boat to the Contemporary and walk to the MK which is not a bad walk at all. We made it to the MK with plenty of time to spare for the rope drop and opening ceremonies...it was an incredible week.
I am very happy we chose the WL for this trip...next is Contemporary 2008!

 

[abordelon]

I've never waited more than 20 minutes for a bus at WL. From what I understand, when using the bus service it is the norm to get your bus anywhere from 1-20 minutes. Usually we waited about 5 minutes.

But of course, once we had to get to Boma for a 9am breakfast, we only left ourselves like 45 minutes to get there and needed to get a bus to MK to switch to a AKL bus-we waited the FULL 20 minutes at WL for our bus! Every minute I was saying to myself in my head-"we should have taken the launch!" and alternated that with "should we try to get a taxi??" It's like a roll of the dice to take the launch or the bus! BTW-we ended up about 15 minutes late to our ADR-they got us in within 5 minutes, no problems...but we did learn our lesson-when transfering to get from one resort to another-you really need to give yourself an hour! We had such quick service on the buses and boats earlier in the week that we thought we could make it in 45 minutes-but you really can't rely on that.

One weird exception of waiting more than 20 minutes...during Christmas week we waited at MGM for a bus to WL for like 45 minutes! This was at like 12:30pm. It turns out that there was such a huge back up of cars trying to get into the MGM parking lot that even the buses were stuck in the gridlock and couldn't get in to get us! I'm a little surprised that there isn't a "special" WDW bus enterance/exit to and from the parks.

Overall, I've always been fine with the WL bus/boat service. One "complaint" I would have is that sometimes you do share a bus with either FW, CR, Poly, and GF. But, then again, Poly, CR, and GF often share busses, BC/YC, BW, Swan/Dolphin share busses and boats...That is fine I guess, but my problem is...you never know if/when you will be sharing and with how many resorts-so you aren't really sure about timing. If you are trying to get to a park for a specific time this would be a bit of an issue I guess. Most times, we had our own bus...but sometimes we would have any combination of sharing. One day direct to Epcot, another day we would pick up FW before we went to Epcot. Anytime we shared with the monorail resorts, it was always on the way back from a park and WL was always the first drop off everytime...that didn't seem very fair to them since WL didn't have to sit on the bus while they were the last to get on(and since they were paying A LOT more for their resort than I was paying for mine! )

It seems like WL gets a lot of "transportation trashing" sometimes...but I don't think it is better or worse than any other resort, somedays you get a break and that EPCOT bus is there right as you walk down...other days you wait a little. Even on the monorail resorts...you could be waiting a bit on that monorail loop. I took the mororail from MK to GF and it took me like 20 minutes! This was with the monorail right there ready to board as soon as we walked up to it-no waiting in line at all-and no "hold" between resorts either.

I think general rules wherever you stay:
1-20 minutes for busses/boats, 1 hour to transfer resort-park-resort.

Thanks for the advice! We have several ADRs at other resorts. We'll make sure to give ourselves at least an hour to get there.

 

[abordelon]

We just returned from the WL. I was a little apprehensive about choosing this resort mainly because I had heard the transportation was not the best. In all honesty though, we never waited on a bus more than 10 minutes. Most of the time we had it times perfectly that the bus would be there when we were...not sure how we lucked out with that. The trip to Downtown Disney was definitely the longest.
Take advantage of the boat to the MK. It's wonderful!!! One morning we got to the boat dock earlier than they were going to the MK, so the boat driver suggested we take his boat to the Contemporary and walk to the MK which is not a bad walk at all. We made it to the MK with plenty of time to spare for the rope drop and opening ceremonies...it was an incredible week.
I am very happy we chose the WL for this trip...next is Contemporary 2008!

I, too, was worried about the negative bus reviews. But the Lodge is so beautiful, we wanted to stay there anyway. We are also thinking about the Contemporary in 2008. Thanks for responding!