Anyone flown into MCO at night time and gotten their own bags and stayed at Hyatt? Could we use the ME first thing the next morning which would be our official check in day?
If anyone has done this before, would love to hear how it went and if you would do again? We are staying club level and CR and I just hate to pay for another full night when we are arriving late.
Thanks in advance!
Yes, my sister and I did this in 2009, and it went very smoothly for us, with a bonus.
When we made our ME reservations, we gave WDW the information for a flight arriving early (our choice) on the day we checked in to POFQ. We decided to stay overnight at the Hyatt because we didn't want to arrive at POFQ late and, since room inventory would probably be exhausted, run the risk of being given a room that didn't meet either of our requests. Besides, that one night at the hotel was less expensive (with the
AAA discount) than adding the extra night at POFQ.
The morning after our flight arrived, we got up, grabbed a quick breakfast from the McD's at the food court, went back to the hotel to grab our luggage and check out, and then went down to the ME counter. BONUS!!! There was NO LINE!!! No other passengers were there and ME check-in has never been so fast. The driver stowed our bags in the storage compartment under the seats, we waited 5 more minutes and the driver said he would be our private chauffer that morning (other buses were arriving and needed the slot). It was just my sister and me on the entire ME bus. Keep in mind, this was our experience this one time and it was probably a fluke or maybe some pixie dust

. This was early, around 7:00-7:30AM, and we knew our room wouldn't be ready at POFQ, but we didn't mind; the earlier we got checked in, the earlier we could hit MK. We had a nice conversation with the driver and it was the best ride to our resort ever.
So, for us this worked out well, and we would do it again. The room was very comfortable, and although we weren't picky about location it would have been nice if we had been given a runway view instead of the interior court view, but this was really such a non-issue it didn't bother me one way or the other.