Disembarkation Day-What time can I expect to start my car rental?

[Sandyrella]

I was just wondering about this? We are leaving from the cruise for a few days at WDW and would obviously love to be there ASAP so as not to waste any park time.

What time should I start my car rental from? What time will I without a doubt be off the ship?

Also, what is the best way to do this? Should the whole family hop in a cab to the rental company or should just DH go while we wait at the port for him? Will he be allowed back in to pick us up?

Funny...after being a perpetual lurker here for about two years, I suddenly realize that I DON'T know everything I need to know

Please help!

 

[MarkLem]

If you do the early dinner rotation, you have breakfast at 6:45 AM on disembarkation day(this is what we had). The late dinner rotation has a later breakfast.

They didn't open the doors to get off until a bit after 7:30 AM.
If you are flying out on one of the main airlines you can check your bags right at the Port all the way to your home destination(we flew Delta and did this). Then you can all go to the rental site.

I would suggest everyone go to the rental site. The Port was very congested to have to come back to, what with people leaving, and the new cruisers coming.

 

[Little Twin Stars]

Originally posted by MarkLem
I would suggest everyone go to the rental site. The Port was very congested to have to come back to, what with people leaving, and the new cruisers coming.

I have overlooked this point.

However, I am struggling since we are with 2 kids and with so much lugguage... Do you still suggest everyone going on the shuttle together?

OR

Is there anywhere that is eay for us to wait for DH to come back after picking up the car from Budget?

 

[gonna go cruising]

Budget has a shuttle that takes you to the rental facility. I would think it easier to all board the shuttle to avoid having to re-enter the port to be picked up by him after he gets the car. JMO.

 

[Sandyrella]

How do you book the shuttle? Budget was the company we were looking at so that would be so convenient!

Thanks

 

[Little Twin Stars]

Originally posted by Sandyrella
How do you book the shuttle? Budget was the company we were looking at so that would be so convenient!

You don't have to book the shuttle. According to Andy, there is a a white canopy in the parking area. Under the canopy there are signs showing which line you need to get into for the different shuttles.

I have already reserved a Budget car to be picked up at MCO and will return it at the Port (CC5).

However, when I was checking the rate for my return: from CC5 to MCO, it's really VERY expensive.

 

[MarkLem]

There is a white canopy in the parking lot across the road from the Port. THis is where you get all your rides: Radisson shuttle, Avis, Hertz, Budget, taxis, etc. There are luggage porters at the port that will take your bags over to the tent

We rented from Budget, and I have to say that their pick up service at the white tent was the worst of the rental companies. Big vans (or small buses) came from Hertz & Avis and were able to carry maybew 15-20 people at a time. Budget had regular size vans that could get maybe 6-8 people. And they had just one van shuttling people to their lot. We waited in freezing cold with our 8, 6, 2 year olds shivering for about 30 minutes (the van came twice and went before we made it to the front of the line). I give them low marks for this.

Once at the Budget lot, things went smooth and quick, but getting there was a real hassle. Some people jumped out of the Budget line and hailed down taxis to get to Budget's lot.

 

[gonna go cruising]

Our budget pickup at the port was painless. Nice fellow picked up my daughter and myself and we were on our way. Of course we didnt dilly dally getting off the ship either. We headed straight for the tent and he loaded us up and we were off. The "fun" part was when we got to the rental agency. Some hints, smell the car before you take it. Look at the tires. If unhappy with it, tell them. The clean up person was not doing such a great job in November. The first one smelled horrible, second smelled like a chimney, third had low tire. Fourth was ok.

MCO to port was painless all around. Even at 2 am.

 

[Lisa F]

That was our intention on our last trip as well. We had late seating so we skipped breakfast. We were waiting patiently in our room to hear some kind of "all ashore" call (as they said not to congregate in the atrium, there would be an announcement, but there wasn't one). We ended up heading to the atrium at 8am. We were in line at mission space at 11am. This included waiting in line to get off the ship, waiting in line to get through customs/immigration (not as smooth as it was our previous two times since they were actually scrutinizing passports), dragging all of our stuff out to the parking lot to meet the budget shuttle, waiting for the budget shuttle, loading up, waiting for another family to decide if they wanted to rent a car at budget or not, loading their stuff as well, unloading at the budget office, waiting in line to pick up the car (there were people there before us), driving over to WDW, parking the car, and walking to mission space.

We were hoping to get over there by rope drop at 9am if we left at 7:30, expecting to get there by 10 for sure and ended up getting there at 11. Things just take longer than you expect and it seems that when you are anxious to get somewhere everyone else around you seems to be dawdling (I guess one of Murphey's laws or something). We were also under orange alert, however. Generally we just take our time getting off the ship. We have breakfast, linger, head off when we notice the line is gone and I have to wonder if we had done that, would we have arrived at Epcot at the same time rather than waiting in all of those lines? We still had a great time!

Lisa

 

[FredS]

Originally posted by MarkLem

We rented from Budget, and I have to say that their pick up service at the white tent was the worst of the rental companies. Big vans (or small buses) came from Hertz & Avis and were able to carry maybew 15-20 people at a time. Budget had regular size vans that could get maybe 6-8 people. And they had just one van shuttling people to their lot. We waited in freezing cold with our 8, 6, 2 year olds shivering for about 30 minutes (the van came twice and went before we made it to the front of the line).

Do you have any recollection of what time you got off the ship? It seems that there are better and worse times to try to get in line and I am trying to figure out what will work with the least amount of waiting. Thanks!