Flight changed to much later after cruise, what now?

[ambula603]

We are heading on a 3-night cruise in April after spending 4 days at WDW. We had planned to take a 1:30 flight back home after we get off the ship, with Ground Transportation already arranged and paid for. Today we received an email that our flight has changed to leave at 6:10. (Actually, they put us on the 10 PM flight but we were able to modify that!)

We cannot find an available rental car that can be picked up at Port Canaveral and can be dropped off at MCO for our date. Ideally, we would love to hang out at Disney Springs for a bit instead of the airport all day. But what do we do with our luggage? What are our other options for transportation?

If you have any ideas, I would appreciate them!

 

[TikiThunderPirates]

Stay at the MCO Hyatt with a day room. It's a hotel inside the airport. It's not as exciting as Disney Springs, but you can book a day room, and just relax there. Take your scheduled transportation as planned.

 

[MomOTwins]

I'm in a similar boat as this just happened to me last night as well. Thinking about switching to a flight the next day and staying at a hotel. Curses--we had such an awesome itinerary and now it's crummy.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Stay at the MCO Hyatt with a day room. It's a hotel inside the airport. It's not as exciting as Disney Springs, but you can book a day room, and just relax there. Take your scheduled transportation as planned.

^^^This.

 

[Pinky3]

You might consider going to the airport and getting a day room at Hyatt - you can enjoy the pool until your flight

 

[KLK622]

We hired a driver to bring us to the Kenndy Space Center a number of years ago. He held all of our suitcases in his car and then dropped us at the airport for our late flight. I am guessing you could find somebody to do this with Disney Springs also (but it did end up being pretty pricey).

 

[JWG]

Are the day rooms cost effective anymore? We used to stay at the Hyatt for our pre-cruise night arrival (we're flying from the midwest, never risk a same day flight getting out with our weather), but I just looked for our cruise later this year and it was $389

We got a 2-bedroom at the Residence Inn just off the airport for our group of 5 instead.

 

[loislane]

Our flight home after our cruise in August is scheduled for 5 p.m. Of course things could change, but our plan is to just chill at the airport - some shopping, lunch, hopefully no mad dash to the plane after finally getting through security.

 

[disneynme]

The same thing happened to us today, all the way down to being put on a 10pm flight. They also changed our 8am arrival flight to an 11am flight. Now we have to change our first flight to come in the night before as we want to get on the ship first thing and not at 2 or 3pm.

 

[sab53085]

Not sure if they'd do this, but you could ask Bell Services at Saratoga if they'd hold your bags for you and then walk over to Disney Springs.

 

[AquaDame]

The same thing happened to us today, all the way down to being put on a 10pm flight. They also changed our 8am arrival flight to an 11am flight. Now we have to change our first flight to come in the night before as we want to get on the ship first thing and not at 2 or 3pm.

Having the flight so close to embarkation would stress me out tbh... any kind of delay and you might see that cushion disappear quickly!

 

[Templemom]

Our flight got moved to late also. we have dcl shuttle/bus bringing us to the airport from port and the plan on renting a car and using that to hold our luggage and go to Disney springs.

 

[disneynme]

Having the flight so close to embarkation would stress me out tbh... any kind of delay and you might see that cushion disappear quickly!

There were 2 more flights after the 5am flight we could have taken if we missed or had a delay. Our flight is just over an hour long, so we had options. We just like to be on the ship as soon as possible, so we’re now flying in the night before.

 

[disneynme]

And we are also now staying at Beach Club for one night after the cruise and will now fly out late Saturday. Our 5 day vacation suddenly turned into an 8-day.

 

[ambula603]

Wanted to come back here and update what we are going to do...

We changed our Ground Transportation to drop us off at OKW (where we will be staying the 4 nights before our cruise) and they said they would keep our luggage at Bell Services while we take a boat to Disney Springs for a few hours. Then we can boat back to the resort, get our bags and take an Uber back to the airport.

My travel advisor spoke directly to someone at the resort to confirm this would work since we wouldn't have a reservation that night at OKW. I am guessing since we would have just been there, they said it was ok. YMMV.

 

[anjuan]

I just wanted to note for those who plan to just hang out at the airport that while you can do this, they won't let you check your luggage until a few hours prior to the flight. I found this out the hard way a few years ago.

 

[TikiThunderPirates]

I just wanted to note for those who plan to just hang out at the airport that while you can do this, they won't let you check your luggage until a few hours prior to the flight. I found this out the hard way a few years ago.

Thank you for pointing this out. We did this after our Alaskan cruise, and we had a lovely chat with all the people who had been on our cruise who were also doing the same thing. It ended up being a nice way to spend a few hours. I would have gotten a day room at the hotel, but it wasn't long enough to make it worth it. But it was to long to be just a short wait. You have to sit outside of security with all your bags piled around. There was a Starbucks from what I remember so at least you had some dining options while you waited.