Magical Express

[kid-at-heart]

We love DME! Does anyone know if it will continue past 2011? When it first started I had read that they signed something with MCO till January of 2011. I hope they will continue to provide this wonderful benefit past that date. Anyone know for certain?

Oh my, I certainly hope they continue it. It has certainly made our vacation less stressful. Now if Disney would figure out a way to pack my suitcases...

 

[Twinprincesses]

We had a really bad ME experience, we had to wait around 45 minutes to get on the bus, then another 30 minutes on the bus waiting for more people then our hotel was the last stop. Our luggage also did not show up until after midnight. It was the only time we used it but we are going to give it another shot this year hoping we just had a bad experience.

 

[lanand3]

2 trips so far and both times we were able to board the bus within minutes and only waited did not wait on the bus for long.With 3 excited little kids I would have noticed a wait of longer than a few minutes We will use ME again this upcoming trip.Very convenient.I would like to visit Seaworld/Universal one of these days but I can't bring myself to pay for the transportation yet when Disney picks us up from the airport and brings us to all the parks! If they ever discontinue this benefit then that will be my cue to finally venture outside of the world

 

[TandyR]

Yes, we use both. We fly into MCO, pick up ME to SSR. Then, from the room, we call Alamo and tell them which resort to pick us up from. The shuttle then takes us to the Car Care Center at the entrance to the MK and we drive 'home' in our rental. No one that I am aware of drops cars at any resorts. We simply do this to enable us to do our own grocery shopping as well as some off-property souvenier shopping. We usually only keep the car for a day. Then we'll let Disney do the driving the rest of the week Take the car back to the Car Care Center and the shuttle takes us right back to our resort...

When you do this do you reserve your car in advance? If you do it in advance do you need do something special with your reservation so they will know you will be needing a ride? Our next trip we are planning on using ME for the first time and renting a car for grocery shopping, off-property souvenir shopping and visiting Mary Queen of the Universe, so I have been trying to figure this out.

 

[Disney93]

This trip we are doing both. 7 members of our party will ride DME and 3 will get rental cars. Then we will return them to the Swan the night before we leave, we are staying at BWV. We found that we got a far better rental rate picking the cars up at MCO, almost half price for 10 days versus getting them from the Car Care Center. Also because DME express is taking most of our luggage, we were able to rent smaller vehicles that also saved a bunch of money. We will take 2 pieces of luggage in each car. That might also come in handy because we don't get into MCO until 9:30 pm, so that means we might not get our luggage until after midnight, or later.

 

[KateB]

We love DME! Does anyone know if it will continue past 2011? When it first started I had read that they signed something with MCO till January of 2011. I hope they will continue to provide this wonderful benefit past that date. Anyone know for certain?

I really hope that Disney keeps the ME. We have NEVER driven in Orlando and don't really want to. We are taking my parents in January 2011 for their very first vacation and have already expressed my love for the ME. Yikes!

 

[Anal Annie]

We have also come to rely on it as a bargain service & we depend on it. It's a real plus not to have to add in car rental or bus transfers. I believe they did have a 10 yr contract for the service so who knows if they will renew & keep it or revamp the system. It certainly gets used a lot though so I hope they renew the contract.

 

[FindTheMickeys]

When you do this do you reserve your car in advance? If you do it in advance do you need do something special with your reservation so they will know you will be needing a ride? Our next trip we are planning on using ME for the first time and renting a car for grocery shopping, off-property souvenir shopping and visiting Mary Queen of the Universe, so I have been trying to figure this out.

No need to reserve in advance but I suppose you could if you wanted to. We've never had an issue getting a car without a pre-reservation... When you get to the resort, call Alamo from your room and arrange for the shuttle van to pick you up to go get the car...

 

[margitmouse]

When you do this do you reserve your car in advance? If you do it in advance do you need do something special with your reservation so they will know you will be needing a ride? Our next trip we are planning on using ME for the first time and renting a car for grocery shopping, off-property souvenir shopping and visiting Mary Queen of the Universe, so I have been trying to figure this out.

we are doing this this weekend, renting for one overnight, to do grocery shopping and so we can p/u DD and DDBF first thing Sunday morning and do some shopping on the way back to the resort, got a cheep cheep rate as an Emerald club member... just happened to hit a discount offered online. Be sure to check both National and Alamo's sites, and mousesavers for discount codes.

Really happy to only have to pay for one night... but going to miss the flexibility of having the car.

PS. If you rent online, and sign up to return the car earlier than you picked it up ( less than a 24 hour rental) the price is LESS!

 

[corpcomp]

Love ME but my biggest mistake on this last trip was not checking the flight departure time. The plane was delayed a hour and with catching a 9:10am ME departure, we could have used the extra time for packing or grabbing a snack at Market Place at BCV

 

[aan1701]

I was reading this and just wanted to chime in really quickly. First, I could have sworn I read on Mouseplanet that the DME will be around at least till 2014 now, I could be wrong, but I swear I read something on Mouseplanet about going past 2011. Second, the reason why their is now a 10:00 PM cut off is, and this is straight from my friend who now just transfered to DCL but came from Bell services at AKL/AKV. People would complain when the bell man droped off lugage at like 3 in the morning. What the guests were never told was they could put a do not deliver bags until........ On the room so Bell services would not deliver till that time. So that is why.

 

[heathers4um]

I have used DME a couple of times and thought it was a terrific thing! we may wait for a bit but its better than the aggravation of fighting lines at the car rental place and traffic!

I have a question I am hoping someone can answer - I want to take a 7 or 9 pm flight from Orlando to go back home so we could enjoy the parks or DTD the day we leave. Will DME still take us when check out was so much earlier?

 

[DaveH]

DME is one of those things, depending on what your expectations are. The bottom line is you are getting a ride to your resort and luggage brought for you. We have used DME arriving at different times of day. First thing in the morning and later in the evening, less people use DME. The line for check in is short and you may wait on the bus for a bit or may not. During times when alot of folks arrive, there are longer lines checking in and may wait awhile to get onto the bus. We have even ended up on a regular Mears bus because of the volume. After long flights with little ones the stress level is already high. So delays and antsy kids do not do as well. Each person/group have to figure out what works best for them. Disney would rather have full busses so use less money. Then if you are the 3rd or 4th resort the wait and time feels forever. The price is free and they usually do a pretty good job. Not perfect but decent. I do believe Disney a couple of years ago did a new agreement with OIA.