Sailing out of Ft. Lauderdale on DCL

[RweTHEREyet]

We are in planning stages for a January sailing on DCL out of Ft. Lauderdale. We might drive down a day early to hit the Sawgrass Outlet Mall. If we do that, are there any hotels where DCL transportation is provided that will also allow you to leave your car at the hotel?

Any suggestions or recommendations about sailing our of Ft. Lauderdale are more than welcome as I usually sail out of Port Canaveral, so I am not sure what to expect here.

Our other option is taking the Brightline down from Orlando, but that would be a first as well.

Thanks for any recomendations.

 

[mmouse37]

We are in planning stages for a January sailing on DCL out of Ft. Lauderdale. We might drive down a day early to hit the Sawgrass Outlet Mall. If we do that, are there any hotels where DCL transportation is provided that will also allow you to leave your car at the hotel?

Any suggestions or recommendations about sailing our of Ft. Lauderdale are more than welcome as I usually sail out of Port Canaveral, so I am not sure what to expect here.

Our other option is taking the Brightline down from Orlando, but that would be a first as well.

Thanks for any recomendations.

We are doing something quite similar!! We are cruising on the Destiny January 26, 2026 but spending a few days at WDW pre cruise. I haven't booked it yet but I plan on staying at WDW on the 22, 23 and 24th of Jan. On the 25th we have Brightline train tickets booked already. We get into FLL early afternoon. I booked those tickets about six weeks ago. We will spend night before cruise at a FLL hotel. For reference we got the Premium seats for $89 pp. I signed up at their website and always get promo offers. First time taking the train for us. We will fly into Orlando on the 22nd and fly out of FLL on the 31st.

We have sailed out of FLL a few times, most recently July 5th on the Dream. We have stayed at the Marriott Airport Hotel Dania Pointe, the AC Hotel Dania Pointe and the Hilton Marina Fort Lauderdale. Last month we stayed at the AC Hotel which had an airport shuttle. We had a group of 16 and rented private van service from the hotel to the port. Worked out great.

For January we have not decided on which hotel yet. Either the Marriott or the Hilton. We are traveling with two other couples....all different Castaway Club status so if we stay at the Hilton and book DCL transfers we have a chance of all getting the same boarding group which will be helpful. I believe the Hilton is the only hotel DCL is currently using for their DCL transfers....along with the airport itself DCL transfers. I believe the Hilton has a park and cruise rate. Last time we stayed there we had a rental car so didn't take DCL transfers. We returned the rental and was going to take the rental shuttle bus to the port but it was mobbed at the rental office. I just called an Uber from the rental office as it was much quicker than waiting for the busloads of car rental people ahead of us.

MJ

 

[RweTHEREyet]

Whoa, we have almost the exact same itinerary on the exact same sailing. I am flying into WDW on Jan 22 and then my Orlando local friend and I are going on the Jan 26 Destiny sailing. We are leaning towards driving down to FLL the day before embarkation as we want to hit the Sawgrass Mills Outlets before getting onto the ship. We thought it would be helpful to be able to leave any purchases in the car and to not have to lug them all onto the ship.