Travel feom airport

[sieprincess]

How long does it usually take from landing in Orlando to your room on Disney? Obviously approx. I have read somewhere it takes approx 3hrs, wondering how accurate that is... Seems long!!!

 

[tlh]

Normally they say at least 3 hours or so for getting to dinner reservations or getting to a park right after checking in I believe. Remember that you have to work your way off the plane, navigate through the airport and down to magical express, wait to be loaded on bus, maybe stop at another resort or two depending on how busy they are, and finally to your resort to wait to checkin possibly. Then drop your stuff off at your room and then to the bus stop to wait on a bus wherever you want to go.....

 

[jeffbear]

Depends on your means of travel.

From picking your bags up to the hotel lobby only takes 30-45 minutes depending on traffic, but that would assume you've got a car waiting curbside. Figure that for a cab or a hire car. Traffic being what it is down there, allow an hour. If you're using Magical Express, I'd allow 2 hours. If renting a car it depends on your vendor and also the line in front of you. That could also take an hour ... or it could take 15-20 minutes if you're using Hertz Gold service.

Checking in at any Disney Resort can take anywhere from 5 minutes to 45 minutes depending on the resort, the complication of your reservations, the bus that arrived just in front of you and about a million other variables. I'd allow at least a half hour to get checked in.

So yeah ... calling it an even three hours if you're using Magical Express or Mears sounds perfectly reasonable. And it could well take you that long if you've got a rental car. A hire car or limo could slice off some time if you need it.

 

[Shelly F - Ohio]

3hr is accurate. By the time you wait to get off the plane, walk to the DME, the possibility of waiting in line for a bus, getting on the bus and waiting for it to fill up enough for it to take off. The 35 minute travel to WDW. The bus usually stops at multiple resorts. So 3 hours is pretty accurate.

 

[sam_gordon]

3hr is accurate. By the time you wait to get off the plane, walk to the DME, the possibility of waiting in line for a bus, getting on the bus and waiting for it to fill up enough for it to take off. The 35 minute travel to WDW. The bus usually stops at multiple resorts. So 3 hours is pretty accurate.

I disagree based on past posts here. Personally I would budget 2 hours. Has it taken longer for a few people? Yes. Others have made it in 90 minutes.

The "general" time frame for utilizing DME is 90 minutes from walking off the plane to walking into your resort. Then checking in and walking to your room, I'd say 2 hours is closer to the truth.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

Best case, worst case, and typical case are three different numbers.

Although the actual time on the road from leaving airport property to arriving on WDW property is less than 30 minutes, all sorts of other things can add up before and after. Many of these things are unpredictable.

It begins with the actual flight arrival arrival time at Orlando Int'l Airport. We've been off the plane 15 minutes before our scheduled arrival time. We've landed 3 hours late.

When getting our own bags at baggage claim, they've appeared within 5 minutes of us getting down to baggage claim. They've taken 60 minutes to arrive a few hours after a summer thunderstorm because the baggage handlers were still backed up. And they've taken 40 minutes for no apparent reason.

Using DME, we once checked in and walked directly onto a waiting motorcoach, which closed its door and drove off within a few minutes, with our resort then being the first stop. Another time, we must have been in line for more than a half hour; we then sat on the coach waiting to leave; and we were the last stop.

Usually renting a car is fairly quick, but there have been a few times when it's taken us over an hour to get a car (not at Orlando).

Several years ago, it took us 45 minutes in line before it was my turn to check in at our resort. Other times, no other guests were checking in at the time we got there. Last fall, they needed to call a help desk to put our annual passes on our MagicBands; it took about an hour to be resolved.

In other words, there's no easy number. Plan on 3 hours. Be delighted when it only takes 2 hours. If it takes 6 hours, just be happy your destination is WDW, not to a cruise ship that sailed without you.

Don't plan anything on your arrival day that will cost a lot money or cause a lot of disappointment if you don't arrive in time. That includes credit-card-guaranteed ADRs for your favorite restaurant, tickets for La Nouba, or anything that you can't reschedule if you miss it.

 

[DVC-Don]

Before I moved down here it would average 1 hour from exiting the plane to arriving at the resort check in desk. I always rented a car while my wife got the bags.

 

[siskaren]

I disagree based on past posts here.

I also disagree, both based on posts here (which generally say to expect about 90 minutes from gate to resort), as well as personal experience. At 3 hours after my flight has landed, I'm in a park. And that's allowing not just for travel time to the hotel, but checking in, getting to my room, changing clothes (if what I wore when I left home isn't going to be comfortable for the weather in Florida), eating lunch at the resort food court, waiting for the bus to the park, and travel time to the park.

Now, I realize that things could happen like Horace Horescollar mentioned that could stretch that time out, and I've been lucky in that regard, but unless something like that did happen, I wouldn't expect it to take 3 hours to get to the resort from the time I got off the plane.

 

[Horace Horsecollar]

I also disagree, both based on posts here (which generally say to expect about 90 minutes from gate to resort), as well as personal experience.

OP asked about landing-to-room, not gate-to-resort. Take the 90-minute rule-of-thumb and add time for taxiing, deplaning, checking in at the report, and getting from the resort check-in desk to the room (which can take quite a while at some of the spread-out WDW resort hotels), and you can add another 30 minutes or so if things go normally. Then add some time for a few delays here and there.

I still stand by my advice to plan on 3 hours and be delighted if it only takes 2 hours.

Planning on 2 hours is likely to lead to disappointment.