mckinley said:
We are going to fly for the first time to disney. So we are not going to have any transportation after we arrive at airport (MCO). I don't want to be out the extra $ to rent a car. I have read some good & some bad about the disney magical express to & from the airport. I am worried that our bags will not arrive soon enough or maybe not at all. We will be arriving late in the afternoon so will we have then that night? Can we take our bags with us on the magical express or is that not allowed?
Please assure me that it is okay to ride the magical express.
DME is great. I'll bet that when you say you've read "good and bad" about DME the "bad" has been posts like yours, people expressing doubts and anxieties, but not actual horror stories. I think I've read ONE report of someone missing a suitcase, maybe less than a dozen others about long wait times or mix-ups after which everything was A-OK. What have you read to lead you to the worry that you might never see your luggage again?
If you don't want to take my word for it, let's look at the numbers. Between 6,000-10,000 people use DME every day. DME has been in existence for about 9 months. That's 273 days. That means between 1.638 MILLION and 2.73 MILLION people have used DME so far. There's been no rash of missing luggage from 2 MILLION people!
Of course, DME can misplace luggage. Hey, airlines can mishandle luggage too. Airlines INVENTED losing luggage! I'm always fascinated how some people trust their airline to take their suitcases 1,000 miles but then don't trust DME to take them the final 20 miles.
People should expect their DME luggage to arrive 2-4 hours after they do. The smart way to prepare for that is to pack a carry-on with what you may need in the early going. This is just smart traveling anyway, because, as I said, AIRLINES can delay and lose luggage. Wherever I travel, I've always packed my carry-on with everything I need for the first 24 hours of my trip. When you actually try it, it's surprising how little space is taken up by a change of clothes, PJs, swimsuit, toiletries, medications, etc. You won't have to wait in your room for your luggage, because it will "magically appear" inside your resort room whether you're there or not. When mine arrived, I was in the hotel pool with my kids enjoying the start of our WDW vacation.
You can choose to take your luggage yourself to the DME bus and have it ride the bus with you (it will be in the cargo hold) so that it'll arrive at your resort with you. To me, this deletes one of the best aspects of DME, the luggage delivery service. I felt like a VIP not having to even think about my checked luggage and wait around baggage claim and then drag it around. I have to do that everywhere else I fly, so it was a real treat to have my luggage taken care of for me!
If you do go get your own luggage to take to the bus yourself, DON'T PUT YOUR DME TAGS ON THE SUITCASES. If you put the yellow DME tags on your checked luggage, it WILL be handled and delivered by DME. Workers at the airport remove DME-tagged suitcases from the rest of the luggage BEFORE the luggage gets to the baggage claim carousel. So if you DME-tag it, it won't be at baggage claim for you to get it yourself.
If having a private ride and that extra-personal service is important to you, go ahead and spend the 120 bucks or so on a towncar service -- they get great reviews just like DME does. But if you don't want to spend the money and don't mind sharing a ride with others on a very comfy bus, then DME is the way to go. Millions of people can't be wrong.
No matter how you get there, have a magical time at WDW!
