Travelling with REALLY large group!

W

WDW Donna

Member
OK, here is the deal.
My Father in Law announced last Christmas that he is paying for the whole family to go to WDW. The trip is in April. There are 14 of us going between the ages of 65 and 6months. We are planning to fly out of Buffalo airport. My problem is how to get to the All Star Movie Resort from the airport. Do we use the Magical Express or the Mears bus. My DH is skeptical of the Magical Express - he thinks we will never see our luggage again, but it will cost $325 round trip for Mears.

Anyone have any ideas? Comments about Magical Express? Mears?

We are not renting cars because only myself and DH will drive in Orlando. No one else knows the area or is comfortable driving in strange places.
 
We used magical express when we went this past March. It was great....however, I had read some stories about not receiving luggage, so we picked up our luggage and loaded it on the bus ourselves...........when we arrived at the hotel, the driver got our bags for us.

This could be a solution for you...yes, it is a pain having to wait at baggage claim, but it ensures that you get your luggage, and the magical express buses are pretty comfy!
 
We didn't have a bit of trouble with Magical Express. ; We just followed the signs after we got off the plane and the nice cast members directed us in the right direction. ; We had no wait time at all to catch the ME. ; It was a great experience. ; It was nice to leave the hotel room and come back with the luggage right there. ; But like Weemcp said, you could probably go pick your own luggage up. ; I don't see why not. ; But going to a fairly popular resort, the bus drivers may not like that you are dragging all your luggage with. ; I would say ME all the way!!! ; If you pack what you need on your carry on for the afternoon/day, there shouldn't be a problem.

We have also travelled with Mears. ; We like them too however we did have a scary adventure with them after our first trip, going back to the airport. ; The guy driving almost fell asleep at the wheel!!! ; Sean spoke up to him and he pretended everything was ok, but when you roll down your window, eat tick tacs and swerve all over the road, I would say he was a bit sleepy. ; It scared me though.

We also took another shuttle the time we landed at the Sandford airport with Jetsgo (hated that airline). ; I don't remember the name, I will have to look into that one, but that was good as well. ; The guys were super friendly and I remember him pointing out all the aligators swimming in the lake that we drove by. ; Watch out for moving logs!!!
 
(Sits down by a fire with a book in hand)

Let me tell you a story of the great and wonderful Magical Express…. It all starts with a new married couple flying out of Halifax Nova Scotia headed for Disney world. They had a connecting flight in Toronto where the nice people at West jet reminded them they needed to put on their Magical express tags so that Disney would pickup there luggage. So as the Dashing newly married husband fumbled with getting the tags on the luggage until the nice west jet lady took pity on this dashing man and put them on for him!

The dashing man was a little worried being that he was from Canada and had herd so many bad stories from other people that his luggage was going to get lost! For the whole flight all he had on his mind was his luggage ending up in Alaska. Until he ended up in Orlando and the thrill of being an hour away from Disney overtook any worries he had about his Luggage. Once at the Airport the newly married man found his way to the Magical express check-in counter with his new bride, Once at the counter a nice man checked them in and directed them to talk to his “bother”. Now this normally wouldn’t be funny however the man at the counter was white as snow and his “brother” was a man of Mexican decent.

So the husband walked up to the man and said “your bother told me to say Hi” The man then started to laugh and pointed to the man at the counter! He then directed the couple to a line where they could wait for the bus. The Husband and wife were a little disappointed because they were the first in line so they figured they just missed the bus and would need to wait at least 30 min. where they ever wrong!!!! About 2 min later they were directed to a bus and on there way to the Hotel!

While on the trip the driver put in a Disney DVD giving the couple information about there upcoming trip and the return trip. Once the couple arrived to the hotel they checked in and went out for some dinner at down town Disney once they returned from their dinner and walk of downtown Disney they walked into the hotel room and there luggage magical appeared in the room. ; – No problems and it took about 2 hours –

They lived happily ever after


The End!

So remember kids the moral of the story is to use the magical express! Oh and it’s free :)
 
Thank you so much everyone for your input and lovely stories!! ;D
We just booked the trip today (I have been put in charge of such task) and we went with the Magical Express! I figure with a large group and young children (4 under the age of five) it would be easier for someone else to look after the luggage. We will probably just go to Downtown Disney for the afternoon to kill some time.
 
I've personally had no problems with Magical Express (although I bring a change of clothes so I can hit the parks on the fly) . ; However, with a large group, I'd make sure that grand gatherings was plugged into the whole reservation process - might make everything go a little smoother. (Youd Disney TA can help you.)
 
Magical express has never let us down.

However flights that are not direct are the biggest threat to you luggage.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/27/natio ... enver.html

27denver650.1.jpg
 
We've use the ME twice and had no problem with our luggage. It was the beginning of the "magic"for us. The only problem we had was that we booked it to get back to the airport and it was running late-so late that we nearly missed our flight!
 
We have used ME the last 5 trips and never had a problem. On the last trip our stroller wheel was broken off and the ME bell hop put a note on the stroller saying that they received the stroller from the airline that way and that they had called the airline ( NWA) to inform them of the broken stroller. Meanwhile they gave us a new stroller to use! and one of the bell hops found the part we needed on an abandoned stroller and fixed our stroller!

The only time we picked up our luggage instead of letting them do the luggage thing was when our flight arrived at midnight. Otherwise, we let the ME do the work.

I would also add that with a large group, ME might be the best way to transport everyone, particularly if everyone's flights are arriving at different times.
 
Just a heads up to the original poster. ; There's really no point in even trying to use Mears, since Mears IS Magical Express. Disney contracted Mears to run their shuttle service.

Kevin
 
We ended up using ME. Since we were flying Southwest they would handle our luggage going down, but not coming home. We picked up our own luggage (the paranoid DH) and went to the waiting area. Since there were 14 of us we had to wait for the next bus, which was only an extra few minutes.
Leaving the resort to get to the airport was another story! The ME was over an hour late!!! With no explaination! Since we had to check in our own luggage at the airport and go through security and had babies in strollers - well- remember that scene from Home Alone when the family is running through the airport and makes it just in time and the airline hostess tells them to pick a seat anywhere? Yup that was us!
We (just the four of us) are driving this time so we don't have to put our lives in anyone elses hands to get us where we want to go.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top