ME & Late Arrival

[Checkers]

Need some info from anyone who has recently taken Magical Express from MCO when their flight arrived late (after 10 pm). I have heard that lately Mears has been using vans with limited capacity and in some cases guests had to wait in excess of an hour for other passengers to arrive. Don't know the specifics but I am concerned because my DD, DSIL & 3DGC will be arriving on a late flight in Oct. (from Seattle) and if this is the case I would just as soon hire a car for them because they will have to pick up their own luggage anyway. Any advice or opinions are welcome or if anyone has had a recent experience and would be kind enough to share. TIA!

[faline]

It's been a while since we had a late arrival but we had a couple of late arrivals in the past in which we used Magical Express. We were on a full sized bus but had quite a long wait before we left the airport. Essentially, it appeared that the bus was not planning to move until is was full or nearly so.

[BugeyedMuggy]

We have only used ME twice and the one time it was after 10 pm there was just the 2 of us to AKL and one person to GF. We did wait a good 30 mins. for others to arrive and no one did. It will cost about $70 for a one way either a prearranged town car or a cab. You can always have them go to ME and if it sounds like a lengthy wait can always get a cab from there.

[CleveRocks]

We arrived late at night in March during spring break. Our queue had only a few people in it. Other queues had lots of people and they were shepherded onto Disney's Magical Express buses while we stood there a while. They eventually put us on a Mears van ... it was one person going to Port Orleans French Quarter, then the four of us going to Contemporary, and finally three people going to Grand Floridian.

It felt like a long time because we saw other people led to buses while we just stood there. Had I not timed it, I would swear it took a couple of hours.

But I always time it. Always.

From exiting the aircraft to our drop-off at Contemporary (we happened to be the second stop) it was 64 minutes. That is great time!

The average reported time is 70 minutes, so we were faster than average. My other times have been 63, 57 and 59 minutes, so this 64 minutes was basically the same.

And there you have it ... because it was late and we were tired and we saw MANY others get on buses while we just stood there looking at the carpet, it felt like it took forever, but in reality we made great time.

[Checkers]

Thanks everyone for the input. Sounds like taking a cab would work if the wait is going to be too long especially since they have to collect their own luggage.