Magical Express

[Stmpmaniac]

Having never used this feature - I have a couple of questions. I've read some posts that say it could take up to 6 hours to get your luggage. While I don't necessarily like that, one of my concerns is that they will lose my luggage. Has that every happened to anyone? I sure don't want to go on vacation and have to go shopping to replace everything.

I thought I read that you can pick up your own luggage and take it to the bus. If so, how do you let them know you are going to do this and not have them pull your luggage?

Thanks for any help.

[jakeybake]

I never lost my suitcase but it is an awesome bus. ;)

[Lodger]

The first time we use Magical Express we were worried too. We used it three times now and have not had a single problem. I suggest you let Magical Express worry about your bags. It is great to go directly from the plane to the bus that will take you to your hotel. Just pack in your carry on what you will need for your first day in the park. When you return to your room your bags will most likely be waiting for you.

But if you really want to get your own bags, don't put the yellow label/tags that identify your destination hotel. Without the yellow labels Magical Express will not know to pull them. Go to baggage and wait for your bags. Once you have your bags check in at the Magical Express desk and inform them that you already have your bags. Having used this service I don't know why you would want to do this. I believe bags have a better chance of reaching the Orlando airport with the bright yellow Disney label.

[PetefromRI]

We prefer not to wait 2-4 hours for our luggage to be delivered so we have them put it on the bus with us.Just don't put the tags on the luggage that they will send you and retrieve your luggage yourself and report to the ME desk.It's really easy and painless.

[KEYONNAH]

Does anyone know when they'll deliver if you arrive during the middle of the night?

[Love of Disney]

Recently, there was a thread describing exactly what they do to get your bags from the airport to your room. I believe your bags are scanned about 3 times and they always know where they are. This will be my first time using it and I'm quite excited that I won't have to touch my luggage!!

[ASweetLov]

I love the Magical Express!!!! They haven't lost my luggage. I love being able to get off the plane and not worry about my luggage and just go straight to check in to magical express and then off we go to WDW:mickey:
I travel first thing in the morning so by the time I get to the resort I go into my room as soon as its ready freshen up and off to the parks and when I return my luggage is there waiting for me:thumbsup:

[wendy*darling]

Does anyone know when they'll deliver if you arrive during the middle of the night?
It still may take a couple of hours. If you would prefer they NOT wake you up in the middle of the night to deliver the bags- just tell Bell Services to bring them in the morning (or that you will call in the morning when you want them delivered).
If you don't tell them- they will come and knock- whatever time it happens to be!


I travel first thing in the morning so by the time I get to the resort I go into my room as soon as its ready freshen up and off to the parks and when I return my luggage is there waiting for me:thumbsup:
That's what we do, too. We check in and head to the parks. Most times our DVC villa is not ready yet anyway. So we just leave our carry-ons with Bell Services and start our vacation.
When we arrive back later in the day- the bags are in the room.

I have to agree- I think having those yellow tags on my luggage actually helps my luggage get on my plane and to MCO. Once it's there- I know DME will retrieve them and deliver them to my resort.

I'd give it a try. I think you will be very pleased! :mickey:

[crazykids]

I just came back & it was my first time using ME - it was great! I was traveling alone w/ 2 small children & it was such a pleasure not having to worry about carrying all of that luggage. When we got to the resort, our room was ready, so we put our carry on bags in the room & headed off to a park for a few hours. When we came back, our suitcases were in the room right by the front door. Great service!

[CleveRocks]

Having never used this feature - I have a couple of questions. I've read some posts that say it could take up to 6 hours to get your luggage. While I don't necessarily like that, one of my concerns is that they will lose my luggage. Has that every happened to anyone? I sure don't want to go on vacation and have to go shopping to replace everything.

I thought I read that you can pick up your own luggage and take it to the bus. If so, how do you let them know you are going to do this and not have them pull your luggage?

Thanks for any help.Apprehension for anything new to you is understandable, and you came to the right place to ask questions. You've already been reassured by others, and I'll continue that.

DME has been around for nearly 3 years. It's news to you, but by now it's business as usual for Disney and for frequent Disney guests.

In their DME directions, Disney tells you to expect your luggage about 3 hours after you check-in to your resort.

They use a very high-tech system for the luggage. The bags are pulled from the luggage stream before they get to the baggage claim carousels. They are brought to a Disney luggage sorting facility on the grounds of the airport, where they are sorted and loaded into cages which are then loaded onto delivery trucks. The trucks are tracked by GPS. The bags are delivered to the resorts, and then the resort CMs take it from there. The bags will be delivered to the inside of your room whether you are in there or not ... in other words, there's no need to wait around for your luggage.

The DME luggage tags have barcodes. During the above process, each of your bags is scanned 5 times ... Disney knows where your luggage is at all times.

Disney recommends you pack a carry-on for your immediate needs, and I agree. This is smart traveling anywhere you travel just in case THE AIRLINE delays your luggage.

As far as 6 hour waits for luggage ... I'm sure they've occurred at times, just like 1-2 hour waits at baggage claim carousels occur sometimes.

If you are flying in late, my suggestion is pack for your bedtime and morning needs in your carry-ons. When you get to your resort, ask to have your bags held 'til morning. This way, you won't have your sleep disturbed.

If you choose to get your own bags at baggage claim, you can do that. As everyone else said, DON'T use the DME luggage tags. And no, you don't need to inform anyone about this choice.

If you do choose to get your own luggage, however, realize that you are very likely delaying your own arrival at your resort. While you are waiting at baggage claim, the next available bus will probably have left and you will wait for the next one. When arriving late at night with small children, this would seem especially problemmatic for me ... when I've landed late, my top priority has been to get those kids to bed ASAP and not unnecessarily delay that even one minute.


Any other questions, please post again!

[Stmpmaniac]

I really appreciate all the advice everyone has given me. At least it gives me a choice and I feel more at ease about whatever we decide to do! Thanks again!!!

:mickey:

[Hull-onian]

:welcome: to Intercot.
We have never lost our luggage either. The first time we got to MCO we picked up our own luggage and took it to ME. This time we have the luggage tags. But we never had a problem. However, I told the kids to make sure they pack swimsuits and take them on the airplane so they will have them when we get to our resort. I think everything will be good.:thumbsup:

[phatcatrun]

Does anyone know about how long it takes the bus to get from the airport to the resorts?

[Ed]

Does anyone know about how long it takes the bus to get from the airport to the resorts?

It's about a half-hour to 45 minute drive from the airport to WDW, depending on the traffic. But the bus may be making stops at other resorts before they get to your resort, so it may be longer.

One thing for everyone to keep in mind, especially with Florida's "rainy season" approaching, is that at MCO with most of the airlines, all loading and unloading of bags to/from aircraft comes to a screeching halt at the first sight of lightning; I believe the guideline is lightning within 5 miles of the airport. This is for the safety of the ramp workers. As a result, if there is a lengthy thunderstorm, your baggage may well be delayed beyond the 3 hours mentioned by Disney. :rain: That makes the advice of packing and carrying a "day bag" very good advice indeed!

[LandFan]

It takes about 35 minutes to get from the airport to Disney property but each bus route stops at 3-4 resorts so your time on the bus after you reach Disney property will depend upon which resort you are going to and in which order they deliver people to them. For example, when we stay at Pop, we are always the first drop off for that bus route so our trip is pretty short. It has never taken us more than 40 or 45 minutes to get dropped off at Pop.

[KineGirl]

We have used it twice - once to OKW and once to AKL and both times there was hardly any wait to get on the bus (maybe 5 min max) and then for the bus to leave ( maybe another 5 -10 min) and then trip to the resorts another 30-35 min. We were dropped off second I think each time and I seemed to remember they got the first group of ppl (which was pretty big) unloaded very quickly. We love the Magical Express. The buses are gorgeous IMO and the movie played during the ride really helps get you in the spirit! Both times no problems with our luggage either. THOUGH you dont get your luggage right away. It is delivered to your room a few hours later so be sure to pack whatever you immediately need in a carry on. For example , we usually dress comfy for the flight so we just pack a change of shorts & maybe socks, paperwork/itineraries, pin lanyards (pre-loaded LOL), hairbrushes & hairclips, sunglasses etc....

[Mommy2boys]

We arrived at noon and were expecting to get our luggage early evening.. 9 pm rolled around nothing. I called down and they couldnt find my bags. We waited and waited. We decided to go down and check. It turns up they delivered our bags...but likely to a wrong room. at about 11pm we finally got our bags and they had been delivered to another room. We also received a broken bag. To say the least I was not happy.

Not sure if we are going to be using the delivery service this time:(

[javamama]

Ok my OP---
last year when I heard it could take 6 hours I was like ummm nope I'm picking up my bag in MCO and bringing it to the ME myself--mind you I had a 8 month old and a 3 yo:(
I was out of my skull:-o
Do the ME, take a carry on for everyone your traveling with, a change of clothes or two for each of you, in my case diapers, snacks, juice boxes, sippy cups, etc, at least I have a diaper bag also so that helps. My poor dad and dh were using smart carts, I had a double stroller, we had 6 suitcases, two little kids, purses, cameras, it was torture, and all self inflicted by me. But then again this is what happens when you worked for an airline since 1993:thedolls:
this year I can't wait to use the ME system:cloud9:

[Jonas_Swe]

Hi! :mickey:

We used Disney's Magical Express on our visit to WDW, and it worked perfect all the way. :thumbsup:

As an international visitor flying in from Europe, I was very concerned before we left how they would handle the luggage for us. But after we had taken our luggage through the customs, we just dropped it on the luggage carousel again... and next time we saw it it was in our resort room. With a card that welcomed us to Walt Disney World - wishing us a Magic Vacation! :cloud9:

[Davyjones]

DME is wonderful! We have used it once with no problems, and we will be using them again this May! My wife and I really enjoyed the service. :thumbsup: I would definitely recommend using DME.

So, this time, we will be arriving at the Pop at around noon, so I've been wondering: Where do they store the luggage if you arrive too early to check in? Can we get to it if we need to? Just some questions in my mind.

[CleveRocks]

So, this time, we will be arriving at the Pop at around noon, so I've been wondering: Where do they store the luggage if you arrive too early to check in? Can we get to it if we need to? Just some questions in my mind.Luggage Assistance stores luggage. You can get to it while they're storing it, but only with their permission and assistance.

[Magic Smiles]

We love using DME. Their service is AMAZING! As we always arrive in Orlando by noon, we check into the hotel right away to get our room assignment and park passes, then head off to the parks with no worry about luggage. On our last trip when we got back to our room after being at the parks all afternoon and evening, we discovered that one of our suitcases was missing. We went down to the front desk and they directed us to the correct person to speak to. As a previous post mentioned luggage with the DME tags on are scanned continuously throughout their trip. Within 15 minutes our missing suitcase had been tracked to the Detroit airport. This was around 9:00 pm. Our suitcase was delivered to our room door approx 1:30 am. Personally I could have waited until the next morning for the suitcase (it was DHs) but this just shows how quickly they were able to locate the missing suitcase and get it to us. I would never hesitate to use them for all trips.

[applecore72]

Hi! :mickey:

We used Disney's Magical Express on our visit to WDW, and it worked perfect all the way. :thumbsup:

As an international visitor flying in from Europe, I was very concerned before we left how they would handle the luggage for us. But after we had taken our luggage through the customs, we just dropped it on the luggage carousel again... and next time we saw it it was in our resort room. With a card that welcomed us to Walt Disney World - wishing us a Magic Vacation! :cloud9:

It's good to hear it's working out for international visitors as well! Unfortunately we will arrive late at night so we'll probably just go ahead and let the hotel deliver our bags in the morning.

By the way - nice to see you Jonas. I contacted you a couple of months ago when we were trying to decide which resort to stay at :mickey: Hope you'll be able to visit the World again sometime soon!