FW - Golf Cart?

Hello,

Staying at Fort Wilderness in Feb 18 in a motor home and wondering if a golf cart is needed and/or worth the expense. I don’t mind walking a significant distance .5 mile or so to things, but my parents/kids who will be with me can’t (My mom is in her 70’s and has mobility issues - uses an ECV). Is it possible for me to drop them off at the pool/bus/boat stops and then drive back to our site and walk myself? Obviously, golf carts seem ideal, but the price x 7 days seems excessive. Any advice would be appreciated!

We stayed in the 1500 loop last year we walked or caught the internal bus when convenient. I didn’t see a need for the cart. However if I was staying in the cabins I’d totally get a cart because you are far from everything.
It’s also worth noting bus stops are close to most loops so you don’t need to walk to far, but if your mom is going to have a difficult time rent the cart.

So some loops are very far from everything, and some are not.

Here is a map: http://www.wdwinfo.com/maps/FWMap.pdf
Here is a list of which sites are classified as what: Loop/Site Info Page Backup - General Camping Discussion and Questions - Fort Fiends

That fort fiends site is fabulous as well, and the community is great. They completely understand that sometimes it is hard to find info on the fort so do a great job of having a place specifically for that.

Anyway - back to your question. I’m assuming you have your own vehicle in addition to your motor home since you mentioned driving… If you do not have a car with you, I would say, yes - rent a golf cart… although depending on what you find renting a car for the week might be cheaper :wink:

My husband and I stayed on the 2000 loop because we have a teenie little teardrop trailer (it is a pop-up and tent loop). So we were at the mercy of transport. I was very pleased, though. We typically did one of three things:

  1. Took the FW busses to the Outpost (for everything but MK) or the Settlement Depot (for ferries to MK, the lagoon resorts and also if you are going to see HDR) and then hopped on WDW transportation accordingly.
  2. Drove to the Outpost - where you can park for the day without any troubles - and then took the WDW busses (what we did most often).
  3. Drove to the park - We only did this on our Animal Kingdom day because it was our last day; we needed to Rope Drop, and I wanted a little extra sleep - so didn’t want to have to wake up earlier to allow for transportation time. I just wanted to get in the car and go.

We were totally fine without a golf cart. However, we simply stayed at FW and basically just went to the parks. IF you are planning on going to the pool a lot, taking part in some of the recreation activities, going to a lot of the evening events… basically if you are going to do a lot of traveling around in FW other than just getting to and from the parks… you may want one if you don’t like driving your car on vacation (some people think it kills the magic). There are parts of FW that are walkable, but as you can see from the map it kind of depends on where your site is.

Yes we will have a car with us. I’m sure we will be using the pools pretty much every day the weather permits and will probably visit the petting zoo. I had read somewhere though that they highly discourage driving a vehicle around the resort unless coming or going, so I wasn’t sure how strict they are about that or if it would be feasible for me to drop off at pool or Depot and then just re park the car and walk myself. It is good to know that you can park for the day at the Outpost. Thank you for the info and the links!

Yeah, I think they reason the discourage is because there just isn’t parking anywhere, and most of the parking we saw (aside from at the outpost) is marked for short periods of time - like if you are stopping to pick up some food or supplies, etc.

With a large RV you have many more convenient options than I did, and like I said, the bus system in the resort is totally fine. So if I were in your shoes, I would plan to drive people as needed and then either walk or take the bus back to meet them.

Have a blast! FW is lovely. It was my first Disney location when I was a kid, and I’m so glad I finally got to go back :slight_smile: