Has anyone taken the DCL shuttle recently from a Disney World resort hotel to Port Canaveral for a Disney Cruise lately? How early do they pick you up & get you to Port Canaveral? I know it’s about an hour ride. I am planning on securing an early arrival/embarkation time, as I’d like to get on the ship as early as possible. I’ve seen a few videos from pre-Covid that did not pick you up until like noon or 1pm, so you didn’t get to the port and on the ship until after 2pm. If this is still the case, would it be faster to just take a Lyft or is there another shuttle van that would arrive earlier in the morning?
Also, if you are taking the DCL shuttle to Port Canaveral, do they transfer your luggage from the resort to the ship or is it placed under the bus, then you check it when you arrive?
Our experience was about a 9:30am pickup at the resort and we were at the terminal before boarding starts. Not sure if that was related to how early we booked the transfer or not, though.
When arriving at the port, all we had to take with us getting off the bus were our carry-ons. Checked luggage was transferred from the bus to our state room by DCL.
Those guests transferring from a Disney hotel to the cruises have the earliest boarding times. You won’t need to choose one as it gets assigned automatically if you are taking the DCL transportation. We’ve been assigned groups 2 or 3 each time. I think they come to get luggage the morning of around 7:30am-ish. The luggage then shows up outside your stateroom. We only get on the ship with a carry on that has swimsuits and the bottles of wine we bring on.
It seems like we left POFQ each time around 9-9:30am. We are typically on the ship by 11:30AM.
We’ve only taken the shuttle from MCO so haven’t had experienced it from the WDW resorts, but we did take the DCL shuttle from MCO last year to Port Canaveral for the Wish.
When we arrived on our shuttle from MCO it was about 11:25am and we arrived just ahead of a group of at least 4-5 other shuttles that I am assuming were from the WDW resorts. I never confirmed with any of the people on them but that’s and the MCO Hyatt are the only other places that have shuttles to Port Canaveral so at least a few of them had to be from WDW. Regardless, everyone on those shuttles was at the port before they called any of our boarding groups. Also, my favorite part of using the shuttles was that before we boarded the busses, we did the port check-in process so everything at the port was so efficient for us & our passports didn’t need to be re-checked there because they had already done that before boarding the bus. We just had to go through security and had a less than 5 min. wait for our boarding group to be called and then we were on the ship with our name being announced! I loved that about taking the shuttle.
As for luggage, at MCO when we checked-in at the DCL desk to be assigned a shuttle they took our luggage and next we saw it was outside our stateroom door on the ship. With the resorts they’ll transport your luggage and you should have a letter with instructions in your room on where/when the luggage needs to be and what time you need to meet in the lobby. If for whatever reason you don’t get a letter, talk to the front desk and they’ll get you that information.
I stayed at POFQ and used the DCL shuttle to the port last week. Luggage was picked up around 7:45am (it needs to be ready by 7:30am). Bus left around 9:30am. Our luggage went to the port on a separate truck that left before the shuttle did. Coming back, our luggage was in the underneath storage area of the bus. The trip is about an hour unless traffic backs up.
Thank you everyone for your responses!!! Just booked a WDW Resort reservation for a few days prior to the cruise to help get into vacation mode. When I called to change the pickup from MCO to the resort to go to Port Canaveral, the cast member did not ask me for my resort confirmation number, just the name of the resort. I thought that was odd, as the last cast member I spoke with told me to call back with the resort confirmation number. She also said she had no idea when the bus would arrive at the resort to go to the port, but that it would be sometime between 9am-1pm. That made me a bit nervous, as I don’t want to wait that long to get to the port & on the ship. She said to call back 10 days prior & they “may” have a pickup time, but that I would need to decide if I will keep the reservation to the port or cancel it and take an Uber/Lyft instead.
I recently watched several videos of folks taking the DCL bus from WDW resorts. In each case, luggage was picked up early (7 am or so) and the bus left for the port around 9:45ish, although it can depend on the resort and such.
Thank you for this info! DD and I are going on the 5-day Fantasy Bahamas cruise in 52 days!
Can you also describe the RETURN schedule at disembarkation for returning to a WDW resort? I’m wondering when I can plan anything back at the resort. Thanks!!
We took the shuttle from Port Canaveral to WDW (CBR) last July and it was very relaxed.
I had prebooked over the phone (I could not just add it on my DCL page as an option because I was booking one-way - I think you can just add the return ticket on yourself if that’s what you need). I was surprised that my confirmation email contained no detail on departure times. I checked in my DCL app the night before our disembarkation and again in the morning, and there was no information - so I asked a couple of CMs and they both told me that we should just have breakfast at our scheduled time (which in our case was 8am - we had the late dinner seating) and then head over to the bus station whenever we’re finished. I am guessing we finished breakfast around 8.30/8.40, used the restrooms and then slowly wandered off the ship and through customs (which took at least 10-15 minutes I’d guess). At the bus station, we saw many waiting buses and the first CM greeting us asked which resort we were heading to before directing us to one of the buses. Our bus left around 10 minutes after we boarded, and the bus driver announced three resort destinations (which were relatively close to each other). I have a picture of my kids guessing along to the Disney quiz on the screens at 9.16am, which I think was shortly before we left. We arrived at our resort around 1.5hrs later, dropped our bags at bell services, changed, and booked an Uber to Typhoon Lagoon (where we tapped in at 11.45am).
I don’t know if our experience was typical, but it seemed that there were buses being dispatched to clusters of resorts on a regular schedule in line with passengers arriving (a bit like ME used to work I guess?) So no stress - and I’m pretty sure you could also eat/disembark earlier if you were keen to get to your resort/to a park earlier.
Our experience was similar…except the leaving after 10 minutes. We were on the bus for at least an hour before it left. I think they just wait until the bus is fill, and we were one of the first ones to get on!
Thanks so much for this information! DCL’s website is lacking in important details.
I’m copying this to my cruise notes file for reference! It sounds like I’m pretty safe in making lunch ADRs for noon back at our resort, though we may not be hungry after 5 days of stuffing ourselves!
Did you carry all of your bags off or did you leave any out the night before? I was wondering how those get tagged as I would like to send one bag the night before.
I also wanted to have 3 bags picked up at the resort at embarkation but have two tags. Any ideas how to get a 3rd without having to do it at the port?
We have two carry ons and then one “family bag” that will have shoes and snorkel gear and probably entirely too much space. It is a very short cruise but sometimes I just don’t feel like packing so carefully that i can fit everything in the carry on. And for some reason my bathing suites take up so much space. And DD will be wearing her combat boots with her dress for pirate night Maybe I’ll call and see if they can send me one more. I am sure it won’t be much trouble to get one printed at the port or the front desk, but sometimes just having it done is the best thing.
We had this same issue in December. 4 days before at WDW, and 2 more days after the 3 day cruise…but they seemed to have thought 2 tags was enough. We made it work, because we ended up carrying on half our luggage instead. BUt I think we could have gotten more tags if we had asked.
Maybe I’ll call and see if they can send me one more. I am sure it won’t be much trouble to get one printed at the port or the front desk, but sometimes just having it done is the best thing.
Probably because it is a 3 night cruise! 
They aren’t counting my days before and after the cruise…