Hotels near port or other ideas

[lovetovacation]

Hi, I am finally booked for a DCL out of Port Canaveral. We will fly in the day before. Where should we stay that will provide transportation to the ship? Or I remember reading about some cruisers who rented a car and stayed nearby and had the rental company do drop off? Thanks.

[bbwex]

We were also planning to stay at Port Canaveral the night before, and I wanted to even keep the entire plan a secret from my granddaughter. HOWEVER, the cost of getting to Port Canaveral is a bit high. As it works out, you can stay at one of the Disney hotels (Swan or Dolphin is only $110 per night in package with cruise), and they give you transportation from the airport to the park hotel and from the park hotel to the ship. The limo/van service to the hotel in Port Canaveral was going to be well over $100 for three people, and the hotel there (the Radisson) was $107 a night anyhow. We are admittedly going at Christmas time, and the numbers are a lot higher for everything, so we decided to give up on the major surprise of going to the ship the next morning out of the blue.

 

Of course, if you are not going back to the park after the cruise, and you will be going on from Port Canaveral to somewhere else, that might be a different story, but the transportation costs get high from the airport to the port itself.

 

The hotel, by the way, had given me the names of Florida Towncar, and Beachline Transportation as sources of limo/van services. I did not check out rental cars as we won't be needing one (we are staying in the park after the cruise).

 

Hope this helps.

[lovetovacation]

Good point about just staying at Disney the night before. I'm going to consider doing that, maybe coming down 2 days early so we can do MK on Friday. That way I'd just do Disney transfers and not have to worry about it. Thanks.

 

But keep the ideas coming please.

[jenmouse]

Keep in mind that even staying at a Disney hotel, you are paying $69 per person round trip for the cruise transfers. If you go another route such as a rental car or car transfers, it may (probably will) end up to be less expensive.

[truck1]

Another idea, depending on how well you can navigate, (not hard to get around in that area) would be to rent a car at the airport, and stay nearby Disney. There are several hotels that have been advertising 70 a night rooms (in some cases less) and they are about an hours drive from the port and maybe 15 minutes from Disney.( International Drive area has a lot of hotels from the standard room type to the upper end hotels, and they are all competeing right now) There are several car rentals near the port that offer drop off service once you have turned the rental back in. ( I would stop at the ship first and drop everything off first then go back.)

 

If you choose to stay on Disney Property, and price is an issue, then the Allstars, and also the Pop Century are budget hotels.The front desk should be able to get you to Coronado (closest to the All stars)or Carribean Beach (closest to Pop) which have scheduled DCL busses.

 

Option 3 would be to stay near the port, and then take the shuttle to the port. Most hotels near the port offer this as a comp service.

 

Forgot to add this. This is a listing of most of the major hotels off I Drive and around Disney with pricing if it helps.

[Cruisin'Nick]

Hey there Lovetovacation!!

 

Just putting in my 2 cents. We're staying at the Country Inn & Suites. Located on Astronaut Blvd, in Cape Canaveral. They have what is called a Park & Cruise Package which can be used for 3,4 or 7 days. This also includes roundtrip shuttle transportation for up to six (6) guests. So you can probably check them out as well, see if that works into your budget and all.

[abitagirl916]

If you would like to stay near the Port, another nice Hotel is the Raddison. It is the closest Hotel to the Port and they also have a package that includes parking for your entire cruise and a free shuttle to and from the Port. We stayed there in 2007 before our 7-night cruise and it was great. We parked for the entire time and took the shuttle.

[onthelake]

We went a couple of years ago and (I think) it was Budget and another rental car company that did not have any drop-off fee. We rented a car at the airport in Orlando, did our thing and dropped off the car at Port Canaveral. The charge was only about $35 for a one-day rental. We did the reverse when we returned but used the other rental company - it had the better price. This is a great price to get everyone to the ship and you have much more flexibility in where you stay. And, don't worry, the rental lots are expecting you and have plenty of employees and shuttles in operation. We had no wait at all either time.

[Rudi610]

We drove down to Port Canaveral and stayed at the Country Inn and Suites. We took the stay and cruise package where we left our vehicle and they dropped us off and picked us up from the cruise terminal. I think it was about $170 for the night, a good bargain since parking at the cruise terminal was $15 a night. Another plus, we could see the cruise ships from our room in the morning. I would recommend this hotel. I have heard good things about the Radisson too. Right next to the Country Inn and Suites was a Hertz rental agency and I remember seeing a Budget and Avis agencies just down the road from the hotel. Depending on the number of travelers in your party, renting a car at the airport and dropping off in Port Canaveral may be cheaper than the Disney bus transfers. Good luck.

[Cruisin'Nick]

Off subject a little bit, but glad you mentioned being able to see the ships from the hotel windows Rudi. As I had mentioned, we are staying at the Country Inn and Suites in July. So this will be an added enjoyment for all of us, including my DSx2 and DB. We're all excited about the cruise, our first for all five of us, but when we see that ship come Friday morning, I think the kids with about feint at the size. Hehe :D They've only eve seen pictures of the ships, so they don't know the true size of one. It'll be a priceless moment!!!

[Rudi610]

Off subject a little bit' date=' but glad you mentioned being able to see the ships from the hotel windows Rudi. As I had mentioned, we are staying at the Country Inn and Suites in July. So this will be an added enjoyment for all of us, including my DSx2 and DB. We're all excited about the cruise, our first for all five of us, but when we see that ship come Friday morning, I think the kids with about feint at the size. Hehe :D They've only eve seen pictures of the ships, so they don't know the true size of one. It'll be a priceless moment!!![/quote']

 

If you want to see the ships, make sure you ask for a room facing the terminal. On our morning, we could clearly see the Carnival Glory, however we were only able to see the tops of the funnels of the Magic (the Glory was in the way). We were on the second floor, so maybe a higher floor can see better. It didn't matter much to me since I was looking at a ship outside my window (even if it wasn't the Magic). It made it even more magical (no pun intended) when on the shuttle bus we rounded the bend in the road on the other side of the Glory and the Magic appeared in all its beauty.

 

Just wanted to add that the Magic arrived in Port Canaveral at about 6:00am on that Saturday and the Glory arrived shortly after. You may need to be up pretty early to see the ships come in. I don't know when the Wonder arrives on her days or which other ships are in port on those days too.