Port Orleans News

The March 2014 Recreation Activities and Movie Schedules for Port Orleans Riverside and Port Orleans French Quarter are now available. See the main Recreation Activities Schedule page for full-size PDF versions, or click on the images below.

The outdoor movies will start at 8pm and the daily campfires commence at 6pm this month. On Sunday 2 March, the Oscars ceremony will be screened live at the Riverside Lobby Courtyard instead of the regular movie.

On Tuesday 4 March, Port Orleans will feature its annual Mardi Gras celebrations, including a mini-parade around the resort organised by the cast members - starting at French Quarter at around 1:30pm and getting to Riverside by 2pm.

Note: French Quarter's "Doubloon Lagoon" pool will reopen on 4 March after its seven-week refurbishment.

Also, in what appears to be a massively short-sighted and very disappointing move, as from 2 March 2014 Disney has seen fit to permanently close the Port Orleans Riverside Levee boat rental facility. Very Bad Show, Disney - you are meant to be all about "plussing" your parks and resorts, not "minussing" them. If you wish to make your views known, ask for an explanation, or request that this decision be reversed, please contact wdw.guest.communications@disneyworld.com.

Well this one came out of the blue... the Riverside Levee boat rental marina will be permanently closing as from Sunday 2 March.

Very Bad Show, Disney - you are meant to be all about "plussing" your parks and resorts, not "minussing" them.

The Sassagoula river ferry will continue to operate to and from Downtown Disney as normal, as will the children's pirate cruises and the cycle rentals, but no more Sea Raycers, kayaks or other boat rentals. As far as I know at the moment, this will be a permanent closure. Apparently this will happen at the other Moderates too.

And so another bit of magic is chipped away.

Please email wdw.guest.communications@disneyworld.com if you want to make your views known, and perhaps ask for a proper explanation.


Update 2 March: I contacted my friend Denise from mousesteps.com and she and her partner Jeff took a trip over to Riverside yesterday and rented out a pontoon boat for an hour-and-a-half and took one last nostalgic trip along the Sassagoula before the service finally closed last night. Her report and photos can be found HERE, and Jeff's video of the trip on YouTube HERE. So sad to see this wonderful facility go away.


Update 4 March: I've heard mutterings that this might be something to do with an external (third-party) contractor who ran the rental service. To be honest, I'd always assumed it was run by Disney directly (certainly the staffing was provided by Disney cast members) but I've never really had the need to look into it.

According to website WDW News Today, the facility was not popular enough at the Moderate resorts and so the company has pulled out, leaving just the Deluxe Resort locations operating. I'm guessing the current closure of the DTD rental dock for the Disney Springs project won't have helped either.

The Downtown Disney Marketplace ferry dock (located next to the Rainforest Cafe) will be closed from 22 February 2014 until the fall for construction work related to the new Disney Springs project at Downtown Disney. In the meantime, the Port Orleans river ferry boats will still run as normal, but they will use the Pleasure Island dock in the centre of Downtown Disney instead.

The temporary new routes will be as follows:

• Port Orleans River Cruise – Yellow Route
  Service between Downtown Disney Pleasure Island and Disney’s Port Orleans Resorts
• Disney Vacation Club Ferry – Blue Route
  Service between Downtown Disney West Side and Disney’s Old Key West Resort, Disney’s Saratoga Resort & Spa and the Treehouse Villas
• Internal Downtown Disney Water Taxi – Red Route
  Service between Downtown Disney West Side and Pleasure Island only

Port Orleans Riverside and Port Orleans French Quarter will be extending their Resort Airline Check-In Service to include guests travelling on International flights as from 24 February 2014.

As with existing guests travelling on domestic US flights, the Resort Airline Check-In Service allows guests to check in for their flight directly at their hotel on their day of travel, including retrieving boarding passes and dropping off checked luggage. This is part of a gradual roll-out, and all Disney Resorts will be offering the International Airline Check-In facility by 17 March.

The airlines which participate in the scheme are Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, AirTran Airways, Delta Air Lines, JetBlue Airways, Southwest Airlines, United Airlines and US Airways - which given that these are all internal US carriers does seem a little ironic, but at least many of them do fly overseas too.

The February 2014 Recreation Activities and Movie Schedules for Port Orleans Riverside and Port Orleans French Quarter are now available. See the main Recreation Activities Schedule page for full-size PDF versions, or click on the images below.

The outdoor movies will start at 7pm and the daily campfires commence at 5pm this month.