Checkout day - Do a park before 11 hour drive?

[BlueFairy]

Hi all.

We have an 11 hour drive home. We are staying 5 nights and arrive too late on Sunday to use one of our park days from our 5 day tickets. We will have one remaining on our checkout day. DDs are 4 and 20 mos. I do not want to leave in the wee early morning hours. Instead I considered doing breakfast and checkout, followed by a day in the parks until mid-afternoon. Then driving with hopefully nappiing children and arriving home around midnight. I'd hope they'll be so exhausted from WDW that they would fall asleep again after our dinner stop. Would you try this?
I'm going to try to post a poll. Please respond.

Thanks!

 

[wdwmom0f3]

We did this one year but we only had an 8 hour drive home. We went to the park & stayed until after lunch. I wish that we had stayed later but I was doing good to get in a few extra hours because of DH. I would do it again in a heartbeat.

What we normally do though is we drive down the night before we check in at Disney. We either make it to Orlando or pretty close and hit the parks the next morning to take full advantage of our Disney days. This always works out best for us because DH is normally ready to hit the road & get home.

 

[BlueFairy]

We did this one year but we only had an 8 hour drive home. We went to the park & stayed until after lunch. I wish that we had stayed later but I was doing good to get in a few extra hours because of DH. I would do it again in a heartbeat.

What we normally do though is we drive down the night before we check in at Disney. We either make it to Orlando or pretty close and hit the parks the next morning to take full advantage of our Disney days. This always works out best for us because DH is normally ready to hit the road & get home.

You make a good point about DH. My DH is similar. We really don't want to spend the extra $$ on an extra night outside of WDW on the drive down. (We already added a day to our trip). I saw this strategy mentioned on another thread, and DH really seems to like the idea. Go figure. I thought he'd say "no way."
Glad to hear someone else has tried it with great success.

 

[disneylovin24]

I never go to a park on the day I arrive or leave. We usually never arrive untill 1-2 pm so we don't have much time on our arrival days. We usually just get our room keys, check out the room, check out the resort, and relax after the car drive. On the days we leave it has become a tradition that we visit DTD first. We usually head to DTD around 10 and leave after 2-3 hours there. I feel that doing a park the last day is too much.

 

[MickeyHereWeCome!]

We have driven for our last two trips down, and both times have visited a park on our last day. The one thing I have learned is that we never leave as early as we plan to! Both times we have chosen AK as our last park. WHY???

The first year was a disaster. Ds forgot his autograph book, so dh went out to get it. 1 1/2 hours later he came back. He couldn't find the car and then got lost finding us (and men can never ask directions). Then we had the fiasco of trying to have lunch with ds (1) who couldn't drink out of regular cups and needed a straw. Of course, AK didn't have straws. Everything you can think of happened. We left about 2 hours later than planned. It was nice for us having the flexibility of leaving whenever we wanted!

Last year, we did much better. We took a picture of our parking area Still, we left about an hour later than we wanted to.

But, I wouldn't waste the day and say go for it! Just be prepared that touring might take longer that day. Maybe it's all in our heads, and we just secretly didn't want to leave yet!

 

[MSSANDRA]

I would try it but keep the option open of stopping and spending the night on the road home if you have to. Kids can be too tired to rest well and DH might be too tired to drive safe.

 

[micheleq]

I voted yes on the poll. Here's my experience:

We drove to Myrtle Beach from CT (12 hours) to visit family, and on our last day we had a full day and left at 7pm. Kids were in pjs, fell asleep within an hour.

The con to leaving that late, is by 2 am DH was exhausted, I hadn't really slept in the car, but he then needed me to take over and drive for a few hours. We were home by 7am, but DH and I were junk the next day.

I think your idea of leaving in the late afternoon sounds much better than what we did! Have a nice lunch, get the kids settled in with books, DVDs, whatever and hit the road. Better that they be awake for a few hours in the car than you fall asleep at the wheel

Have a great trip. Pack a few Red Bulls for the drive home!

 

[BlueFairy]

You guys are so reassuring. Thanks. Bumping for more input.

I would try it but keep the option open of stopping and spending the night on the road home if you have to. Kids can be too tired to rest well and DH might be too tired to drive safe.

We checkout on Friday and no one has to work until Monday. Plenty of time to extend the trip home or rest up when we do drag ourselves into the driveway.
Thanks.

 

[arielmomma]

I voted to visit at park. We are going down in a couple of weeks and have a 24 hour drive. We have every intention of hitting HS for a couple of hours on the last morning just to say goodbye. That last day is always hard and the kids are cranky. We want to go out on a positive note (just before our daughter's nap time )

 

[WantToGoNow]

After we checked out on our last day, we headed to Animal Kingdom. We arrived back at POR at 3:00 for the rest of our group to get on Magical Express. After they left, we walked around, got some snacks and headed for the car. We have a 17 hour drive. We drove until 8 that evening and stopped for the night. Then we finished our drive the following day. I don't know how many hours you are planning to spend in a park that final day before you start your trip, but remember you will be tired.

 

[mommyof2princesses]

Don't do it! We have a 9 hour drive and we decided to do Magic Kindgom till about noon and then left. We were exhausted. Both dh and I had such a hard time staying awake! The kids were out, but we almost were too!

 

[kbheap]

We have a 10 hour drive and we always go to the parks the day we arrive and the day we leave. It starts us with magic and ends with magic.

 

[DecaturDad]

We only have a 7 hour drive. But what I do is send the wife and son off to a park while I pack up the room and car and check out. I find it less stressful to do those things without "help". Depending on timing, I could then meet them in a park, or wait at the hotel. We will by going to Universal in April, and will do something similar.

 

[BlueFairy]

We only have a 7 hour drive. But what I do is send the wife and son off to a park while I pack up the room and car and check out. I find it less stressful to do those things without "help". Depending on timing, I could then meet them in a park, or wait at the hotel. We will by going to Universal in April, and will do something similar.

Not a bad idea. I'd imagine DH would be happy to load the car without our "help," too. Especially after 6 days of close quarters.

 

[ms_missy66]

We always pack the car, go to the park earlish in the morning, eat lunch and then hit the road. The kids sleep the first several hours, we stop for dinner, they play/read/sing for a few hours then crash for the rest of the drive. My DH and I are a little tired by the end, but it's managable. I say go for it!

 

[Ericandus]

We are also about 11 hours away...
We drove down the day before our check-in at Disney and stayed at the Orlando Vista right outside the park entrance for one night. It was much less expensive than an extra night at our Disney resort (and since we arrived late and had the dining plan, we would have had credits we wouldn't have had time to use). We arrived Saturday about 7pm, had dinner, and then got a good nights sleep. We were up and checked out early Sunday morning, arrived at All Star Music by 9am and had gotten checked in, moved into our room and into the MK by 11am! I highly recommend driving down early while everyone is excited and anxious to get your extra day in on your tickets, rather than trying to cram it in on your departure day. I can't imagine trying to get yourself all packed to leave, car loaded, etc the night before you check out (probably staying up late) and then trying to do a park before a long drive home. Also, I know our 3 kids would never have wanted to leave if we tried to leave for home directly from a park! Dragging them out just as they were having fun would have probably caused more trouble than it would have been worth! Instead, we said all our "goodbyes" the evening before. In the end, you know your family best. I know you will decide what is best for you! Hope you have as magical a time as we did!!

 

[joandegennaro]

Haven't had the driving experince yet but thought I would add my 2cents. Think about what time of year you will be driving. We are traveling by car for the first time this March. March can have wonderful weather but it is also know for the winter storms during the March break. It you are traveling into states that may have weather problems this will possibly add onto your drive time. This is why I've split my 22hr drive into 3 days driving down and have allowed myself 3 days to drive home.

 

[MichelleinMaine]

We only have a 7 hour drive. But what I do is send the wife and son off to a park while I pack up the room and car and check out. I find it less stressful to do those things without "help". Depending on timing, I could then meet them in a park, or wait at the hotel. We will by going to Universal in April, and will do something similar.

This is what we did. DH is meticulous about packing the car, making sure all everything is ready to go (which is a good thing . He's also not an up at the crack of dawn and go sort of guy.

Last night, we packed everything but what we needed the next day. I got up early with the kids and hit DHS. DH got up a little later, got a good breakfast, packed the car all up and checked out of the hotel. He picked us up around 1, we grabbed some lunch and off we went.