Doing the drive - how do I time it?

[mickeywho?]

I've been along for the drive (and took my turn!) many times. This summer I'll be driving once again - but doing it all myself as my passengers are non-drivers.

So I want to make sure I don't overtire and keep as alert as possible. It's over 20 hours and I think 7-8 hours a day will be my limit. So the final day arriving in the afternoon.

Is there a way to map it out so I can time where I'll end up at the end of each day? We'll leave around 10am the first day - stopping for a couple of breaks and then dinner before finally stopping for a decent early night. I've been hotel-hopping looking for a room late at night on previous trips and don't want to do that being the only adult this time around.

Looking at mapquest - we'll cross at Fort Erie. How do I figure this out??

 

[eschil]

I did it by looking at a map and picking two cities and using mapquest to check the driving time between the two. It's not exact but I have found it to be close enough.

If the time wasn't quite right, I just tried a different city

 

[mickeywho?]

And which route would you recommend for a lone driver?

 

[minnie mum]

And which route would you recommend for a lone driver?

That kind of depends on where you're starting from. Are you crossing the border at Buffalo?

 

[mickeywho?]

Sorry! I'm in the GTA - I can cross at Queenston or Ft Erie or Windsor... they length of the overall trip only changes by an hour or so depending on the route. Just wondering which route has more hotels etc just for safety sake along the way.

 

[minnie mum]

Have a look at this route:

From Buffalo take I 90 to the 79, then to the 77, 26, 95, 4.

This route avoids many of the larger cities, and the traffic around them. Try to avoid hitting Charlotte and Columbia at rush hour on your second day, and Jacksonville and Orlando rush hours on your 3rd. Jacksonville has a bypass (the 295). Use it.

If you can stop around Princeton WV on your first night, then you can easily get to Savannah or Brunswick on your second. Then it's an easy drive to Orlando by the 3rd afternoon.

But I wouldn't leave that late on your first day. You're setting yourself up for a long wait at the border. If at all possible, try to leave as early as possible. Preferably early enough to avoid the morning rush hour.

 

[mickeywho?]

Thank you !

I am concerned about the smokey mountain portion of that route. There doesn't seem to be many exits - or they are certainly few and far between which is worrying if I'm driving later at night.
Have you ever tried the I75 route? It looks like it would take me about 2 hours longer overall.

 

[Skjhjb]

I found the Along I-75 book to be fantastic for helping us to time about where we would be at certain points of the day. Each page of the book represents about 30 minutes of driving (I found it to be closer to 25 or 20 sometimes). The book starts at the Windsor border, so if you knew when you would be hitting the border, you can then page through to estimate where you would be for meal stops or if you needed to push just a wee bit further to hit a good hotel spot for stopping for the night.

We used it to gauge about where we would be at meal times to see if there were any Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives locations around (yes, we are nerds that way).

Chapters carries it in store, I think it was $20 or so. Totally worth it!

 

[Cdn Gal]

I wouldn't leave so late in the morning- the earlier the better, that way you avoid traffic. We stop every 3-4 hours for gas/drinks / bathroom breaks no matter what. I usually leave at night and drive through with a 2hour sleep in the car at a rest stop along the way. On the way back through, we stop for 1 night.

 

[Skjhjb]

I drove with my Mom in November - just the two of us, and I did all the driving. We are north of Guelph, and it was snowy, so we took the Windsor route. We left at 4am, and I was able to keep going until 7 that night. We stopped along the way for gas & food breaks, and then found a hotel at 7 and got dinner then. Of course, my GPS took us across the Ohio turnpike and had us back on the "cross at Erie" route, so my poor Mom couldn't follow along with the I75 book. She had to stop and get a map so she could see where we were! lol

 

[ontdvc2015]

The I-75 route definitely has more exits and lots of hotel and food options at those exits. Its also an easier route as far as roads. You basically get on the I75 in Detroit and don't take another road until the bypass at Macon, Georgia. I find it kind of a boring drive because of that sometimes though, the Fort Erie route gives you more milestones to shoot for which seems to make the drive go by faster. (more state borders, more exits, etc) They are both pretty close to the same amount of time, so just personal preference.

 

[cslittle999]

I would leave earlier than 10 am and book two hotels. One that you will be sure to reach and a second as a stretch goal. Just ensure the reservations are setup so that you can cancel them without penalty by 4 pm. This relies on you having a cell plan in the US. You can adjust the second day hotels when you stop for the night. I just use google maps and adjust the stop town to get a rough idea of the distance. From there you can look for hotels.

When we plan a drive we use 100 km per hour of travel inclusive of stops. The highway speeds in the US are mostly above 100 kph which balances out the break times. In your case we would look for a hotel 800 km into the trip and you'll likely get there in around 8 hours. Of course this will depend on your family and how long the breaks need to be. We tend to bring our own drinks, snacks and lunches for at least the first couple of days so that we can stop at rest areas for lunch instead of restaurants. This also gives kids time to run around if they need it. Gas stops tend to be quick. Depending on your vehicle you probably are only going to stop once per day while traveling and fill up before you head out the next day.

There are some stretches with few gas stops on the 77/79 route but you can plan for them. Mostly this involves know your vehicle's range and filling up early. In the end these stretches are not long.

How long you spend driving is up to you. I do all of our driving and we do the trip in two days stopping in Huntersville, NC. This lets us get through Charlotte early in the morning. Charlotte traffic is no where near as bad as Toronto.

The first trip we stopped in Beckley, WV and then Jacksonville leaving a short drive to our Disney hotel the last day. The kids were 5 and 7 on that trip. This plan might work out well for you. Arriving at the hotel a little early lets everyone hit the pool before bed time.

 

[Chip_Dale]

When picking hotels; pick one south of major cities going down and north coming home. you will not get stuck in rush hour traffic when you leave in the mornings.

 

[tarakrane]

We drive down from the GTA. I'm usually the only driver, however, DH is able to drive if I need him to.
We have driven both routes. We leave about 4am and stop around 6pm on the first day. The second day we leave about 6-7am and get into Orlando around 4pm or so...
There are definitely more places to stop along the 75. The book Along the 1-75 is a great resource! Can the non-drivers help with navigation? The book lets you know where stops are and what is there.
Going through the mountains at night or in fog can be a little scary. When we drive down next, we'll be doing this route though. We're looking to stop around Charlotte or Statesville for one night.

 

[Cdndisfan4]

We usually stop around Charlotte first night too. Rockville is place we stay. We leave 5am too to avoid rush hours. On way home we stop by Summerville. We have also drove straight through on way home. We are only 19 hours.

 

[mshanson3121]

I've been along for the drive (and took my turn!) many times. This summer I'll be driving once again - but doing it all myself as my passengers are non-drivers.

So I want to make sure I don't overtire and keep as alert as possible. It's over 20 hours and I think 7-8 hours a day will be my limit. So the final day arriving in the afternoon.

Is there a way to map it out so I can time where I'll end up at the end of each day? We'll leave around 10am the first day - stopping for a couple of breaks and then dinner before finally stopping for a decent early night. I've been hotel-hopping looking for a room late at night on previous trips and don't want to do that being the only adult this time around.

Looking at mapquest - we'll cross at Fort Erie. How do I figure this out??

Maybe repeating info but:

1. How much longer than 20 hours?
2. You'll need 3 full days with what you're planning. Also remember, you need to stops for gas, meals and potty. Add 1.5 - 2 hours per day for that on top of your driving time. More if you get held up in traffic. Which leads me to...
3. Leaving at 10:00 is a horrible idea. You want to be on the road each day early, otherwise you'll be travelling over rush hour each day which can really extend your day if you pass through/by a city.
4. How we figured out where to stay: we plugged in our beginning and ending destination and just looked at various places along the way. We knew how far we wanted to travel each day. We also planned on hitting hard the first day and then taking the remaining two days easier (28 hours for us). So we knew we wanted to get to PA the first night (roughly 12 hours driving), and then near the SC/GA border the next night (10 hours driving) so we would just have a shorter 6 hour drive our final day, when wed be getting tired of travelling.

We found areas that were near those benchmarks, mormally picked a couple possibilities per night. Now we didn't prebook motels. To me its a waste. What if you decide to go further? Or can't get as far as you planned? So we used hotelcoupons.com. We just searched hotels in the areas we wanted to stay in a week before we left so I could research reviews, chose 3 choices per night (just in case one was booked) and then once we were underway, called and booked a room when we were a few hours away. Worked great. Never paid more than $65 US and they were great hotels - all close to the highway and easy to get to, all had pools, all had full hot continental breakfast (saving you money on meals) and all were very clean.

 

[KNovacovschi]

We are driving from Hamilton and are planning on crossing at the Peace Bridge and then taking I90 to the 79, then to the 77, 26, 95, 4. We are leaving around 2:30-3 am, stopping for leg movement and bathroom/snack breaks every 3 hrs. We have booked a room at the Econolodge in Cayce, SC and plan on getting there around 6-7pm and then in the morning finishing the 6.5 hr drive around 8-8:30am so we can be at CBR shortly after 3pm. It's only my DH and I so we aren't really worried about to much driving on the first day. We also are leaving on Friday night or should I say Saturday morning. Every time I google map the drive, and I do this a lot lol, it is usually an 18.5 hr drive but can vary depending if there are any accidents as it will update to include those.

 

[hardis5]

Definitely + those leaving early morning if doing a morning departure. If I-75 from the GTA I'd leave as early as 3 am to get through Windsor/Detroit before rush hour. The I-90/95 route through NY/PA I'd leave by 5 am to get through border crossing chosen (we normally do Fort Erie) to get beyond Buffalo before 7:00 am.

 

[Happy2BGoofy]

I use GasBuddy.com to plan my gas trip in term of gas fuels. Based on the result, on the map you can pretty much calculate where you would be after certain amount of time or mileage.

For example, I know I can travel 650 kilometres on average on one tank of gas alone, and on average it will take about 5 to 5.5 hours driving if we use the 100 km per hour since I would be driving on major highways only. Using this rationale, this would mean that from the GTA I can travel all the way down to West Virginia (8 hrs avg) for my first leg of the trip, West Virginia to Savannah, Georgia (8.5 hrs avg) for my second leg, and Savannah, Georgia to WDW (4.5 hrs avg) for my last leg.

Now that you broken your trip now you can look into hotels and places to eat along your route. Hope this helps and hopes this makes sense!

Happy travels