Driving am I nuts?!?!?!?

[emilyltd]

We're driving 19 + hours, too. My DS is going to help drive, too. I think we're crazy not to fly, but everyone else thinks it'll be an adventure.

 

[DisneyCrazy1981]

Some of my best memories as a kid are my family's road trips from WI (near Madison) to Disney World. My parents would always pack us a "surprise bag" to keep us busy in the car and we wouldn't know what was inside until the crack of dawn as we loaded ourselves into the car. We would always stop in TN or GA and stay overnight.

When I was a teenager I went with school and we went straight through on a school bus. . .was still fun! My senior year, my friends and I took turns driving straight through- yup- still a fun time!!

The only bad parts are the days you need to add to the vacation for driving which is the reason I don't drive now with my DH and DS. As much as I HATE flying, I would rather be in FL and enjoying Disney in 2 hours than 2 days. Also, I'm not a big fan of driving the mountains (the emergency truck lanes filled with sand to stop them scare me) and can't stand driving through Atlanta. Oh- and IL and IN are loooooong states to drive through.

I would say go for it! There is nothing like leaving the snow and ice of WI and reaching that invisible line where you stand outside at the rest stop and realize it's time to put on your shorts and tshirts. There is also nothing like the tacky souvenir shops and Waffle Houses along the way. The mountains are beautiful and it's a great way to see the US!

 

[hymanptm]

We leave this Sunday morning hopefully around 6.. Am with dw and dd hope to be Disney by 2.30 pm taking 95 hope the Gil's slept most of morning so we can keep on trucking down the Road got get cd ready for Some good rock and Roll .rey to have Blast at Disney !!!

 

[jpfiff]

We drive from boston every year...alternating Disney and West Coast Port charlotte area.

20 hrs drive time to Orlando takes 22 hrs with 4 children ages 2,5,9,10 on our last trip. Port Charloltte is approx. another 2.5-3hrs drive time.

We take a minivan, fit everything in the back, 1 big stroller and 1 umbrella stroller and pack in duffles to safe space for packing into the van. We have cooler with drinks, etc behind the passenger seat and a snack bag. Each kid has there own bag of things to do (crayons, paper, books, puzzle books), ipad/itouch/kids players and each has a dvd player in front of them.

We leave late afternoon, stopping only for bathroom breaks/diaper changes and make our longest stop for breakfast in morning around 7 or 8am which ususally takes about an hour.

We don't stop for anything except gas or emergency potty break if a baby is sleeping!

fun? no. Worth it vs the cost of 6 airline tickets? yes!

 

[dgagnon519]

We flew our first trip to Disney and then drove the next 3. This year we are flying. We drive from RI so it is about 20 hours, but with stops it is about 22.

The first time I drove it was just me and my 2 kids who were 8 and 5. I stopped twice on the way down. We spent one night and Virginia and one night in Georgia. It was very nice. Driving home, we only made on overnight stop and it was in North Carolina. I am not sure why I didn't just fly, but I am thinking at the time I thought a road trip would be fun and it was.

The next two times we drove it was for financial reasons. There was 7 of us going, which at the time was going to cost us about $2000 for airfare and it cost me $600 to drive round trip. We drove straight through without overnight stops both times. It was fun and worth the savings.

This trip we are flying. There are 12 of us going, three families. We are all coming at different times. If we drove it would have cost about $1800. Flying is costing 1932 so it made more sense to fly.

 

[LeahA]

We drive from Illinois every time we go! It is a long drive but we are used to is by now. We used to stop in Dalton, GA. at a Hampton Inn, very clean and nice. Dalton is right over the border between Tennessee and Georgia. We now even go further driving almost 15 hours the first day! We have stopped in Tifton or Valdosta the last several trips.
We stop every 3 hours or so for a break, the boys watch movies, play with IPOD touches or IPhones, when they were smaller their DS's. They nap, I bring a bag of snacks and drinks for the car. Some of the rest areas are nice to stop for a picnic and some have playground equipment.

If I want to go to Disney every year, we have to drive!

 

[SA mom]

We drive from San Antonio, Texas, and it is about a 20 hour drive. Neither of us likes to drive at night so we spend the night somewhere after about 15 hours of driving.

Our kids are great road trippers. When they were little, I used to take some of their favorite toys out of rotation about 2 months prior to the trip. Then I'd wrap the toys up in tissue paper. Every half hour, I'd give them a little present.

We try to encourage reading books, drawing pictures, and playing games versus using electronic devices on the way to our destination. On the way back, we break out every gadget we have.

Have a safe trip!

 

[tryplm]

We've driven from Cleveland twice, which is about a 18-19 hour drive without stops. Did I mention that we did it in a Kia Soul on the last trip? I agree with a PP poster about taking time to see the sights along the way. There's so much out there that you would otherwise never get the chance to see of you didn't drive. DH & I are flying for this trip, but that's only because we were able to find airfare for $350 round trip total. As for the being crazy part, you'll notice that most of us are!!

 

[Heatherdbby]

We drive from boston every year...alternating Disney and West Coast Port charlotte area.

20 hrs drive time to Orlando takes 22 hrs with 4 children ages 2,5,9,10 on our last trip. Port Charloltte is approx. another 2.5-3hrs drive time.

We take a minivan, fit everything in the back, 1 big stroller and 1 umbrella stroller and pack in duffles to safe space for packing into the van. We have cooler with drinks, etc behind the passenger seat and a snack bag. Each kid has there own bag of things to do (crayons, paper, books, puzzle books), ipad/itouch/kids players and each has a dvd player in front of them.

We leave late afternoon, stopping only for bathroom breaks/diaper changes and make our longest stop for breakfast in morning around 7 or 8am which ususally takes about an hour.

We don't stop for anything except gas or emergency potty break if a baby is sleeping!

fun? no. Worth it vs the cost of 6 airline tickets? yes!

Woot Woot! Port Charlotte!! I went to school in Sarasota and rented a beach house in Port Charlotte for the duration!

 

[Heatherdbby]

We drive from SC. Its not that bad. I can do the drive alone in 6 hours but when I factor in my mom (who has a few health issues) and the at the time just turned 2 year old, it took close to 10 hours. I was DYING.

I am driving to Port Canaveral for a Disney Cruise this October, with just me and shortstop, who will be a couple months after turning 3. I am hoping that since it will be just me and him, it will be a much more chill drive... Planning to turn his carseat foward facing, load up his ipad with downloaded netflix movies, the ABC mouse app (which has additional free apps that you log into that work without wifi!), and leaving around 6AM. Hopefully he will sleep through GA and wake up somewhere when we cross the FL/GA line

 

[Metro West]

We used to drive from Virginia to WDW when I was a kid...about 13 hours or so. Some of my favorite memories are of I-95 and seeing Stuckey's, Hardee World and South of The Border. If it were any further we probably would have flown but would have missed all that Americana.

 

[siskaren]

Zombie thread alert! (from 2013)

 

[Heatherdbby]

Zombie thread alert! (from 2013)

I have a really bad habit of doing that.

 

[adflipp]

Used to drive when the kids were little in the 90's - rented a van and made our way from NJ... if was fun...

 

[Shellyred8]

The last time I stayed on site and had a vehicle with me, they gave me a parking pass so I didn't have to pay for parking at the parks. Not sure if they still do that, as it's been a couple of years. Others on this site may have more current info for you.

Have a great trip!

 

[Heatherdbby]

The last time I stayed on site and had a vehicle with me, they gave me a parking pass so I didn't have to pay for parking at the parks. Not sure if they still do that, as it's been a couple of years. Others on this site may have more current info for you.

Have a great trip!

This si still true! If you stay onsite with Disney you get free parking to the parks, or you can use their transit system.

 

[Ddaba1]

I did it around 2007 and it was horrible! Never again but good for you if you enjoy it!

 

[ryanj52]

We drove when I was a kid, when I was a teen I helped my dad drive, and now I drive my family we are headed for our second trip and I am driving. I think it is part of the fun, it takes about 13 hours depending on how much we stop.

 

[Penmac]

I think you make a solid point about the weather in that part of the country. It is a gamble and may be worth driving for that reason alone.
We just got back from our drive to Disney from Massachusetts. It's also 19-20 hours of drive time from here. With stops and bathroom breaks it is obviously longer, but we did it in two days- choosing to stop for the night both ways. We drove last year, too. We have stopped in Fredericksburg, VA, Fayetteville NC and have friends who have stopped in Florence SC. All of these places are good, safe options with direct access to I-95 and reasonably priced, clean hotels. I only recommend stopping in VA on the way home. It makes day 2 a very long day if you don't get through some of the Carolina's on day 1.

Last year we rented a car on points, but this year we drove our own minivan. The rental is the way to go, for sure!!! Too stressful taking own car, and I explain more below. Get a minivan or SUV w/ 3rd row. If you think you will be dealing with bad weather in your area the SUV is probably the way to go. Although we serviced our car before departure, the check engine light come on in NJ and we had to stop at a Toyota dealership to have it looked at. It ended up being nothing to worry about, but it set us back 3 hours and we hit horrible traffic. We had planned our departure time around avoiding high traffic areas at peak times, and that unexpected stop really blew our itinerary to shreds. If we had a rental, it probably would not have happened. We also left the weekend before the eclipse and that made traffic on that Saturday so horrendous. Even before the check engine light came on, we hit bumper to bumper traffic in NYC at 6am on a Saturday. With the unplanned dealership stop, we then sat in heavy traffic from NJ to Southern VA. It added a substantial amount of drive time to our day 1, and we did not reach Fayetteville NC until 9:30pm. We had originally planned to arrive in Florence SC, a few hours south of Fayetteville, by 4pm. Day 2 was a breeze. We left NC at 8:30am and checked into our hotel in Orlando just around dinner time. The kids were amazing through all the unexpected bumps in the road, and really handled it well. We were just grateful that there was nothing more serious and we were still able to drive our car with no major repairs necessary and arrive in Disney at the time we had planned to. We planned our trip so carefully, but you cannot always plan for the unexpected. Go into it with an open mind. On the way home, we always leave Orlando at 8am and drive until about 8:30 or 9pm. Fredericksburg VA is a good stopping point (not sure if you go the same way, though- coming from Wisconsin). We leave Fredericksburg around 5:30am and get through NY by 9am and are home in Boston by 1:30. Both years the drive home has been great with this time frame.

In terms of drive time, it really depends. We have had bad luck both years driving South through the Northeast corridor from a traffic standpoint, but I think if we didn't hit that glitch in NJ with the van and there wasn't a major eclipse happening, the 2:30am departure time would have been perfect. Last year we picked up our rental car at noon and left at 2pm. We should have just waited and left 12 hours later because we also hit traffic in NY/NJ then. We knew we would but we got too impatient to leave. Definitely a mistake. 19 hours of driving is going to be more like 22-24 hours with stops to eat and use the bathroom. And there will always be unexpected stops. Someone will need to use the bathroom at an inconvenient time (maybe not as many for you since you have fewer people in your car), or if there is a major accident on the road and you don't want to sit in traffic, you may plan to stop and eat earlier than you planned to avoid that. Google maps will be your best friend! Expect accidents on I-95 in the Northeast corridor. Sometimes it's just someone pulled over with their hazards on and a flat tire, but it will cause back ups if there are a lot of people on the road and Google map lady will let you know!

We have 5 kids, ages 1-8 currently, so we really took a chance driving all of them down there both years. Can't live without items besides food and drinks were DVD players and lots of movies in the car, a notebook and crayons for each kid, a small white board and expo marker, some small toys for our toddler and preschooler, travel pillows and regular pillows so they could get comfy, and most importantly-small puke buckets/dramamine for kids. Also, we let them have tablets/kindles on the drive home only. That's about it. We took lots of books & extra coloring books the first year and found they just took up a lot of space in the car.

If you leave in the middle of the night, make sure you give your kids a piece of bread or something to put in their bellies. I learned that the hard way. Our 5 year old woke up from a sound sleep vomiting from car sickness because her stomach was empty and she was probably a little dehydrated. She does not typically get car sick, either. A piece of toast and drink of water after using the potty and before hitting the road is my advice. Even if they don't want it. Dramamine is nice to have on hand, but you may not need it if your kids do well in the car.

Please feel free to message me if you have any other questions. We are going again next summer, but if we can get Southwest's super cheap wanna get away fare, we may fly this one time. We will be driving again in the future though! It's the only way our family of 7 can enjoy Disney more than once in a lifetime .