Driving for the first time

[Disneygirl 792]

We're going the third week in Aug and DH wants to drive.....which is about 16 hrs. I think from South Jersey with no stops( I may be wrong). I'm a little uneasy because I've never driven to WDW before always flew. So to all you drivers who stop or drive straight through...
1. how is it really??
2. are there good places to eat, take bathroom breaks?

 

[hmansure]

We're going the third week in Aug and DH wants to drive.....which is about 16 hrs. I think from South Jersey with no stops( I may be wrong). I'm a little uneasy because I've never driven to WDW before always flew. So to all you drivers who stop or drive straight through...
1. how is it really??
2. are there good places to eat, take bathroom breaks?

We have done the drive from South Jersey on several occasions. Though we prefer to fly, sometimes the costs for the 5 are just way up there so we load up the van and go!

For a trip to Florida in the summer we have never done it all in one shot. We usually stop overnight somewhere in South Carolina usually. The places to eat are the usual stuff you see off the highway exits here in NJ. There are some I-95 websites that list restaurants by exit number, etc. We try to look for the healthiest options possible.

The worst part of the trip is around the DC and Springfield, VA area... well, usually the whole northern part of VA can be messy. My advice would be to time your departure to avoid peak travel times in that area.

Keep your fingers crossed and hopefully there will be no accidents in NC and points south where I-95 goes down to 2 lanes in each direction. Been stuck in some long delays when that has happened. A good traffic/detour feature on the GPS has come in handy as well on some trips.

Enjoy your trip... take it easy and enjoy the journey.

 

[autismgoesdisney]

We're going the third week in Aug and DH wants to drive.....which is about 16 hrs. I think from South Jersey with no stops( I may be wrong). I'm a little uneasy because I've never driven to WDW before always flew. So to all you drivers who stop or drive straight through...
1. how is it really??
2. are there good places to eat, take bathroom breaks?

We drove with our kids last August. Our kids were 7, 5 and 3. It went A LOT better than I thought it would. SO much so that we decided to drive again for our September trip this year! We left here earlier than we planned at 11 am because of the hurricane that hit in August. We drove straight through to Jax (stoppign to eat and gas every 5 hours). We slept at my sister in laws house and then left in the morning to get to WDW the next morning. We had some funny stories to tell and the tv/ipod/ds kept the kids busy. The 3 year old was a bit more difficult to entertain, but movies worked well

On the way home, we left around 2 pm and went straight through. This worked well because we stopped for dinner, and then changed the kids into their pajamas and we all crashed hard!

My husband did the majority of the driving but having me take one 5 hour stretch on the way there and home helped him rest a bit.

I would do it again in a heartbeat (as I said we are doing it again in September). Also, we don't use WDW days to drive. otherwise, that would be an issue for me. We just vacation a few extra days instead