Driving from Chicago

[Lizzybean]

Hello! We will be driving straight thru on July 27th from the southwest chicago suburbs. I was wondering if anyone had any particular favorite routes or advice.

We drive straight thru to St. Pete Beach every year for vacation but this year we decided to change it up and take a Disney vacay. Our trip officially starts July 28th at FW but after much thought, we decided it might be better to leave very early am (4-5) on the 27th and arrive late night and stay at a hotel outside the park and get a good night's rest and bfast (and shower!) to start our vacation right. Any recommendations?

We usually make it in about 17 hours from Chicago to Tampa/St. Pete (we only stop for gas and quick bathroom breaks) so I am hoping that that will be same approx. timeframe to Orlando.

TIA!

 

[Butterbunkins]

If you make it 17 hours I think you should stick to whatever route you have been taking because it works! The one time we drove straight thru it took us 18 hours and we did mostly night driving but we did hit Atlanta for AM rush hour.

Where in St. Pete do you stay? St. Pete has become our other favorite Florida destination and we will be spending 3 nights there after the Disney portion of our next trip. Also if you have any restaurant recommendations I would love to hear them especially somewhere with good alligator!

 

[Lizzybean]

We always stay at the Hideaway Sands in St. Pete which is a couple doors down from the Don Cesear. It's very small but my DH's family has been staying there every summer for 30 years and we LOVE it! It has been refurbed, has free wifi, pool, jacuzzi, beautiful beach chaises and full kitchens in each room.

We love to eat at Crabby Bills, The Hurricane, Bella Habanna, and Gigis (for Italian). The BEST pizza is down there is Fortunatos!

 

[kelleyrn2000]

Hello! We will be driving straight thru on July 27th from the southwest chicago suburbs. I was wondering if anyone had any particular favorite routes or advice.

We drive straight thru to St. Pete Beach every year for vacation but this year we decided to change it up and take a Disney vacay. Our trip officially starts July 28th at FW but after much thought, we decided it might be better to leave very early am (4-5) on the 27th and arrive late night and stay at a hotel outside the park and get a good night's rest and bfast (and shower!) to start our vacation right. Any recommendations?

We usually make it in about 17 hours from Chicago to Tampa/St. Pete (we only stop for gas and quick bathroom breaks) so I am hoping that that will be same approx. timeframe to Orlando.

TIA!

We'll be on the road with you! We're driving from n. IL, and staying overnight in Paducah, KY on the 26th..leaving in the morning and taking I75 through Atlanta, hopefully making it through before Fri rush hour and the Braves game traffic. We'll arrive in Orlando late Friday night as well!

What route do you usually take to FL?

Not sure about hotels, we've only done resorts off property. I'm sure there are plenty of good ones thought!

 

[Lizzybean]

We'll be on the road with you! We're driving from n. IL, and staying overnight in Paducah, KY on the 26th..leaving in the morning and taking I75 through Atlanta, hopefully making it through before Fri rush hour and the Braves game traffic. We'll arrive in Orlando late Friday night as well!

What route do you usually take to FL?

Not sure about hotels, we've only done resorts off property. I'm sure there are plenty of good ones thought!

We usually take 80/94 over into Indiana and then take 65 South through Kentucky and into TN. Once into TN we get on I 24 E and take that to 75. We will take 75 through Atlanta (we never take the bypass--we have found that almost always adds time and have only been stuck in traffic once and it was due to a bad accident on a Saturday lat afternoon coming home) and keep going until Orlando.

The only difference is we usually arrive in FL early Saturday morning so we typically drive thru ATL sometime between 11pm and 2am so I am not quite sure what to expect. Pretty cool we are going to have some Illinois neighbors on the road with us though!

 

[Butterbunkins]

We always stay at the Hideaway Sands in St. Pete which is a couple doors down from the Don Cesear. It's very small but my DH's family has been staying there every summer for 30 years and we LOVE it! It has been refurbed, has free wifi, pool, jacuzzi, beautiful beach chaises and full kitchens in each room.

We love to eat at Crabby Bills, The Hurricane, Bella Habanna, and Gigis (for Italian). The BEST pizza is down there is Fortunatos!

We have been staying at the Grand Plaza (right next to Crabby Bills) and we have loved it. It’s an older hotel but the rooms are clean, the service is great and the staff is wonderful! We really like the beach bar at the hotel called Bongos. The bartenders are a ton of fun. They also have a pretty good food menu and a huge drink menu. We always meet a bunch of other people from IL when we’re there.

We tried Crabby Bills because of people from home recommending it and we were not impressed. My parents tried it on a separate trip and they felt the same way. Locals told us they hate the place. But since its right next door we’ll have to give it another shot. I have heard awesome things about Hurricane so maybe that will be our new place to try this trip.

Thanks for the info!

 

[Lizzybean]

We have been staying at the Grand Plaza (right next to Crabby Bills) and we have loved it. It’s an older hotel but the rooms are clean, the service is great and the staff is wonderful! We really like the beach bar at the hotel called Bongos. The bartenders are a ton of fun. They also have a pretty good food menu and a huge drink menu. We always meet a bunch of other people from IL when we’re there.

We tried Crabby Bills because of people from home recommending it and we were not impressed. My parents tried it on a separate trip and they felt the same way. Locals told us they hate the place. But since its right next door we’ll have to give it another shot. I have heard awesome things about Hurricane so maybe that will be our new place to try this trip.

Thanks for the info!

We like the hush puppies, onion rings, and grouper sandwiches at Crabby Bills and Only go during happy hour bc it can def be hit or miss! Hurricane is great at sunset and dockside Dave's as well as mad hatters is good too. Forgot about those! We've never made it into bongos but always meant to. Now we will for sure.

 

[cruisingkat]

We drive to Disney about 4 times a year from the Chicago burbs. We have tried both I65 thru IN and I57 thru IL to I24. We much prefer the I57 route - less truck traffic than I65. From both I57 or I65, you then take I24 to I75. South of Ocala, you take then take the Florida Turnpike (toll road) to the Disney area - it definitely saves time and mileage than taking I75 to I4 and over.

When going through Atlanta, we always stay on I75 but use the HOV lane.

 

[Butterbunkins]

We like the hush puppies, onion rings, and grouper sandwiches at Crabby Bills and Only go during happy hour bc it can def be hit or miss! Hurricane is great at sunset and dockside Dave's as well as mad hatters is good too. Forgot about those! We've never made it into bongos but always meant to. Now we will for sure.

DH and I looked up Hurricane’s website and we like what we see so we’re going to stop this time. I will keep happy hour in mind and check out those other places. Thank you!

 

[hearts8701]

we drive from chicago o'hare area we prefer 65 to 24 to 75 to the turnpike to the 429 exit final exit at western way to disney
here's some helpful hints from previous post
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2901783