Driving home (Bay Area) from Anaheim

[RobertaMomof2]

Hi everyone! I have a question for you all. We are driving down for spring break for a couple days. Going to Anaheim isn't a problem, we are going on a Saturday and leaving the Bay Area early (around 6am) so that isn't the issue. I am worried about driving home from Anaheim... We leave on a Tuesday. What time should we leave the hotel to miss most of the traffic? I am sure we will hit a bit (it's inevitable) but when does it start to ease up? Need to have the rental car back by 5:30... or possible I can extend it a day if need be. Any help would be much appreciated!

 

[kangamama]

we left at 10 am last tuesday morning and had no traffic on either end (FWIW, we are off 580, so just took 5 to 580)

 

[Nonsuch]

The ongoing construction on 5 often creates slowdowns, so I try avoid 5 though LA.

This is my "zig-zag" route.
5 North (use carpool lane)
Carpool to carpool ramp to 91 West.
605 North (carpool almost to 210)
210 West
210 West at Pasadena (take exit ramp to stay on 210)
5 North

 

[PinkBudgie]

We usually leave Anaheim around 9:30-10am to make sure we miss most of the going to work traffic through LA but get through before noon. However, it is a balance because then you often hit rush hour traffic in the bay area. We are in the North Bay and go past Emeryville (to get to the Richmond/San Rafael bridge) which is our worst traffic of the trip up. We stay on 5 the entire way until the bay area. We have at least an 8 hour trip and would never make it back to return a car by 5:30. If you aren't north bay then maybe it will be faster for you.

 

[rms123]

We left 2:30 or so on a Monday a few weeks back and missed most of the traffic. We took 210 as well following Waze.

 

[superlarz]

I would say leave around 5-5:30 am or 9:30-10

 

[Brancaneve]

My husband came up with a brilliant plan for our DLR vacations. On our last night at the parks, we leave and drive directly to Santa Clarita. Traffic was relatively lighter at 9:00. We stayed at the Embassy Suites in Santa Clarita, slept in the next morning, had a nice breakfast and we still arrived home( Nor Cal) at a decent hour. Plus, we skipped all the awful morning traffic.

 

[RobertaMomof2]

Awesome. Thank you all so very much! Sounds like my best bet is to leave around 9:30 which is perfect. We live on the Peninsula, closer to SF so I plan to come over 152 (I think it is, ends up at Gilroy) from the 5 so I avoid the 580 traffic.

Brancaneve, I love the idea of staying in Santa Clarita, going to look that up now for our next trip down. Already have reservations set for CCI and dont want to change them this late in the game. Love that idea though, thank you!

 

[Pucka1378]

I live in Gilroy and we obviously do the 152 thing... we usually leave noon-1pm and are home around 6pm and that includes a bit of traffic and a stop after we go over the grapevine at the starbucks. On average it takes us about 5.5hrs. Once you hit 101 in the gilroy area you will be going opposite traffic.

 

[Belle Ella]

Whenever I make the trip back to the Bay Area I always like to leave really early in the morning so I don't hit traffic, and don't have to drive over the Grapevine when the sun is up. I think my last trip I home I got out a little later than normal - so about 4am? The only traffic I hit is on 580 when I'm trying to merge onto 680 (dang, that's a nightmare) but you mentioned you won't have to deal with that.

 

[RobertaMomof2]

Thanks Pucka and Jessica

 

[DharmaLou]

We're doing something similar - We're flying to SNA, 3 days at DLR, then heading up to Oakland for 4 days to hit up some baseball and hang out with friends, then back to LA for 3 days. Anyhoo, we'll probably leave by 5:30 so that we can get up to Oakland in time to rest a bit before we tailgate.