Driving Pittsburgh --> WDW

[cassandrap83]

Hi! I've used the 'search' tool and have found other people's response to the typical... "How long did it take you/where did you stay" question.

My question is for those of you that drive the whole way through:

Weren't you tired when you arrived at your hotel in WDW?
If you arrive late at night, are you able to check in at 11pm? Did you do the parks the next day, or did you find yourself too tired?

If you arrived in the morning (8am or so) did you tour the parks, or did you spend the day relaxing at the resort?

I'm not so much worried about the drive, as I am our "functionality" after we arrive.

We purchased airline tickets last year for our trip this same week for the same week in September and we paid $135 total each person (4 of us) round-trip. This year, I have *YET* to find anything cheaper than $200 round-trip on any carrier, and I have been looking for several weeks now. It's driving me nuts, to the point where I am considering driving with 2 small children.

 

[DebbieB]

I live in Pittsburgh and you were very lucky to get $135 last year. I haven't seen less than $200 in a long time. Last June the best I could get was $365 round-trip. I ended up cashing in some hotel points for Southwest points to get a free ticket.

 

[Robert P]

Hi! I've used the 'search' tool and have found other people's response to the typical... "How long did it take you/where did you stay" question.

My question is for those of you that drive the whole way through:

Weren't you tired when you arrived at your hotel in WDW?
If you arrive late at night, are you able to check in at 11pm? Did you do the parks the next day, or did you find yourself too tired?

If you arrived in the morning (8am or so) did you tour the parks, or did you spend the day relaxing at the resort?

I'm not so much worried about the drive, as I am our "functionality" after we arrive.

While I can't offer much on the driving from PA part:

We've driven from NC many times. The latest we have checked in anywhere was around midnight at Pop Century once. It was no problem, and we certainly were not the only ones checking in that late. We changed hotels the next a.m., and were still at the parks before opening time. We were not totally zonked, but we didn't want to stay for a full day either.

We have arrived early a.m. in the past, after driving all night. We checked into our hotel, dropped the bags, and did go hit the parks then as well, but were running out of steam badly by lunchtime. Worked out well though, as our rooms rarely seem to be ready when we check in early.

Others may have different opinions, but we would not schedule a full park day in either of those cases, if we were to travel that way again.

 

[mrodgers]

Folks at work think I'm nuts for stopping 4 hours away for the night. They think I should drive straight through. I can stop for the night around 7 pm, get plenty of sleep for the next day, get up plenty early and have an easy 4 hour drive and be there by noon. We'll have all day to go to a park and it would be no different than if I was to drive 4 hours to Cedar Point or the old Sea World in Ohio and be there all day.

Guys at work recommend leaving at 5 pm and driving all night. Then it would be a completely wasted day the following day because we would have just finished driving 18 hours or so at just before noon.

I've never done this trip before, but driving straight through as well as leaving in the evening and driving all night just doesn't seem to be the smartest to do. Seems like wasted time to me.

Oh yeah, and you say Pittsburgh. I'm about an hour or so north of you (I'm just north of Butler), so pretty much the same trip.

 

[DebbieB]

A friend of mine from Arnold PA has an RV and they drive down. I think they stop for a couple nights, the second night around Daytona and then drive into WDW the next morning (Ft Wilderness).

 

[dblr]

We left De. @ 5pm and drove all night and only stopped for fuel and breakfast off of rt4 and got into Saratoga Springs around 10am, we were able to get right into our condo,the kids rested and then we went to Downtown Disney for a little while then onto Wilderness Lodge for dinner, we were tired by the end of our meal and could not wait to get to bed. i do not think we would want to tackle a park after driving all night.

 

[edna E mode]

I am 35 minutes east of the city.
We drive to WDW. The last time we made it to Jacksonville just before 8 PM, shocked! Had we planned our dinner better we would have kept on driving. We also got an hour late start with a 7 AM leave time.
While we never have driven straight thru going, we do drive straight thru coming home. So while, you are excited to get to WDW, you may want to swap out your straight drive thru.