Driving to Disney – do you drive overnight or during the day?

[Spaceace5150]

I've driven with two keeps on a 17 hour trip a couple of times, and was thankful that we left on the weekend. We didn't have any major traffic to hold us up. Also like the two day approach.

 

[Jfsag123]

Just did the drive to WDW and back - got home Sunday. We come from DFW in Texas and it's about 17 hours. We drove over two days each way, stopping in Alabama for the night. No thank you to the overnights!

 

[MomofKatie]

We are 8 1/2 hours away from WDW, and we always get on the road at 4am. That gets us through Charlotte and Columbia SC before rush hour starts. We stop twice for gas, once for food, and arrive at our hotel right around 1pm.

 

[Kristina4109]

When we lived in New York we would often drive to Disney. We did it in two days with an overnight stay. Ah, the memories. "Mom, she's touching me!" "No, she's leaning over into my side of the car!" "I'm going to turn this car around if you two don't stop it..."

 

[Liz Vogel]

Drive without staying overnight. Stop semi frequently to take bathroom breaks, food breaks, and just breaks to stretch. Alternate drivers at every stop so that each driver is well rested when you arrive. The best advice for traveling with a child would be to have some kind of device playing Disney movies all the way down, this will get them excited, and then when night comes, turn off the movies and have them cuddle up with their favorite blanket and stuffed animal. I've driven down from Ohio and the best advice I can give is if you know someone in your car will not sleep well in the car, do not plan to arrive in the morning and go straight to a park. I suggest timing it so you arrive around 4-5 so you can check in, possibly take a nap, get some food, and then enjoy the resort, Downtown Disney, or if you have the finances or a season pass go to a park to enjoy the end of the day festivities.

 

[laura-k]

We go every year late Feb -March ,and live in MN.
so 23 to 24 hours strait through with gas and potty stops and decent weather
my husband drives us through to southern Illinois and by that time it is getting late so we make
a gas stop and then I drive usually through the morning Atlanta traffic
I stop at a rest area on the other side of town ,I just jump in my bed ,so nobody is sleep deprived -
and then he takes us to Disney we usually arrive between 3 and 4 pm and we
check in shower up and go to the MK for a few hours just to get our Disney On
We started out driving in 1999 with financial stuff more in mind ,our kids were young and we had a motorhome and the
grandparents would ride with we drop them at Riverside and we stayed at the campground for 10 days to 2 weeks
This year was our 1st year alone as a couple and we did join DVC I think it was 2010 so we stayed BLT for 5
and then Beach Club for 5
and then back to Fort Wilderness for 7 nights it was fabulous with the extended stay .
As of lately We have considered flying for a couple different reasons -
If it's only us we aren't really saving money driving instead of flying
The per night fee for the fort has snuck up from $39.00 per night way back then to $130.00 for a loop 3 spot
and the discounts never apply anymore ,there used to be the same ones as the other resorts , there
maybe a AAA 10% but nothing great
But we really love the Fort and being in the area close to the boat dock and the hoop de doo
I could stay at an AS for cheaper or a moderate for about the same or a little more with discounts
so we are still undecided but for now that's what we do and we don't mind the drive !

 

[THEDISNEYTHREE]

We drive from Michigan every year and split it into two days with an overnight stay in Tenn. We love road trips! You have to stop and get your free orange juice and pamphlets at the welcome center!! My ds loves that.

 

[daveag]

I either get up early and go from Atl to WDW in one day or we leave out late afternoon one day and leisurely get there by mid afternoon the next.

 

[Holly Quinlan]

Usually when going to Florida we drive straight thru overnight. About 16 hours from Cincinnati but last time we decided to fly took less than 2 hours and now its hard to go back to driving.

 

[disneysteve]

About 16 hours from Cincinnati but last time we decided to fly took less than 2 hours and now its hard to go back to driving.

A lot of people around here (Philly area) like to say it takes 2 hours to fly when we tell them that we drive. I don't hesitate to explain that it doesn't really take 2 hours when you add it all up: the drive to the airport, parking, being there 2 hours early for security, flight delays if any, baggage claim, getting from the airport to your hotel, etc. If you are lucky, it is at least 6 hours and probably more like 7-8.

 

[bluezy]

A lot of people around here (Philly area) like to say it takes 2 hours to fly when we tell them that we drive. I don't hesitate to explain that it doesn't really take 2 hours when you add it all up: the drive to the airport, parking, being there 2 hours early for security, flight delays if any, baggage claim, getting from the airport to your hotel, etc. If you are lucky, it is at least 6 hours and probably more like 7-8.

Exactly. My kids were just in Disney on their school music department trip and they flew out of Philly under what is probably ideal conditions as they had a bus pick them up at the high school and drop them off at the airport -- no need to park and walk. And they had a private bus picking them up at MCO to transport them to their resort to drop off their luggage. That private bus then took them directly to DHS. They left the high school at 4:00 a.m. (we're about an hour away from PHL -- probably 50 minutes at that time of the morning) for a 7:00 a.m. flight. Flight took off 5 minutes early and landed at MCO 20 minutes early. They didn't have any delays/issues anywhere along the line but they still didn't get to All Star Music until almost 11:00 to drop off their luggage with luggage services and then jump back on the bus. They got to DHS at 11:40. So close to 8 hours from the time they left home until they were in a park. I don't think it can be done much faster than that.

I also hear a lot of people in our area talking about how much "easier" and faster the Auto Train is. I have one friend who *constantly* tells me the Auto Train is so much faster than just driving the whole way because you don't have to deal with traffic *and* it travels through the night. Yet she has to leave her house by about 8:30 a.m on day 1 of travel to get to the train station for check-in and depending on how quickly her car is unloaded in Sanford, she arrives at her resort by 11:30ish on day 2 of travel. When we drive, we leave our house at 5:30 a.m. on day 1 and arrive at our resort around noon on day 2 (after stopping for the night around 7:00 p.m.). We could get there earlier but we choose not to get up super early on day 2. So she saves about 3-4 hours travel time over our 2-day driving plan. And we get to sleep in a nice comfy hotel room all night and take a nice hot shower in the morning before finishing our drive and arriving fresh and ready to hit the ground running at Disney. Meanwhile, her family heads to their room and takes a shower and sometimes takes a nap because they're tired from not sleeping well on the train. The real kicker about the Auto Train (for us) is that 90% of the "bad traffic" areas on the I-95 drive from PA to DW are *before* Lorton, VA. It's usually pretty smooth sailing from that point on. I totally understand using the train if you don't like to drive, but in general, it's not something that is going to save you a lot of time and certainly isn't going to save you any money.

 

[Holly Quinlan]

A lot of people around here (Philly area) like to say it takes 2 hours to fly when we tell them that we drive. I don't hesitate to explain that it doesn't really take 2 hours when you add it all up: the drive to the airport, parking, being there 2 hours early for security, flight delays if any, baggage claim, getting from the airport to your hotel, etc. If you are lucky, it is at least 6 hours and probably more like 7-8

Good point. I guess I've never thought of it like that before. I didn't feel like it took that long last time. We did fly out of a much smaller airport only about 30 minutes away from us. We only had carry on bags and we had a family member waiting on us at the airport to take us to WDW. I will have to time it this year and see. We will have checked luggage and a rental car. Now I wonder how much time we will be saving.

 

[Grumpy Nenny]

We are lucky. We are in middle GA and it only takes us about 6 hours with one stop for gas, depending on weather and traffic. We left on Friday afternoon around 2pm last Labor day weekend and it took us almost 9 hours going down I-75. Several accidents and some places where it was raining so hard you could barely see the front of the car. That was the longest it has ever taken and we go about 6 or 7 times a year.

 

[rikhub]

Its about 24 hours from our home in NH and we've done it once. The reason we did it once was because we thought how hard could it be. We found the answer. For what it took out of us the first 2 days we arrived we found it wasn't worth it. Now, it may be for others but this is simply a cost vs. convenience issue. 12 hours is about the max I will drive now but , again, if I were to save a substantial amount maybe my arm could be twisted to drive farther.

 

[kruegeme]

Our drive from TX is 16.5 hours. I've driven it straight thru a couple of times with a 6 & 8 year old. Did this during the day starting out really early. Can't say I, or my wife, safely drive thru the night and wouldn't want to do that to our bodies. If our trip was much longer than there would be no way the kids could go straight thru. We always split the return trip as with that we always do something in the parks before heading out after lunch.

 

[Hunterr]

stopping at night is the best. Everyone will be less cranky and tired.

 

[1Grumpy9]

Usually when going to Florida we drive straight thru overnight. About 16 hours from Cincinnati but last time we decided to fly took less than 2 hours and now its hard to go back to driving.

Once you fly it is definitely harder to go back to driving. That was the struggle for me last October. What came down to the decision for my friend and I to drive was the cost. Because of the schedule we needed to do for her vacation time, we had to leave on a Saturday and leave WDW on Saturday. So flights were outrageous. For each of us a round trip flight was going to cost us around $400 each (with airport parking and/or luggage). We really lucked out with the price of gas dropping right before we left and our total cost round trip was $200. So yes, we lost a day and a half driving, but we also saved ourselves each $300 and we used that for other things. Plus, we both didn't mind driving and we had a blast.

 

[thisismyusername]

We do both. We do a lot of short little trips to Disney (3-5 nights) throughout the year, which wouldn't make any sense to drive. But we also have been doing long trips during the summer, which are usually anywhere between 10-16 nights, so those we've driven just as much as we've flown. (We're about 16 hours away.) If we drive, we've been able to do it in one haul, leaving at 7 a.m. and arriving home by midnight, but we've also stopped, too. We do whatever works so we don't stray too much from our normal sleeping patterns.

 

[Nan P]

Before my retirement I was fortunate to have 3 - 4 weeks vacation per year. Starting in 1989 DH also had same vacation time and we drove our motorhome on a 2200 mile round trip to Fort Wilderness. We would stop a few nights in campgrounds and when we drove into Disney we knew we were home for a while. I did fly down two times and stayed at Coronado Springs, but the experience of driving in our motorhome and staying at the Fort was our passion. Moved to Florida 8 years ago, so now we do a 90 mile trip.

 

[RuGoingToWDW]

We used to fly all the time but airfare has really gotten expensive in the last year so we are going to start driving. It takes long enough (>12 hours) that we think it's a good idea to start early afternoon, stop for the night somewhere halfway, and then leave early in the morning so we arrive in Orlando in the early afternoon. I'm looking forward to not having to worry about checked bags, which seats we'll get (typically fly Southwest and just hate the boarding process) and being able to pull over for a bit if we see something interesting along the way.