California to Florida

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Originally Posted by amukia

I will submit to an extra full day of driving, so we will leave on Wednesday about 0600 and plan to arrive on Saturday about 1600!!!.
AAA trip tik and mapuest as well as my GPS say it's 38 hours, 2,400 miles. @ 60 MPH it is 40 hours of driving. So, 3 full days at 12 hours on the road every day leaves me only 4 hours on the last day. According to a past forum, 55 to 60 MPH is the average.

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I will buy you a tank of gas if you really can drive that far with three kids that fast. The only way you can average 60 mph over three days of driving is to drive at least 100 mph for significant periods of time. In fact, if I were a betting man... I would wager that you will not exceed an average speed of 51 mph on this trip. 12 hour days -- four full days.

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I am curious, anyone with a family of my size done this kind of crazy, adventurous,stupid thing? I am curious about how many stops and rest you had to take? We have a large SUV and am wondering, doesn't this help stay on the road longer?

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Not really, the size of bladders is not materially affected by the size of SUV. I think you will be stopping at least once every two hours for an average 30-45 minutes per stop. But at least you are getting closer to roadtrip reality...

I think it's do-able but only if you're willing to put in earplugs and ignore the whines of energetic kids who are sick of sitting and the family disharmony that you'll probably have the first day or so of DisneyWorld. In other words, even over 4 days, I agree with everyone else that this is too intensive of a trip for kids. Heck, most adults would go bonkers doing this.

I've driven the types of miles you're planning on doing for 2-3 days at a stretch but it has exhausted me. Maybe your younger? More energetic? I don't know....I just know that I have usually only done this on the trip home and when I know I'll have at least a day to recuperate before returning to work. No way could I have handled the fun of DW after doing it. DW is exhausting in and of itself, you know. Especially with 3 kids, at 3 different ages, with probably 3 different levels of interest and energy themselves....OY VEY!!

Is it possible that flying might actually be cost-effective? I know, strange advice for a roadtrip forum. But you'll still have to sleep, eat, and gas up that large SUV. By the time you add it all up, you might not be saving much over flying, if anything at all. It looks like the cheapest roundtrip fares are around $250 each from LA to Orlando. I think that would be $1500 well-spent!

With a family of four, 12 hours is going to turn into 14 hours. At least. Youre going to go insane if you don't figure something else out. I know I'm wearing the train thing out, but..... you might want to look at Amtrak. It gives you the same sense of accomplishment as driving, but with more room for the kids, and plus youre not driving and you are moving at night. Plus, trains are awesome.

I just looked at some train info. The problem is that for a round trip train ride from LAX to ORL, with two rooms booked each way, the total is about $3000. That covers your transportation, food and drinks for six days, and accomidations. While this train trip would be a dream come true for me, maybe you'd be better off flying. Or maybe you can just take the train one way. Or, you can always drive! Good luck, whatever you decide.

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Originally Posted by amukia

Speed is always a good thing.

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Well, you have heard from the roadtripping brethren and I don't think it was what you hoped to hear. You are experiencing the "thud" between expectation and reality and it affects everyone of us -- even the pros (like me, who roadtrip for a living) we all think we can do more than is reasonably possible on roadtrips. So, may I make a suggestion?

Traveling across the country with your family is going to be labor-intensive and it WILL take more time than you have anticipated. So, make it pro-active -- realize that you are going to be stopping every couple of hundred miles and embrace it. Make it part of the planned experience of your roadtrip. The best part of the vacation is going to be showing your kids America -- Disneyworld and the timeshare will be fun -- but it is only Disneyworld. You are about to embark on an adventure of epic proportions.

And, maybe consider the experienced advice of RTA contributors Judy and UGAphin about trains and planes -- personally I would still do the drive -- but only if I could arrange enough time to make it make sense. Professional drivers rarely do that distance in less than five days (legally they can not drive more than 10 hours per day and all of them have easier driving conditions -- no family aboard -- than you are going to have).

Slow down, become an "Accidental Speedster" (that is take it when it happens -- but don't expect it to happen every day) and enjoy the ride!

Mark

OK, I get it, but boy am I a stubborn mule!!!!!
I really do appreciate everyone's comments and advice and they have made me look at different angles and ideas. Bottom line is we are on a budget.

Train - I would love to go on a train and when the money is right, we will take a train ride. It's about 3K more than driving with car rental and everything else.
Plane - Momma won't have it, it's still about 1-1.5k more expensive.

Pirmarily - we love family time, the but whys and how comes are ok with us. This is a family vacation so we will be in each other faces for at least two weeks. Unfortuntely it's not a let's see America type trip, that is another trip all on it's own that we WILL do.
Second - the @&#*%*&!^#%@$!^ money situation.

My wife and I agreed, we will leave Wednesday 1200 noon and hope to get there as soon as we can. We will drive as much as we can for as long as we can and hope to get there On Saturday around 1200 noon.

Be sure that we will report, and if we do make it on time, someone owes me some gas!!!!! Thanks guys and gals

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Originally Posted by amukia

OK, I get it, but boy am I a stubborn mule!!!!!
I really do appreciate everyone's comments and advice and they have made me look at different angles and ideas. Bottom line is we are on a budget.

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Have you ever met anyone NOT on a budget?

OK. Looking forward to the field report. One more thing to read -- Chris Epting's take on Family RoadTrips

That is probably the best plan, to just see how fast you can get there. Don't set deadlines. That could get you in trouble. Just drive until you can't drive anymore, or until you need to get away from your kids =)

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plane - Momma won't have it, it's still about 1-1.5k more expensive.

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I can't help but be curious why "Momma won't have it". Planes are infinitely safer than driving.

And I don't get the 1-1.5k more expensive issue. I found fares as low as $230 per person round trip. That's only $1,150 for a family of 5. The highest fares if I chose various specific date was $300 per person, that's still only $1.5 total.

Your trip is over 5,000 miles roundtrip. In a large SUV, I'm guessing you get maybe 18mpg? Maybe less? Anyway, if you figure this at 18mpg with gas costing an average of $2.50 per gallon, your fuel costs alone will be about $700. That's with NO extra driving off-route so your true costs will definitely be higher. Add in a hotel or 2, and a few meals at restaurants and your costs will definitely exceed $1,150 and maybe even the $1.5k.

(Editor: To get an idea about the range of accurate fuel costs -- use our custom-built fuel cost calculator.)

How much are you budgeting for your gas, meals, and lodging? Unless I'm seriously confused, I don't understand your analysis.

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Pirmarily - we love family time, the but whys and how comes are ok with us. This is a family vacation so we will be in each other faces for at least two weeks. Unfortuntely it's not a let's see America type trip, that is another trip all on it's own that we WILL do.

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OK, speaking as a mom and veteran of almost 20 years of roadtrips with kids, I think this is your idea of a good time, and your wife's maybe? but not the kiddies. Sorry to be so blunt. My fear is that this will be such a boring, marathon trip for the kids that they learn to hate roadtrips. Is that what you want?

We have done some marathon blitz drives with the kids when they were younger but for shorter miles/timeframes than you're planning. For example, several times we went to Disneyland from home (about 18 hours driving time) as straight shots, sharing driving duties and napping. But we would leave at like 5pm, drive all night when the kids were sleeping, so they might be awake a few hours in the evening, and then a few more hours in the morning but asleep most of the trip. Even then they were squirmy, fidgety, and needed to run around like heck, play in the hotel pool, etc. before they would have been calmed down enough to handle the lines in Disneyland.

The most fun vacations we've had with our kids during roadtrips have been those types where you have no destination, no itinerary, and have the time to simply stop at anything the kids found interesting, a few things we adults found interesting, and geared the trip to our kid's energy levels and interests as much as possible. This is not to say that we also didn't drag them through a few museums and other such stuff that bored them a bit. We do believe in exposing them to things. However, we always balanced that with something that they enjoyed doing. Like letting them play in the park they spotted on the way to the museum for awhile after the museum visit. And I can't tell you how many playgrounds/parks we've stopped at over the years that we would never have stopped at without kids. Even today, as young adults, some of my kid's favorite memories are of a certain slide at some obscure school playground in some little town along the way that we don't even remember the name of. I really think, for the kids, these are the stuff of which good memories are made.

Both of my kids love roadtrips because we did this type of traveling, for the most part, with them. I can also tell you stories of taking friends of theirs on short roadtrips with us. The friends said they hated roadtrips with their own families because they couldn't stop and do things, they had to stay "on schedule", and they usually ended up arguing and fighting with each other because everyone was tired and stressed. These friends always found our slow, meandering style much more fun.

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Second - the @&#*%*&!^#%@$!^ money situation.

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Well, unless my analysis is way off-base, and your SUV runs on air, I still think you'll find it cheaper to fly.

I want to emphasize that I sincerely hope that you prove me wrong. That you prove all of us wrong. And that this turns out to be a fantastic trip for you and the rest of your family. I'll be curious to read your trip report upon your return.

OK, the plane thing,
380+tax X 5 = 2000,,,,,,that's just for the tickets, I still need a rental for a week which is about 600 for 7 days. That puts me at 2500.
Driving, I figure about 1,000 on gas. 75 hotel x 6 total = 450, food is about 450. That's a total of 1900
The difference is about 500 less to drive. But driving has a whole different value that we can understand.
If plane tickets were 300 or less I would fly and rent a car.
I really do like working all these numbers and calculations. Thanks for all your input guys and gals.

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Originally Posted by Editor

Professional drivers rarely do that distance in less than five days (legally they can not drive more than 10 hours per day and all of them have easier driving conditions -- no family aboard -- than you are going to have).

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And the reason for limiting the hours would be for everyone's saftey! I'm so glad that you have expanded the number of driving days. Keep in mind you want to reach your destination and not kill anyone in the process. Driving when fatigued could be deadly!

Driving while fatigued

Utahtea