Montreal to Orlando Advice

[Squarrior]

Hello,

My husband and I are planning our first family road trip from Montreal to Orlando. We have 2 children, 5 and 7, and are looking to make 2 stops. We were planning on taking the 87-95 straigt down with our first stop in Washington for some sight seeing and the second stop in Savannah, but after reading some posts I am a bit fearful as it seems the traffic from NY to Washington is aweful. We are expecting to travel at the end of March and have 9 days to make the trip with 2 days in Orlando (3 days would be idealistic). Can you suggest other stops or perhaps should we save the sight seeing for our return trip home? Is the trip to Washington too much for 1 days travel there for our first stop? A stop at a beach location is also an option, All advice is appreciated.

[AZBuck]

Bienvenue sur les forums de RoadTrip Amérique. Welcome aboard the RoadTrip America Forums!

Personally, I wouldn't use just I-87/I-95, even though that is what most mapping software recommends. Nor would I plan on spending my first night in Washington DC. The thing is, such software does not take into account traffic, tolls, or the time spent waiting to clear customs. Each of those considerations will play a major part in your first day's travel. Last summer I drove from Montréal to Albany on I-87 and waited a full hour just inching up through a long line waiting to clear customs. That is not unusual and will take that hour out of your day's driving time. Then there's the tolls. Going the way you propose will cost you around $26.50 each way in tolls, a little bit less if you have E-ZPass. And that's for the privilege of driving some of the most congested roads in America including the New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland Turnpikes. Finally, given that you will have to spend time at the border crossing, and lining up to pay all those tolls, there is simply no way that you should plan on covering the nearly 600 miles required to get to Washington on the first day.

There is a better option. At Albany, switch over to I-88 down to Binghamton NY and get on I-81 there. Follow that down to Harrisburg PA and get on I-83 down to Baltimore and I-95. There are a few connecting roads in the Albany, Binghamton, Scranton, Harrisburg, and Baltimore areas, but that's the basic route. And as I note, I wouldn't try to get to Washington. You can make the full trip to Orlando in just under three days if you don't make any major stops en route. Make your first day the short day to account for the traffic and border problems on the northern end of it. Then spend the next two full days getting the rest of the way to Orlando. I'd make my overnight stops roughly around Scranton or Harrisburg, depending on how you do at the border, and around Fayetteville NC.

As I said, you won't have time for any major stops if you want to get to Orlando in three days, but with children aboard, you will want to make time for a couple of short stops each day to let them run off some of their youthful exuberance.

AZBuck

[AZBuck]

Sorry I didn't mention this before, but since you won't have time to stop and see the sights in Washington, there's no real reason to go through Baltimore and DC either. Just stay on I-81 after Harrisburg all the way to southwestern Virginia and use I-77 south to Columbia SC and use I-26 from there to reconnect with I-95. That adds about 30 miles of driving but saves you from the traffic in Baltimore (bad), Washington (really bad), and Richmond (not too bad). Going that way would put your second night's stop in the Charlotte NC area.

AZBuck

[glc]

I would have to say that if you really wanted to spend some time sightseeing in DC, your time may be just a bit too limited. In order to make it work, you could possibly do it this way:

Spend your first day on I-87/I-88/I-81, see how far you make it. The next day, at Harrisburg take US-15 to Frederick, then I-270 on into DC. Spend the rest of the day sightseeing, then spend the night in the area.

Next day, take I-66 out to I-81, then I-81 to I-77 to I-26 to I-95. Plan on Charlotte for the overnight.

This will take 4 days to get to Orlando, then 2 days in Orlando, then 3 days back home via I-95/I-26/I-77/I-81/I-88/I-87. Sorry about retracing your steps, but your other options are to deal with the DC/NYC congestion, or add another day or 2 to the return trip to get off the beaten path.