First time driving from Chicago to Orlando - tips please!

[classicpooh]

We are planning on driving from Chicago to Orlando in August with a 3 1/2 year old and a almost 7 year old. Anyone who has done it before have any tips - good stopping points? Any help will be appreciated. Thanks

 

[mkymouse4ever]

Prefer to take 57 south down through illinois, instead of 65 through indiana, less traffic once out of chicago area, and virtually no big cities till paducka kentuckey ( if you consider that a big city). You wind up merging at nashville with 75 but you really save some time. Also at all cost try to get through atlanta at an off time ( late at nite?) if possible. Your worse areas are basically atlanta, nashville, chattanooga.

We have stopped at dalton, georgia but it is before atlanta, and you need to get up pretty early to beat rush hour going through atlanta.

Good luck, MKY

 

[BCV23]

Just back on Friday from driving solo. I asked about his a few months back and got great advice. Thank you to manning, redbirdgrad and others (I'm going to have to pull out my notes and post a proper thanks). At any rate, I took 57 and 24 to Chattanooga, too. They were great...not much traffic despite the holidays. 75 was very busy through Georgia and FL but maybe it always is? As MKY said plan to get through Atlanta at a quieter time. Going down I made it through on a Sunday morning which was fine. Coming back I was on the early side of rush hour but it started to rain and the traffic on the north side of Atlanta started to crawl.

 

[OhMickey]

Can you recommend any hotels to stop at on the way down and back. I'm from Central Illinois and will be traveling with 4 kids and DH. We plan on leaving after work on a Friday and driving to Paducah. Then possibly driving from Paducah to either southern GA, or northern FL.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

 

[crazelion]

Ok I live in Chattanooga and I help with this leg of the trip. I-24 to I 75 is a easy driving through Chattanooga only thing say to avoid is early in the morning it has a little bit of traffic but not much. Now for hotels I would stay in Downtown Chattanooga. The Courtyard by Marriot, Hilton Garden, Residence INN by Marriot is the new hotels and very close to resurasts, tourist attarctions and baseball park own the downtown free shuttle route. The tourist attactions I would do is IMAX Theater where I work at. Then go across the Street to Aquruiam which also I work at to. Also the hotels is a baseball park near the hotels I have list.

If cannot found a hotel room in dowtown Chattanooga then I recommend the Hamilton Place Mall area which has good hotels. The ones I would recommned is theCourtyard By Marriot, Days INN, Hampton Inn, County Inn and Suites and Fairfield Inn by Marriot.

Now heading ino Geogia is a different ballgame. When into Dalton is good place to stop for the small outlet strip. But I would not there I got to Calhon where they plenty of outlet malls and hotels. Good traveling until get started getting in Rome Georgia then it's messy. Watch for road concruction it all over the place and can have delays.

Also I would keep my eye for the Georgia State Partol they love to give people tickets.

Get ready for the Daytona 500 heading toward Maritta. This where the crazy driving people is at. They believe in driving fast go with the flow or you will get run over. Don't worry about the Geogia State Partrol here they will catch. It's better to get a ticket then to be dead. Also avoid rush hours like the bad news. Do be fool in thinking that taking the Atlanta bypass that it will be no traffic wrong. It's lots of traffic. Going directly into Atlanta is worst.

But once get past this it's smooth sailing all the way to florida border and start back watching for the Georga State Patrol

The Attactions in Atlanta is Six Flags Over Georgia and White Water and the malls.

I am the owner of the combo tickets to both parks and love going to Atlanta malls for shopping trips.

I hopes that helps

 

[crazelion]

Ok I live in Chattanooga and I help with this leg of the trip. I-24 to I 75 is a easy driving through Chattanooga only thing say to avoid is early in the morning it has a little bit of traffic but not much. Now for hotels I would stay in Downtown Chattanooga. The Courtyard by Marriot, Hilton Garden, Residence INN by Marriot is the new hotels and very close to resurasts, tourist attarctions and baseball park own the downtown free shuttle route. The tourist attactions I would do is IMAX Theater where I work at. Then go across the Street to Aquruiam which also I work at to. Also the hotels is a baseball park near the hotels I have list.

If cannot found a hotel room in dowtown Chattanooga then I recommend the Hamilton Place Mall area which has good hotels. The ones I would recommned is theCourtyard By Marriot, Days INN, Hampton Inn, County Inn and Suites and Fairfield Inn by Marriot.

Now heading ino Geogia is a different ballgame. When into Dalton is good place to stop for the small outlet strip. But I would not there I got to Calhon where they plenty of outlet malls and hotels. Good traveling until get started getting in Rome Georgia then it's messy. Watch for road concruction it all over the place and can have delays.

Also I would keep my eye for the Georgia State Partol they love to give people tickets.

Get ready for the Daytona 500 heading toward Maritta. This where the crazy driving people is at. They believe in driving fast go with the flow or you will get run over. Don't worry about the Geogia State Partrol here they will catch. It's better to get a ticket then to be dead. Also avoid rush hours like the bad news. Do be fool in thinking that taking the Atlanta bypass that it will be no traffic wrong. It's lots of traffic. Going directly into Atlanta is worst.

But once get past this it's smooth sailing all the way to florida border and start back watching for the Georga State Patrol

The Attactions in Atlanta is Six Flags Over Georgia and White Water and the malls.

I am the owner of the combo tickets to both parks and love going to Atlanta malls for shopping trips.

I hopes that helps

 

[Eeyore1954]

Originally posted by OhMickey
Can you recommend any hotels to stop at on the way down and back. I'm from Central Illinois and will be traveling with 4 kids and DH. We plan on leaving after work on a Friday and driving to Paducah. Then possibly driving from Paducah to either southern GA, or northern FL.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

There are a lot of hotels around Paducah. Be sure to grab one there, because if you pass Paducah, pickin's get pretty slim until you get near Nashville.

My DW and I prefer the Holiday Inn Express near Paducah. It has a Cracker Barrel restaurant and gas station next to it; rate was fairly low and it was clean and comfortable. Easy off and on to the x-way.

One caution: be careful if you plan to leave early morning the next day. My experience has been that I-24 can get very foggy before sunrise and there seems to be an abundance of wildlife that likes to play "tag" with cars in the fog. We just barely missed a deer on one trip. Now we wait until the sun is up and most of the fog is burned off before we hit the road.

 

[redbirdgrad]

BCV - Glad to see you had a good trip.

I've done the 65 and the 57 route - 57 has less traffic and is only about 14 miles longer ( if my memory serves me ). I've stopped on the way down in Stockbridge, GA which is immediately south of Atlanta. My kids ( now 6 and 9 ) where able to handle the first day drive from Chicago (SW burbs) to Stockbridge with no problem. I believe, we left around 4:30 am and it took about 13 hours and a one-hour time change. That left a very short 7 to 8 hour drive left for the second day. We took the middle bench out of the mini-van, had the kids sit in back, a TV/VCR had a dual headphone coming out of it so each could listen or not ( and I didn't have to ), also CD players for each and plenty of books. A cooler and snacks and stopping whenever needed. My 9 year old daughter doesn't want to fly anywhere now because she likes the van part of the trip. Let me know if you need any specifics.

Redbirdgrad