Raineman
Well-Known Member
I would love to hear about people's experiences driving to WDW on I-75, good or bad. My DW, DD and I left our home in London, Ontario at 3 am on February 28 of this year. The drive through Michigan and Ohio went smoothly, although the heavy traffic and heavy construction in Cincinnati make driving through that city a bit dicey at times. Kentucky was great, and getting into the mountains added some beautiful scenery to the trip. It was just over the border into Tennessee when our trip hit it's only big hitch. earlier that day, just past the exit to Jellico, TN, alot of large chunks of rock had covered both sides of I-75, making it impassable. Well, TDOT had set up detours-northbound would take 25W through the mountains to the east of I-75, and southbound would go through Jellico and through Elk Valley to the west of I-75. The traffic was backed up to a standstill on I-75 south, and moved extremely slowly through Jellico. Once we got out of Jellico, still moving slowly, traffic stopped completely. We eventually saw people turning around, and going back through Jellico-a truck had hit a guardrail and blocked the southbound detour. So, we turned around, moving back, slowly, through Jellico, and now, the northbound detour through the mountains was also the southbound detour. I can tell you that those mountain roads were not meant for 53' trucks to be driving on them in heavy traffic, and taking some of those tight curves with a truck going the other way taking a few feet of your lane as well as his, made for some white-knuckle driving. We finally rejoined I-75 south, over 4 hours after we had left it. Onward we went, with the rest of the drive fairly uneventful (although, if you have never driven through downtown Atlanta at night, with all 8 lanes full of traffic-be prepared), finally stopping at 11 pm at a hotel in Cordele, Georgia. I dont think I have ever felt as ready for bed as I did after 21 hours behind the wheel. The next day was so much better-back on the road, into Florida by mid-morning, then by early afternoon, arrival at WDW. I would definitely do it again, but-and here's a tip for those of you who have never done the drive-we will be watching the traffic reports all along I-75 to avoid blindly running into another mess like the rock slide.
