Going to Florida

Before retiring, we spent almost two decades heading from PA. to FL. for the Christmas holidays. We were not able to be flexible at all with our travel times, and always took 81-77-26-95, regardless of anticipated weather. During that time we had weather issues exactly once, and it was the hundred year storm that shut DC down for nearly a week, and dumped 30" of snow in the lower half of VA. If 77 is your desired route, check the weather, and do it. Blocking out months at a time, because 77 is somehow "unsuitable for travel" due to potential weather danger, as some suggest, is simply irrational.

Well we ended up taking our usual route (95-26-77-19-79-90) home from Florida a few days ago because the weather looked good. There used to be a map of Interstate driving forecasts on the web. It had the interstates colour coded depending on the road condition & you could change the date until about 5 days out. It seems to have disappeared and now this https://www.theweathernetwork.com/maps/us-highway-forecast/ is all I can find.

The only trouble we had, aside from the many miles of construction on I-95 & I-77, was a long detour around the Bluefield tunnel on I-77. We stopped for gas at a truck stop in Wytheville & a kind trucker saw our ONT licensce plates and told us he had just come southbound & saw traffic at a standstill for miles due to a big rig roll-over south of the tunnel. It was a scenic detour (on US-52) and added over an hour to our trip but at least we weren't stopped on the interstate (hubby hates that)!

Dutch_12078 wrote:
I think the best idea at that time of year is to just keep an eye on the weather forecasts and be prepared to be a little flexible in your travel plans. We always build in a few extra travel days along the way that we can shuffle around before we reach any place where we have hard reservations. One of our last non-reserved stops before Florida is in an area we really like, so if we have a couple of extra days left when we get there, we don't mind staying there a little longer.

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excellent advise. let the wx be your guide. Check the wx a few days before you depart.
Traffic around Charlotte, NC is bad due to construction. But it is only for 20 miles or so. Try to hit it late at nite.

Route 81 thru Virginia is a lot of mountains, had you thought about going over to 95 at Winchester VA, seldom ever get snow along the coast. We only use 77 to 81 sometimes in the spring when we come home. That would be rt 66 east to 17 s to 95 and it is shorter also. We used to drive a MH home with toad and those mountains in VA and 77 are heck on fuel. Now we use a van.

17 is 15 miles longer but you do have some lights which add time, We get off 95 at Fredericksburg quite often if we are hitting DC at commuter time.