We have driven to Orlando 9 times in the past 12 years. We have tried several of the different routing options. Here are our opinions on each:
I90/I79/(US 19)/I77/I26/I95/I4 route - This is by far our favorite route. We find the scenery through the blue range mountains breathtaking. Being from a large city (Toronto) it also helps avoid most of the congested cities on the way down. There are several alternatives we have used on this route - 1) turn south at Erie PA onto I79, or 2) turn south at Cleveland on I77. We prefer I79 - shorter. Also, there is a shortcut from I79 to I77 if you turn south at Erie - use US 19 to avoid Charleston. This is a good divided highway. As one reply noted ? you may use more gas using this route because of the mountains. Also, I have found that the air conditioning suffers somewhat while in the mountains. I drive an Olds Siloutte Mini Van and did not notice a significant difference in gas. (1272 Miles)
I90(or 401)/I75 - The advantage to this route is that it is fairly flat and straight. The disadvantage of this route is that it is flat and fairly straight. It all depends on perspective I guess. I prefer the 79/77 combo because of the scenery, mountains and differences in routing. The other disadvantage is that you are routed through several large cities - Cincinnati, Columbus, Knoxville, and largest of all Atlanta. (1394 Miles)
I90/I81/I83/I95/I4 - This was the worst of all combinations for us. We made good time to Baltimore - arriving around 3:00 PM. We left Washington about 6:30 - 7:00 PM. I have never seen traffic this bad in my life - and we used the circular routes around the city. I would definitely not recommend this. (1472 Miles).
A few pieces of other advice based on our experience ?
1) Rand McNally Trip Maker is worth its weight in Gold. It plans the routes, your stops, budget and best of all tells you what is coming up at future stops. We print all of our maps out before we leave and have the Trip Maker on the laptop in the car so we can find upcoming lunch stops etc.
2) If you are traveling on Labor Day weekend ? be sure to book hotels ahead of time and secure with credit card. We made this mistake one year and ended up driving until 3:00 AM in the morning.
3) As mentioned, the halfway point on I79 route according to Tripmaker is around Wytheville, however, we have found this to be decieving. We find that if we leave early in the morning (7:00 AM), we can make Rock Hill, SC by about 10:00 PM. This has us arriving in WDW about 4:00 PM the next day.
By the way, we leave on Aug 22/23 for WDW. When are you leaving?
Glenn