Best driving time to get down to Anaheim from Sac

carmelbride05

with a 2 yr old.  We are debating if we want to leave say at 6pm on Wed night, so we get there close to midnight and then sleep and go to disney first thing in the morning, so we can have a full day, or we just leave first thing in the morning say at 6am and then only have a half day at disney.  Thoughts?

TheMutleys

I would leave at 6pm.  You could add up to 2+ hours to your drive if you hit south of the Grapevine at the wrong time (aka 6:30-10am or 3:30-7pm.)  

 

We made the drive in both directions many, many times when we lived in San Diego.

dblhappiness

It really depends on how you think your child will do. We did the drive in the middle of the night when my boys were 14 months old and it kinda backfired. They didn't fall asleep until about 10-10:30pm and were wide awake at 1am when we arrived. If you have your one day at Disney, I'd lean towards leaving at night and getting there around midnight or so. If you have more time at Disney, it also might be worth to just have your first day be a run through/half day and then go back. 

ladipale

We are going in January and plan to leave Sac about 4pm. We will drive halfwayish, stop for dinner and a change into PJs and then continue on, arriving to Anaheim about 10 or 11ish.

Ellie is an excellent car sleeper so I'm not worried about that. She also transfers fairly easily.

ashleyhuney

We drive to LA area all the time (am here right now actually). I think that afternoon nap time is the best time for us. We get the kids tired out then leave right after lunch. They take a good, early nap which gets us quite a ways. We stop for dinner and then usually get there by 8, which isn't too late for a decent bedtime since there was a good nap. In our experience night travel could too easily backfire, once our good car sleeper wasn't able to get comfy and was miserable the whole tune.