Florida Trip Day 3 (Disney Universal Studios)
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Driving from Dallas to DeFuniak Springs, FL

We left Dallas on our trip to Florida on Wednesday morning, and we knew that the entire first day of our trip would be spent behind the wheel of my little Hyundai.

The first segment of our trip, which took us from about 10AM to 1PM, took us from central Dallas east along I-20 to Shreveport, LA, around the city on the new bypass, and onto I-49 south.

From Shreveport, we headed south on I-49, stopping about two hours later near the city of Alexandria to have lunch at a little BBQ place that we happened to see a sign for. Then we continued south on I-49 until we picked up I-10 near Lafayette, LA. We headed east on I-10 towards Baton Rouge.

The drive from Layfayette to Baton Rouge is an interesting one, as most of the trip is on an elevated roadway that crosses one of the largest swamps in Louisiana. This part of I-10 is actually quite old; this stretch has been unchanged since the first time I drove this way with Grant back in the late 1980s. At first I thought that Fred had not been on this road before, but then I found he had, although it had been many years previously.

The elevated causeway ended some miles west of Baton Rouge, and we began seeing since for both the city and the Mississippi River crossing. Then, after some more mile, we were there. The point where we crossed the Mississippi to enter Baton Rouge itself was just about the only place along our drive down where we took any pictures. Since I was driving it was Fred that took them. If you will click on the thumbnail images below, you can see the pictures that Fred took as we crossed the Mississippi River just west of Baton Rouge:

We encountered a lot of traffic where I-10 goes south to New Orleans and I-12 continues on eastward. It took us the better part of an hour to make it through Baton Rouge, and by the time we were well east of the city the sun was setting. But then we had clear sailing all the way to the Louisiana-Mississippi border. We passed north of Gulfport, and on into Alabama and through Mobile. We stopped for dinner just east of Mobile, where I also took the time to make a hotel reservation another hundred miles down the road in De Funiak Springs, Florida.

After eating, we continued eastward on I-10, crossing north of Pensacola, past Eglin AFB and to the exit for De Funiak Springs.

We reached the exit for the town of De Funiak Springs a bit after 10PM, and we were ready to stop. The Super 8 Motel was easy to find, and the accomodations were waiting for us. I broke out a Diet Sunkist and we hit the hay.

Driving from De Funiak Springs FL to Orlando FL

We got away from the motel fairly early, and were on the road towards Tallahassee on I-10. This part of the drive around Tallahassee and over to I-75 south took us until early afternoon.

When we turned onto I-75 south, it was getting on towards lunchtime, so we started looking for a place to stop and eat. It wasn't until we got to Gainesville that we found lots of stuff, and we got off the highway to both get gas and have some lunch at a local Shoney's. Then it was back onto I-75 south and then, eventually, onto the Florida Turnpike, which begins to angle off southeast towards Orlando.

We had talked to Ron and Jay a couple of times on the phone; they had already made it to the hotel by the time we reached the outskirts of Orlando. They told us where the hotel itself was, and we figured out the route to it for ourselves. We got off the Turnpike at I-4, and took that southwest for just a ways to Route 528- the Beeline Expressway- which we took just one exit east.

When we got off the exit for International Drive (the main street through the entertainment area of Orlando proper), we just went across the drive and onto Westwood Blvd. and took that about two blocks to the hotel. We got checked in easily (into a very nice little suite-type room) and then met up with Ron and Jay.

Ron wanted to take a nap, so while he did that Fred and I went out to do a bit of exploring (and see if there was a flat area we could throw the Frisbee). In the latter quest we failed, but we did navigate the nearby entertainment area (where the Civic Center and Exposition Center are) and located a Don Pablo's for dinner. We came back to the hotel and I ended up using the recumbent bike in the fitness center for a while until Ron and Jay were ready to get something to eat.

We made our plans for the next day, planning to do Disney Universal Studios on Friday and then Disney's Animal Kingdom on Saturday.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	Florida Trip Day 3 (Disney Universal Studios)
	Return to the Florida Trip Master Index