Thanks, all. I appreciate the advice. So if I were to travel the 26th and the 2nd you think that wouldn't be too bad?

I haven't done this drive at Christmas, but we do it every year at Spring Break which is also a heavy travel time south. We have never had any problem with traffic once we got south of Fredericksburg.

I would do the 27th through the 2nd. I think a lot of people travel on the 26, since that gives them time to spend the 25th at home.

We did a DC-Florida road trip last year during that time, stopping in SC for a night. We drove from DC to SC on Christmas Day and of course there wasn't any traffic. I would guess that the day after Christmas is probably not too bad either (we drove from SC to Florida that day and didn't hit major traffic). I do think you're likely to hit a lot more traffic on the trip home. On our return trip last year we ended up stopping for a sitdown dinner around Richmond, I think, to wait out the typical Fredericksburg area backup.

In my experience Christmas day itself is a great travel day.

bump

We want to visit family in SC between Christmas and New Years (but not on actual the holidays). I detest holiday travel. We are flexible on days - somewhat. If we traveled down the day after Christmas would it be less congested? When would be the best day to come back? I can take off Monday, January 5. Ideas?