Day 5: Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure
Started the day off as usual. Woke up, showered and left about 8. Chip was still not going with me to the parks. Oh well. Here's what the
Hub looks like from my angle walking to the park.
Bubba Gump,
Endangered Species Store
I was actually somewhat hungry this morning (and I had time to kill) so I went to
Cinnabon. OMG, the
Pecan Roll was to die for. I got to the
front gates with about 15-20 minutes to spare. They opened the gates early again, but were only letting people ride Jimmy Neutron or Shrek. I chose Jimmy, not that I didn't like Shrek, but I just really love that stupid chicken dance part. It completes me. It's amazing how quickly they get things put together over here. I was at the Studios Monday, and by Thursday they had the
Witch's Tower (or I assumed it was, am I right?), and these
construction walls were farther out (
Before pic).
I wonder what they're building, lol. I got some pics I forgot to get the first time I was here:
Twister entrance,
Mummy entrance
I fell in love with ROTM, and I rode it a total of 4 times back to back. The TM working the entrance was amazed at how many times I was willing to die. I was alone on 2 of the 4 rides. And Imhotep was not working today.
Second ride.
Mummy prop On my last time through, I was behind these two people who were trying to use their room keys for the FOTL, but the TM told them there wasn't a wait and to use the regular line. It turns out they were the friends me and Chip made at Dueling Dragons on Tuesda! (Kristine and Mike) We rode ROTM together, and, since I was alone, I asked if they didn't mind my tagging along. They didn't, luckily. We decided to hit MIB next. I had more fun this time on our two times through. Mike got the bonus the first time, and I got it the second. Mike still had the highest score both times. For some reason, walking through the queue the first time, the windows of the
break room were fogged up, but not the second time.
Slime,
big screen,
1st ride,
2nd ride
I had fun in that crazy misting Coke thing:
1,
2
We hit The Simpsons next. I don't think I could ever get tired of this ride. We were on the 1st level I think our first ride.
Map of Krustyland.
Patty and Selma,
Groundskeeper Willy. Then we were on the third or second level the second time, and I was able to get these pics:
Moleman,
Wheel of Pain, The Future-Looker-Atter
didn't know we were coming. For those who don't know, it is Simpsons creator Matt Groening in this
pic with Krusty.
The Best Krusty Can Afford.
100 Tacos for $100.
The first showing of T2-3D was starting soon, so we headed that way. We past
Ghiradelli, and
Cafe La Bamba. I also noticed that what looked like part of the setup for The Skoolhouse had been put up:
The Skool and the
bus. Right by the show building, we ran into
Curious George and
Woody and Wendy Woodpeker. I felt bad cause I didn't know Wendy's name (I didn't even know there was a female woodpecker actually). We had a better Kimberly Duncan this show, in my opinion. And better seats. At the exit, we ran into one of those survey people. Apparently, the survey had to do with Lay's Kettle Cooked chips. I don't really like chips, but Kristine got selected to do the taste test part, so we got to go inside the
Dark Room to wait on her. Inside:
Ceiling,
columns,
pictures. Kristine and Mike had yet to ride Jimmy Neutron, so we rode that next. Spongebob had just come out to take pictures as we were exiting,
me and Sponebob,
Spongebob with Kristine and Mike Outside, I found
Dora the Explorer and
Jimmy Neutron.
The Simpsons were out too, but it started to rain as we were in line, so no pics with them.
We were hungry, and since it was their last day there, Kristine and Mike wanted to do both parks, so I convinced them to go to Mythos. I'm a sly little devil. Mwahaha!!
Mike had never really worn flip flops before, so his feet weren't used to them, and he had a blister in between his toes. Luckily they sold
Crocs at a kart in IOA. Which I told him about. While he was surveying the Croc selection, I took this
pic and spied someone in a bright blue outfit.
We yelled to Mike we were going to be over in the Marvel island. Did you guess who I saw? Here he is with
me and
Kristine. Over yonder, we took our pics with my favorite Marvel women:
me,
Kristine and
Mike. Wolverine:
me,
Kristine and
Mike. Captain America:
me,
Kristine and Mike.
We decided it would be quicker to head through Seuss Landing to Mythos than to keep going the direction we had started.
Entrance to Seuss Landing,
Green Eggs and Ham. I think the Lost Continent is probably my favorite Island.
That vomiting guy,
Poseidon's arm,
Poseidon building. We arrived at Mythos, which was actually a little busy!!
Chandeleir at the entrance. We only had to wait like 5 minutes at most for a table. We also had the same waiter me and Chip had when we were here.
view from table,
menu,
back of menu,
carved column,
fountain,
oven. I got the
Aqua Panna water. Kristine had the
Mythos beer which she said was pretty good (I don't like beer
). I remembered to get an appetizer this time, and I chose the
shrimp tempura which was good. Mike got the
Chef's Signature Pizza and Kristine had the
tortilla soup. Since I had the Pastabilities my previous meal, I got the
risotto of the day this time. I know it had beef medallions, and I think it was a Spinach Alfredo risotto (spinach for sure), with asparagus and button mushrooms. It was tasty. Kristine had the
Mythos bistro filet and Mike had the
Chicken a la Oscar, which he let me try a bit of the crab cake, very good. I love seafood. For dessert, I believe I had the chocolate sabayon dessert shot, and Kristine and Mike split the
rice krispie sushi dessert.
It was still drizzling outside, so we headed to Poseidon. There was a line and we didn't feel like waiting for the next show, but I did get these pics:
archway,
Columns 1,
columns 2,
um.....whatever this is,
Map of the Lost Continent. We headed back to Seuss Landing to ride Cat in the Hat. More hat pics!
Things,
Cat in the Hat hats. With the rain, it was hard to tell which rides were running or not, so we made our way to Jurassic Park, and I got this pic of the
Harry Potter building. Raptor hat!
1,
2. We ducked inside the Discovery Center for a bit.
Dinosaurs. I don't remember where I took this
pic at. We stopped by Hulk too, but that wasn't running. We were all tired at that point, and hungry again, so we headed out and towards Margaritaville.
Lighthouse. Oh, funny story. We stopped at that little shop at the exit of IOA, and I found acute shirt that had Dracula, Frankenstein, his Bride and the Wolfman on it that had "Classic Rocker" underneath. Well I didn't check the tag when I bought it. Got back to the room later, tried it on and the neckline was weird. I looked at the tag.....it's a woman's shirt!
I ended up giving it to my mom, but I didn't tell her that story!
There was no wait at Margaritaville. We got a good view of the volcano, but it was too far away for a pic. Kristine and Mike both had a
Red Stripe to drink. I tried the "Off to See the Lizard" margarita. It was pretty good. We got picked by the stilt walkers to get the first balloon hats of the night.
me,
Mike,
Kristine. We split the
crab dip for the appetizer. We were all still kinda full (why we decided to eat, I still don't remember, lol). Kristine and Mike had appetizers for their meal, the
volcano nachos and the
Jamaica Mistaka wings respectively. I, of course, had to have the
Cheeseburger in Paradise, which I again gave away the pickle. The cheeseburger was delicious, and I ate most of it, even though I shouldn't have. lol We were too full for dessert (and I had gotten fudge on the way out of IOA I now remember). But we still wanted to chat some more. We decided to go to Cigarz and have a smoke and chill (I'm a social smoker. Bad Robert, I know). We had fun talking, and we had a lot in common (me and Kristine are both big musical fans). After that, they headed back to their room at RPR, and I prepared for my walk back to my hotel. I stopped by the theater on my way out to pick up my ticket for the Rocky Horror Picture Show the following evening. And I'll have my final park day posted sometime soon. Probably Thursday, my next day off!