Is 1 day at Universal enough?

[InNeverlandWithPan]

Hello,

My friend and I are going to Disney World in November for 8 nights. We are planning to rent a car for a day and go over to Universal to see the Harry Potter park and stuff. Do you think one day would be enough to take in most of the HP Park and Universal (not worrying about IOA)? We will be going on a Tuesday during a very uncrowded time according to traffic calendars. The park will supposedly be open from 9-6 and we plan to be there before opening.

Any insight would be very much appreciated! Also, if we buy a 1-day 1-park ticket and plan to use it at Universal, will that allow us in to HP? Or do we need to get the park-to-park pass?

Thank you!

 

[Brian Noble]

I've spent a half day in the Louvre, and "saw it"---which is to say I saw Venus de Milo and the Mona Lisa, and *maybe* a Rembrandt self portrait, but almost nothing else. That's all the time I had, so that's all I did.

My wife and kids spent a week last year at Sea World and the two Universal parks, and spent most of that time at Universal. They were not bored.

Finally, the Potterverse is not a separate park. It is part of IOA. If you have only one day, I'd focus on IOA and skip the other park.

 

[Detailor]

Any insight would be very much appreciated! Also, if we buy a 1-day 1-park ticket and plan to use it at Universal, will that allow us in to HP? Or do we need to get the park-to-park pass?!

No, a 1 park, 1 day ticket will get you into Universal or Islands of Adventure (where the Harry Potter attractions are located). If you're interested in the rides and attractions at Universal and want to take in Harry Potter you'll need at least a park-to-park, 1 day ticket. Just be aware that it costs a little less for a
2 day/one park per day ticket than it does for a 1 day/two park ticket.

There's a lot to see and do at the Universal theme parks and I'd be surprised if you didn't find a two visit to be worthwhile.

Dick Taylor

 

[DCTooTall]

It's doable... but maybe not totally recommended.

The question you have to ask yourself is are you someone who likes running from attraction to attraction, or do you prefer a more leisurely touring pace?

Also, several attractions at Universal Studios are more like shows in their scheduling/pacing than rides, even though they are usually shown to "run continously". this means if you wanted to do things like Terminator, Disaster, the horror Makeup show, Twister, Shrek, etc.... during an off-season you could end up spending a lot of the day waiting for the next show to start.


Either way, As others have mentioned, The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is located in the IOA park, so you would need a park-to-park if you were wanting to do both Universal Studios and HP on the same day. Honestly though, If time allows I'd recommend looking into just doing 2 days and doing a park each day. IOA can be a lot of fun and you can easily spend a day in each park.

 

[DOOM1001]

HP is only part of IOA,it's not a separate park.Universal is the other park next door,as someone said to do both parks in one day you'll need a 2 park one day pass which is expensive and there's no way you'd get most of the attractions in unless it's a very slow day.I would suggest at least 2 days for the parks and a preferrably a third day.

 

[A Mickeyfan]

I agree with all that is said here, you really cannot do all in one day. You can see, but not do... why don't you check out the Universal/IOA sub forums and see what they have to say about different attractions, waits etc over there.. it may help you a little...

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

Wow, we can't do all of 1 park in 1 day even when staying onsite there and using our room key to bypass lines. I would highly recommend allowing 2 days, 1 for each park and staying onsite. Even a 1 night stay gets you Express Line access (like Fast Pass) from park opening on the day you check in, until park closing on the day you check out. So a 1 nt stay gets you 2 full park days with the key.
We will never do Universal without a room key.

 

[A Mickeyfan]

Wow, we can't do all of 1 park in 1 day even when staying onsite there and using our room key to bypass lines. I would highly recommend allowing 2 days, 1 for each park and staying onsite. Even a 1 night stay gets you Express Line access (like Fast Pass) from park opening on the day you check in, until park closing on the day you check out. So a 1 nt stay gets you 2 full park days with the key.
We will never do Universal without a room key.

if you plan it right, it can be done without a room key.... maybe HP should have had an app for that that is if we ever get out touch pads

I use to stay on site there (when my DH made more than what he is now), but times have changed so I stay off site. I go early in the morning and can manage to get a lot done. Since these parks have several rides, unlike Disney, with single rider lanes, my family splits up. We do singles. My kids are much older now, so it really doesn't matter to us (18, 23 & next week the oldest will be 25).

 

[kacaju]

As others have said Harry Potter is just one section inside Islands of Adventure, you do not need a separate ticket to get in.
If your plan is to focus on Harry Potter and then take the rest of the day to explore IOA, then yes you can probably do it in one day if you don't care if you end up skipping a few things.
If you want to see Universal as well as Harry Potter then you need the 2 park pass and you really should plan on two days. They are both great parks...we just spent a week there going back and forth between the two parks and had a blast!!

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

if you plan it right, it can be done without a room key.... maybe HP should have had an app for that that is if we ever get out touch pads

I use to stay on site there (when my DH made more than what he is now), but times have changed so I stay off site. I go early in the morning and can manage to get a lot done. Since these parks have several rides, unlike Disney, with single rider lanes, my family splits up. We do singles. My kids are much older now, so it really doesn't matter to us (18, 23 & next week the oldest will be 25).

We had APs for a few years which allows a great discount for onsite hotels. ($139-179/night) Dh is getting "parked out" so we didn't renew.
We like the single rider line for HP. It was the shortest of all lines and still ended up riding together sometimes.

Some day we'll get our touchpads.

 

[oobidoo]

We have a WDW trip coming up next month, and we plan to go to IOA and spend 99% of our time at WWHP that day. We don't really care for wild rides, though, so this is enough for us. When we went last year, we really didn't feel like we had enough time to "take in" the whole Harry Potter experience, and realized after that we would have rather spent the majority of our time in that area. This is, of course, personal preference, but if your main objective were WWHP, with maybe a couple of other rides thrown in, then one day is plenty. i agree with other posters, though, if you plan to hit both parks. It would take up half of one day just walking between rides/parks, so you would really need a minimum of two days.

 

[LMO429]

We did one day at universal park to park oct 3rd of last year. The park was for the most part dead.. The hours were 9 to 6pm as well. and we purchased the express pass.We arrived at rope drop and immediately went to forbidden journey no wait walked right on..We did pretty much all the rides/attractions that we wanted to see and went on all the headliners..even stopped for an hour lunch break. Did we see every detail the park had to offer, no..but we were content with what we did experience and do not feel like we missed anything.

i would advise bringing a change of clothes if you intend on doing the water rides..you do get soaked...either bring a pair of clothes leave them in a locker or your car...or do the water rides towards the end of evening..even when its hot i personally am not a fan of walking around in wet clothes

enjoy!

 

[JustCallMeMommy]

We did both parks pretty thoroughly on a 14 hour day (rope drop to park close on an extended hour day), but we had some help:

• We purchased the front of the line pass (good for each ride one time - we never waited more than a few minutes for any ride)
• We skipped the 2 big coasters that DD wasn't tall enough to ride.

We could not have done it in a 9 hour day. You could probably do all of Islands of Adventure, including Harry Potter, in a 9-6 day.

 

[Jacie]

My husband and I flew in at Noon, made it to the parks and did both parks before leaving at 6. We saw and did almost everything (With the exception of the Suess stuff.) I wish we had spent more time roaming in Hogsmeade, but given another hour, we could have.

I'd say a day is plenty.

 

[Oglet]

My husband and I flew in at Noon, made it to the parks and did both parks before leaving at 6. We saw and did almost everything (With the exception of the Suess stuff.) I wish we had spent more time roaming in Hogsmeade, but given another hour, we could have.

I'd say a day is plenty.

Are you sure that you didnt miss half of the parks?

 

[Tinkerbellie16]

It depends on what you want to do and see. If you are only interested in a few rides, it will be fine. We went to IOA for a half day over Memorial Weekend and it was fine. But only DH went on the 'big' rides. We also had front of the line passes since we were staying onsite and this helped tremendously. We went to the park early to go to WWOHP (cool looking ONLY - the castle was so cool inside and the ride was HORRIBLE). Anyway, I thought it was all ok but I must be really disney-fied because I was itching to leave. And I must be getting really old too because they play their music way too loud in the parks!!

 

[DCTooTall]

Wow, we can't do all of 1 park in 1 day even when staying onsite there and using our room key to bypass lines. I would highly recommend allowing 2 days, 1 for each park and staying onsite. Even a 1 night stay gets you Express Line access (like Fast Pass) from park opening on the day you check in, until park closing on the day you check out. So a 1 nt stay gets you 2 full park days with the key.
We will never do Universal without a room key.

In November, I'm thinking they can easily avoid needing the express access. i went during november 2009 and literally walked onto every attraction w/o the express.

Now... WWHP will probably have increased lines a little.... and closer to the holiday i'd be surprised if things are the same... But for the majority of November, since it's off-season and much slower than during the summer/spring months, Most people can probably bypass the needing of an Express Pass and still get things done.

My husband and I flew in at Noon, made it to the parks and did both parks before leaving at 6. We saw and did almost everything (With the exception of the Suess stuff.) I wish we had spent more time roaming in Hogsmeade, but given another hour, we could have.

I'd say a day is plenty.

I don't doubt you could've done the headliners, but there are quite a few things you would've have had time to do in only 6hrs thru both parks..... especcialy if you went during a time of year (or day) when the parks are even moderately crowded.

 

[petals]

It depends on how interested you are in the rides and that. Last year we got 2 park pass for one day but all we did in universal was E.T. which was ten minute wait then we went to Wizarding World of Harry Potter and Suess Landing we didn't want to see anything else though so it suited us.

 

[Queen2PrincessG]

I think it depends on what you want to accomplish and if you have been before. I would say you need two days if you wanted to do everything with no Express lane.

 

[mom2princesses2]

In November, I'm thinking they can easily avoid needing the express access. i went during november 2009 and literally walked onto every attraction w/o the express.

Now... WWHP will probably have increased lines a little.... and closer to the holiday i'd be surprised if things are the same... But for the majority of November, since it's off-season and much slower than during the summer/spring months, Most people can probably bypass the needing of an Express Pass and still get things done.

Just saw that there is a 10th Anniversary celebration of the HP movies at WWOHP from Nov. 11-13 so that will increase traffic during those days. They'll have some cast members there.