We just returned on Saturday from a week away!
This was our first trip to Universal Studios Florida. We have been wanting to visit for a while because of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter but did not have the opportunity until this year. My amazing parents gifted us a trip to Orlando for Christmas, complete with a stay at the Universal onsite resort, Cabana Bay Beach Resort. Our last visits to Orlando were 7 & 8 years ago and we stayed at off-site condos through my mom’s Interval International ownership points. This was also our first trip without Grandma and she was sorely missed!
CBBR was chosen because of the early entrance to Wizarding World every morning which is included in the Universal resorts. CBBR is one of their newer resorts, being only 2+ years old. It is not one of the resorts that includes Express pass for staying onsite as it is considered a value resort.
Sunday - We flew into Orlando International from Bradley International, Hartford, CT. Living in NH we find it so incredibly easy just to hop on 91 and get down to Hartford. Easy in and easy out. It is about 1.5 hours from home. It was easy to get through security, etc. I gave us plenty of time so we had time to grab some breakfast and then wait for our on-time flight to Orlando. It was a very full flight. Dear Husband (49) and younger daughter (9) sat together closer to the front and Older Daughter (13) and I (41) sat together over the wings. Both of my girls love flying and requested window seats. The flight was uneventful and we landed 30 minutes early in Orlando.
I had decided not to get a rental car this time as we were staying onsite at Universal and could use their transportation. I researched extensively and decided to try using Uber this trip. What a great decision! I requested an Uber XL once in the pickup tunnel (all Ubers needs to be met in the tunnel behind the rental car desks on the bottom floor) and we were quickly picked up (5 minutes) by a black Suburban and a wonderful driver. We asked if he could stop so we could get some cases of water. Uber doesn’t allow for this with extra time or payment but our driver was great and said he would do it anyway. We stopped at a grocery store and my husband ran in for two cases of water. We drink a lot of water and did not want to have to purchase expensive bottles from the hotel. We gave our driver an extra $20 tip for stopping. Uber is so easy to pay for with the app and we had great drivers every time we used it. Wonderful experience. We were then on our way to Cabana Bay.
Cabana Bay Beach Resort is, as I stated earlier, one of the newest resorts onsite. The newest one, Sapphire Falls, is right across the street. CBBR is a huge resort. Behind CBBR is the newest Universal park, Volcano Bay, which is currently under construction and will be a massive water park when it is done.
CBBR is a themed resort based on the 50’s and 60’s with all of it’s retro coolness. It is very colorful and modern looking. Very mid-century modern in design, which happens to be my favorite. They have classic cars parked out front (3 total) and only play classic music from the same era (think Elvis!!) in the lobby and huge diner seating area. The lobby is huge, open and colorful. The wait to check in was minimal and we were quickly checked in, given a map of the resort, told where to pick up the shuttle to the parks and one our way to our room.
We were given room 6736 on the 7th floor. We got off on the 7th floor and started walking towards our room… and kept walking. Holy walking, Batman! We just kept going. Our room was almost to the end of the hall, and took forever to get there. Like I said, CBBR is a huge resort!
Our room was on the small side with 2 queen sized beds, a small table and two chairs, a good sized LED Flat Screen Samsung tv, a bathroom with separate toilet/shower room, a mini-fridge inside the tv console and a view of the Volcano Bay construction with hundreds of workers. If you turned your head just right you could see the far end of the lazy river down below. Eventually, once construction is done, it will be cool to have a view of Volcano Bay, but it was rather noisy, even 7 floors up. Plus, they are desperately trying to get it finished before summer, so construction is going on 24/7. It really was incredible how quickly it was happening though. There was a lot of progress made in just the week that we were there.
That evening we had tickets for Blue Man Group at City Walk. As we did not have much time for dinner we went to the Bayliner Diner right in the hotel. The diner is a cafeteria style food court. There are different stations for food: Grab and go with drinks, pastries, snacks, etc, Sandwich area, pasta and pizza area, burger & grill area, & carving station with more elaborate meals. My husband and youngest daughter had a steak dish, older daughter had a grilled cheese and I had the Vegan stirfry with tofu. Steak was only ok as they overcooked it and my daughter did not like the sauce. Older daughter loved her grilled cheese. I liked my stirfry, the tofu was good and the coconut sauce was good but there were so many onions in the cous cous that it was practically inedible.
Blue Man Group. We took the shuttle to City Walk, which is very easy and only about 10 minutes away. We got off and went up the escalator and went through security. Security includes putting bags through an xray machine and metal detectors for people. Security guards also have wands for scanning those that set off the metal detectors.
We arrived at 5:30 for a 6:00 show after walking through City Walk (Blue Man Group is in a sound stage fairly close to the entrance to the Universal park. What a fantastic show! My husband and I saw the show 7 years ago, the last time we were in the area. It has been modified some but even the stuff we saw last time felt new and fresh because it is just so entertaining. I highly recommend the show and it is family friendly. My girls loved it!
After the show was done we walked over to the Toothsome Chocolate Emporium. This is the newest restaurant in the area and is themed in a SteamPunk style. Very cool. It looks like a factory. The Steampunk theme is followed throughout. The front area is retail with merchandise and a variety of ice cream, chocolates and desserts available for purchase. We just wanted dessert to take back with us. It looked very busy inside but we were actually helped pretty quickly. Daughter (9) got a chocolate covered marshmallow stick, Daughter (13) got a beautiful looking chocolate napoleon, I got a fancy looking chocolate raspberry dessert and husband got a chocolate/chocolate cupcake. We then took them back to the hotel with us and relaxed with our desserts while watching tv.
Next: Monday at Universal - President's Day with Express Passes!
This was our first trip to Universal Studios Florida. We have been wanting to visit for a while because of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter but did not have the opportunity until this year. My amazing parents gifted us a trip to Orlando for Christmas, complete with a stay at the Universal onsite resort, Cabana Bay Beach Resort. Our last visits to Orlando were 7 & 8 years ago and we stayed at off-site condos through my mom’s Interval International ownership points. This was also our first trip without Grandma and she was sorely missed!
CBBR was chosen because of the early entrance to Wizarding World every morning which is included in the Universal resorts. CBBR is one of their newer resorts, being only 2+ years old. It is not one of the resorts that includes Express pass for staying onsite as it is considered a value resort.
Sunday - We flew into Orlando International from Bradley International, Hartford, CT. Living in NH we find it so incredibly easy just to hop on 91 and get down to Hartford. Easy in and easy out. It is about 1.5 hours from home. It was easy to get through security, etc. I gave us plenty of time so we had time to grab some breakfast and then wait for our on-time flight to Orlando. It was a very full flight. Dear Husband (49) and younger daughter (9) sat together closer to the front and Older Daughter (13) and I (41) sat together over the wings. Both of my girls love flying and requested window seats. The flight was uneventful and we landed 30 minutes early in Orlando.
I had decided not to get a rental car this time as we were staying onsite at Universal and could use their transportation. I researched extensively and decided to try using Uber this trip. What a great decision! I requested an Uber XL once in the pickup tunnel (all Ubers needs to be met in the tunnel behind the rental car desks on the bottom floor) and we were quickly picked up (5 minutes) by a black Suburban and a wonderful driver. We asked if he could stop so we could get some cases of water. Uber doesn’t allow for this with extra time or payment but our driver was great and said he would do it anyway. We stopped at a grocery store and my husband ran in for two cases of water. We drink a lot of water and did not want to have to purchase expensive bottles from the hotel. We gave our driver an extra $20 tip for stopping. Uber is so easy to pay for with the app and we had great drivers every time we used it. Wonderful experience. We were then on our way to Cabana Bay.
Cabana Bay Beach Resort is, as I stated earlier, one of the newest resorts onsite. The newest one, Sapphire Falls, is right across the street. CBBR is a huge resort. Behind CBBR is the newest Universal park, Volcano Bay, which is currently under construction and will be a massive water park when it is done.
CBBR is a themed resort based on the 50’s and 60’s with all of it’s retro coolness. It is very colorful and modern looking. Very mid-century modern in design, which happens to be my favorite. They have classic cars parked out front (3 total) and only play classic music from the same era (think Elvis!!) in the lobby and huge diner seating area. The lobby is huge, open and colorful. The wait to check in was minimal and we were quickly checked in, given a map of the resort, told where to pick up the shuttle to the parks and one our way to our room.
We were given room 6736 on the 7th floor. We got off on the 7th floor and started walking towards our room… and kept walking. Holy walking, Batman! We just kept going. Our room was almost to the end of the hall, and took forever to get there. Like I said, CBBR is a huge resort!
Our room was on the small side with 2 queen sized beds, a small table and two chairs, a good sized LED Flat Screen Samsung tv, a bathroom with separate toilet/shower room, a mini-fridge inside the tv console and a view of the Volcano Bay construction with hundreds of workers. If you turned your head just right you could see the far end of the lazy river down below. Eventually, once construction is done, it will be cool to have a view of Volcano Bay, but it was rather noisy, even 7 floors up. Plus, they are desperately trying to get it finished before summer, so construction is going on 24/7. It really was incredible how quickly it was happening though. There was a lot of progress made in just the week that we were there.
That evening we had tickets for Blue Man Group at City Walk. As we did not have much time for dinner we went to the Bayliner Diner right in the hotel. The diner is a cafeteria style food court. There are different stations for food: Grab and go with drinks, pastries, snacks, etc, Sandwich area, pasta and pizza area, burger & grill area, & carving station with more elaborate meals. My husband and youngest daughter had a steak dish, older daughter had a grilled cheese and I had the Vegan stirfry with tofu. Steak was only ok as they overcooked it and my daughter did not like the sauce. Older daughter loved her grilled cheese. I liked my stirfry, the tofu was good and the coconut sauce was good but there were so many onions in the cous cous that it was practically inedible.
Blue Man Group. We took the shuttle to City Walk, which is very easy and only about 10 minutes away. We got off and went up the escalator and went through security. Security includes putting bags through an xray machine and metal detectors for people. Security guards also have wands for scanning those that set off the metal detectors.
We arrived at 5:30 for a 6:00 show after walking through City Walk (Blue Man Group is in a sound stage fairly close to the entrance to the Universal park. What a fantastic show! My husband and I saw the show 7 years ago, the last time we were in the area. It has been modified some but even the stuff we saw last time felt new and fresh because it is just so entertaining. I highly recommend the show and it is family friendly. My girls loved it!
After the show was done we walked over to the Toothsome Chocolate Emporium. This is the newest restaurant in the area and is themed in a SteamPunk style. Very cool. It looks like a factory. The Steampunk theme is followed throughout. The front area is retail with merchandise and a variety of ice cream, chocolates and desserts available for purchase. We just wanted dessert to take back with us. It looked very busy inside but we were actually helped pretty quickly. Daughter (9) got a chocolate covered marshmallow stick, Daughter (13) got a beautiful looking chocolate napoleon, I got a fancy looking chocolate raspberry dessert and husband got a chocolate/chocolate cupcake. We then took them back to the hotel with us and relaxed with our desserts while watching tv.
Next: Monday at Universal - President's Day with Express Passes!
