A Salute to AK but mostly Dinosaur! TR 9/5-9/14/24! New TR link**

[disneyAndi14]

Very cute Magic Shot!

We have found this a nice spot for a picture and usually never a wait here!

I do too. There is so much to see in here.

It is a fun walk through. I can see how littles would really love this spot with all the water features!

The front row is the best row.

I love the front row on LWTL We usually get it since we are a group of 2 or 3

We had these last year and really enjoyed them.

We thought the pickles were delicious from this booth! We didn’t try any of the wings here. I’m not a big chicken wing fan with the bone in, to messy!

I just read Disney has announced backstage with the new baby tiger and momma.
Can’t remember if is starting Tuesday are in Tuesdays only.
Keep this secret.I hope nobody ever reads your trip. Reports!

I can’t wait to see the baby tiger one day! I will be watching! I have seen so many babies now at AK it is really enjoyable!

Did you happen to get photo of Marley before he was retired to his private Paradise ?
He was a giant crocodile living back there in Dino dogs area. Talk about scary lizards ! My one and only picture of Marley is terrible and would love if you shared something better.

standing at waters edge wondering where an alligator would hide as we looked across to the golfers …and then we looked down at waters edge and guess what was sleeping at waters edge by our feet. Then we took out our cellphones to take pictures!

I always stopped to see the big crocodile at Dinoland! I don’t have a good picture of him either!
Wow, scary! I saw an alligator swimming in the waterway behind our studio ant Beach Club once when I was on the balcony!

And I love the Grinch morethan Mickey Mouse during the holidays!

I love the Grinch and Universal at Christmas also Earl the Squirrel mascot at Universal!

This is a fun area. Just don't go there when you don't want to get wet, like on a cold day. But it is perfect for kids.

I always stay on the dry path! I certainly see the draw for the kids

That picture turned out cute.

I couldn’t believe it was decent and not some weird Swiss cheese one like my previous one

We saw the Harvest display last week and I thought that they had forgotten to take down a Halloween decoration.

I thought it was a nice fall area, soon all Christmas decorations at Epcot!

This is one of my favorite F&W foods. I love kalua pork and would eat it when we would go to Hawaii.

Same, I love it, usually I get it at least twice! My picture for lack of a better word resembled vomit so I couldn’t post it haha

 

[pkondz]

They like The Edison. I haven’t been yet.

Try it. Interesting place.

Thank you. I should have smiled more because I was having a good time!

In that case… yes you should have!

It is new on the Boardwalk

I need to get back there sometime.

Of course Dinosaur is the best no one would debate that duh

I think people are holding grudges and want the old Splash back.

Ohhhh…

You know like how I will be when Dinosaur turns into Indiana Jones. I will hold a grudge and be very salty about it!

Those brain freezes really hurt! Our winters are just like yours and I would never drink an Icee outside in the winter here! Haha

Google slurpee capital of the world

Today was our last morning at WDW.

The worst.

They will put cold items in the refrigerator for storage.

Huh! Had no idea.

We stopped for a PhotoPass picture in France!

Fun shot.

Journey of Water.

Fun photo of Andi.

Next up LwTL and I got a foot picture on here since we had the front row.

Not required but I appreciate the dedication.

Here I am picking out my party outfit on SE

Another picture of Kait and Andi at Journey of Water.

Nice shot.

I waited at the Fry Booth for Adoba Yuca Fries with garlic cilantro aioli.

I’ve had that but don’t recall if I liked it.

They gave the girls the pickle cider free because they made a mistake thinking they had ordered this. Thank goodness it was free, it was really gross. Enough pickles already, haha

I can’t see ever ordering that.

The girls picked up the potato and pea samosa with coriander lime cream. They liked this.

Can’t go wrong with a samosa.

Slow-roasted pork slider with sweet and sour dole pineapple chutney and spicy mayonnaise. This was delicious and continues to be a favorite of mine.

That is sooooo good.

Despite the look on my face I had a good time.

The lady behind you is living her best life.

Stay tuned for the scary portion of the trip, coming up soon!

Ooooohhhhh

 

[eliseisawkward]

Dipping my toes back in to trip reports after a hiatus and I was so excited to see a name I recognized!!

Love the report so far. Congrats to Andi on the engagement and the house!! She’s a real adult now.

 

[disneyAndi14]

Try it. Interesting place.

It is on the list. The girls really liked the atmosphere at The Edison

I need to get back there sometime.

Yes, try the Blue Ribbon corn dogs and visited the Boardwalk!

Google slurpee capital of the world

Wow, you all take your icee drinks seriously
Winnipeg is the Slurpee® capital of the world. Funnily enough, Winnipeggers have the world's most refined taste buds. Haha you all have numb reflexes now so don’t get the brain freeze

Huh! Had no idea.

That is why I added it in the report because I thought they wouldn’t do that anymore. I was happy because we had a jug of cold brew and creamer, and a few other fridge goodies

Fun photo of Andi.

For once she was okay with maybe getting a little wet!

Not required but I appreciate the dedication.

Haha I thought this would give me extra points showing a foot picture on LwtL

I can’t see ever ordering that.

It was downright disgusting, like drinking pickle juice yuck

That is sooooo good.

I love that precious little Hawaii bun. I should have got two!

The lady behind you is living her best life.

I think she was new to the ride if I remember correctly she was nervous at the start but look at her now!

Dipping my toes back in to trip reports after a hiatus and I was so excited to see a name I recognized!!

Yay Welcome back! Thanks for reading and commenting

Love the report so far. Congrats to Andi on the engagement and the house!! She’s a real adult now.

It is hard for me to believe Andi is an adult now! We have had so many wonderful trips to Disney through the years! I’m so happy for her and Kait!

 

[pkondz]

Yes, try the Blue Ribbon corn dogs and visited the Boardwalk!

I will!


Some day.

Wow, you all take your icee drinks seriously

Yes we do.

Winnipeg is the Slurpee® capital of the world.

for about 20 years in a row now. Little more I think.

you all have numb reflexes now so don’t get the brain freeze

For once she was okay with maybe getting a little wet!

Did she?

Haha I thought this would give me extra points showing a foot picture on LwtL

points awarded!

think she was new to the ride if I remember correctly she was nervous at the start but look at her now!

 

[disneyAndi14]

Tip toe through the tulips …..

We headed back to BWI to pick up our luggage and get a Lyft for the resort change to Universal. We spent some time talking to a very nice CM at the valet area for BWI.

He is a super fan of the HHN event so he was really excited for us to be spending two nights at the scary event.

Our Lyft arrived and off we went. This portion of the trip was 3 nights at Portofino Bay. I had done the online check in and requested a higher floor. We had an AP rate for a Bayview room. Our ride over was uneventful and soon we were at the Italian seaside resort. I went to see if our room was ready and it was. The TM did say the area we are in is right in the middle of all the construction, otherwise he had another room in the west area with a water view but on a lower level. I said we would rather have that. He gave me the EP cards and off we went. Bell Service here is wonderful, they grabbed all our stuff and said they would bring it up shortly. Well… we got to the room and this is what we saw, Ugh! our window was completely covered with an opaque paint barrier. It was not good.

We headed back down to see if it was possible to get a room that didn’t have all the painting going on outside.

I get to the front desk and right when the TM was looking for something else their Internet went down. Wondering if the construction crew hit something? They were totally helpless without the Internet . We went and sat in the lobby and it took over an hour to get the Internet back up and running.
A photo op in the lobby.

The manager came to talk with us and he said they didn’t have lake view rooms left at this point, that didn’t have the windows covered. He did have a standard room without painting going on outside and offered to take $40.00 off a night since I had paid for the bay view. We said that was just fine. We found our room and since it was later than we thought, Andi had pushed our Antojitos reservation back a little. Our room was just fine. We just had a view of a mud puddle and some bushes, haha I will take that over the painters and the totally covered up window. I really like this resort, rooms are big, great staff, restaurants, and ambiance, however, it really was a giant construction zone this time.


It actually was fairly quiet in our room and the construction crews didn’t bother us at all. The price for 3 nights at this deluxe resort with EP was worth the construction in my opinion.

We got our luggage sent up and unpacked what we needed. We put the cold items in the fridge and got ready to head out. Our rest time was basically sitting around the lobby. We had to dig deep for extra energy because our night was going to last until 1am!

We gathered up our essentials for the night. We had tickets for HHN which included 9/11&9/12. We added EP (express pass) to both nights. This allowed us express access to all 10 houses one time.

We took the boat transportation over to Citywalk for our dinner reservation. We did notice last year at HHN the food booths were often always extremely long lines so we wanted to eat beforehand.

We checked in and asked for a table outside. It wasn’t too crowded at this time. It was a little before 5pm. We each ordered a Margarita and chips and salsa were served up.

I really like the salsa and chips here. The salsa is very fresh and delicious.

The girls decided to share the chicken and rice burrito with a cheese sauce on it and red beans. Andi and I have had this before and it is really yummy.

I decided to try the chicken taquitos. I love the ones at Frontera Cocina. I liked the ones here but Frontera beats Antojitos in this selection.

We enjoyed our dinner and drinks. I do get a 10% discount with my AP and certain places this week are 20% off for Passholder Appreciation days.

I paid and we headed out enjoying some of the decorations along Citywalk before entering HHN through the special hotel guest entrance by Hard Rock restaurant.

Follow me to the next post as we tip toe through the tulips…

 

[disneyAndi14]

Tip Toe through the Tulips …

We checked in and entered HHN. It was still light out which I do like for some of the scare zones, makes it less scary for me!

Last year Andi and I found out our eyes didn’t adjust well to the very dark houses when it is still light out. I literally felt blind last year in the first few houses and it wasn’t as enjoyable.

We decided this year to do a few scare zones and The Ghostbusters House since this was not a real dark house. It was based on the Frozen Empire film which is the newest in the GB series. I had watched the movie prior to the trip.

First we walked through the Renaissance Festival gone bad, this was a scare zone.


We walked through the Zombie swamp? Scare zone.

This year Universal did a couple areas featuring characters from movies. This was really a good photo op area. Here are characters from Blum House productions like Megan, The Black phone, and The Purge.

Here are pictures of these zones.






We also walked through Diagon Alley and the Death Eaters were out so we caught some of this.

Next, we started our houses with Ghostbusters! I liked it! The production value in each room was awesome.

We continued on with the houses.

Our average wait time was under 15 minutes with the EP, a couple more popular houses were maybe 15-20 minutes for us. The houses stand by lines all posted 50-90 minutes. Let’s continue to Tip through the Tulips

 

[disneyAndi14]

Tip through the Tulips

Here is a little synopsis from each house in the order of my favorite to least favorite from Universal Studio’s website.





I loved this house, it had really good scares and the whole storyline was so good.





































I really enjoyed all the houses and how much time and work goes into these productions.

 

[disneyAndi14]

Still Tip Toeing through the Tulips …

The scariest house was Insidious with Tip toe through the tulips playing in the background! Very creepy and terrifying jump scares everywhere!

It was a great night.



My favorite house!
We had brought our refillable cup from last year and just that week the big wigs at Universal said don’t accept these anymore to all the bartenders! Such a bummer because the cups had been refillable up to the week we got there. So no more using last year’s mug from now on.

We bought the new cup for this year and would usual get two drinks and split the drinks 3 ways using the old cup!

I didn’t write down the different drinks we tried. I really liked everything. Nothing was outstanding and nothing was bad!

We also used our gift cards we had purchased in February at Mardi Gras, which was really nice to have! Between the 3 of us we had $300.00 in gift cards for the food and drink booths. We spent it all by our last day on Saturday.

It was busy but I didn’t think the crowds were too crazy this year. It helped that we went on Wednesday and Thursday with the EP.

We had finished all 10 houses around 11:00pm. I decided to head back to the hotel. The girls had another plan! I had heard you could add EP unlimited to your EP later in the night if it wasn’t to busy. Well it was only $30 for the upgrade for each girl so they did it. They planned on staying until the closing at 2am.

I picked up some Vodoo donuts and headed to the boat launch. I was back to the room around midnight. I only got a picture of the donut box, lol I must have been tired. I picked up the Vodoo doll with raspberry jam, the Captain crunch, little pink, and a regular glazed

Here are some of the T shirts we saw tonight for this year’s event. I ended up buying a couple T shirts!




The girls stayed and did all 10 houses again.

They did stop for a little snack. It was a chocolate Cherry dessert from The Insidious booth.

They got back to the room around 2am. Their feet were really sore! They walked over 38,000 steps! It was hot and humid tonight with a few sprinkles of rain but nothing major! The rain actually felt good because of the heat!

Stay tuned for more Universal fun coming up soon.

“Not with 3 barrels on him”

 

[Wood Nymph]

He did have a standard room without painting going on outside and offered to take $40.00 off a night since I had paid for the bay view. We said that was just fine. We found our room and since it was later than we thought, Andi had pushed our Antojitos reservation back a little. Our room was just fine. We just had a view of a mud puddle and some bushes, haha I will take that over the painters and the totally covered up window.

I agree with you about the covered windows. I would have asked for clear windows, too.

Last year Andi and I found out our eyes didn’t adjust well to the very dark houses when it is still light out. I literally felt blind last year in the first few houses and it wasn’t as enjoyable.

That was a good plan. It is hard to adjust to the dark when it is bright sunlight outside.

Our average wait time was under 15 minutes with the EP, a couple more popular houses were maybe 15-20 minutes for us.

The EP was definitely worth it. Was this one of the earliest parties of the season?

We had brought our refillable cup from last year and just that week the big wigs at Universal said don’t accept these anymore to all the bartenders! Such a bummer because the cups had been refillable up to the week we got there. So no more using last year’s mug from now on.

That was a bummer, especially since you went to all that trouble to save and return with the mugs.

They walked over 38,000 steps!

Wow! But they are young enough for it.

 

[vamassey1]

Sorry your room situation took a bit to sort out. Sounds like it was good in the end.

I admire you for doing the scary stuff. The most I will do is checking out the new area in Epic Park in May. People jumping out at me is too much for me.

 

[schumigirl]

Tip toe through the tulips …..

We headed back to BWI to pick up our luggage and get a Lyft for the resort change to Universal. We spent some time talking to a very nice CM at the valet area for BWI.

He is a super fan of the HHN event so he was really excited for us to be spending two nights at the scary event.

Our Lyft arrived and off we went. This portion of the trip was 3 nights at Portofino Bay. I had done the online check in and requested a higher floor. We had an AP rate for a Bayview room. Our ride over was uneventful and soon we were at the Italian seaside resort. I went to see if our room was ready and it was. The TM did say the area we are in is right in the middle of all the construction, otherwise he had another room in the west area with a water view but on a lower level. I said we would rather have that. He gave me the EP cards and off we went. Bell Service here is wonderful, they grabbed all our stuff and said they would bring it up shortly. Well… we got to the room and this is what we saw, Ugh! our window was completely covered with an opaque paint barrier. It was not good.
View attachment 913582
We headed back down to see if it was possible to get a room that didn’t have all the painting going on outside.

I get to the front desk and right when the TM was looking for something else their Internet went down. Wondering if the construction crew hit something? They were totally helpless without the Internet . We went and sat in the lobby and it took over an hour to get the Internet back up and running.
A photo op in the lobby.
View attachment 913578
The manager came to talk with us and he said they didn’t have lake view rooms left at this point, that didn’t have the windows covered. He did have a standard room without painting going on outside and offered to take $40.00 off a night since I had paid for the bay view. We said that was just fine. We found our room and since it was later than we thought, Andi had pushed our Antojitos reservation back a little. Our room was just fine. We just had a view of a mud puddle and some bushes, haha I will take that over the painters and the totally covered up window. I really like this resort, rooms are big, great staff, restaurants, and ambiance, however, it really was a giant construction zone this time.
View attachment 913587
View attachment 913586
It actually was fairly quiet in our room and the construction crews didn’t bother us at all. The price for 3 nights at this deluxe resort with EP was worth the construction in my opinion.

We got our luggage sent up and unpacked what we needed. We put the cold items in the fridge and got ready to head out. Our rest time was basically sitting around the lobby. We had to dig deep for extra energy because our night was going to last until 1am!

We gathered up our essentials for the night. We had tickets for HHN which included 9/11&9/12. We added EP (express pass) to both nights. This allowed us express access to all 10 houses one time.

We took the boat transportation over to Citywalk for our dinner reservation. We did notice last year at HHN the food booths were often always extremely long lines so we wanted to eat beforehand.

We checked in and asked for a table outside. It wasn’t too crowded at this time. It was a little before 5pm. We each ordered a Margarita and chips and salsa were served up.
View attachment 913579
I really like the salsa and chips here. The salsa is very fresh and delicious.
View attachment 913580
The girls decided to share the chicken and rice burrito with a cheese sauce on it and red beans. Andi and I have had this before and it is really yummy.
View attachment 913588
I decided to try the chicken taquitos. I love the ones at Frontera Cocina. I liked the ones here but Frontera beats Antojitos in this selection.
View attachment 913584
We enjoyed our dinner and drinks. I do get a 10% discount with my AP and certain places this week are 20% off for Passholder Appreciation days.
View attachment 913585
I paid and we headed out enjoying some of the decorations along Citywalk before entering HHN through the special hotel guest entrance by Hard Rock restaurant.
View attachment 913583
Follow me to the next post as we tip toe through the tulips…

Glad they sorted a room for you, yes, a poor view is better than a completely covered window and happy they gave you a discount for your trouble.

It is a lovely hotel.

A common complaint about the food booths are the long lines and we found that our last few visits to HHN, they are getting more and more popular, so eating before hand is a good idea. I do love the look of those cocktails!!

Tip Toe through the Tulips …

We checked in and entered HHN. It was still light out which I do like for some of the scare zones, makes it less scary for me!

Last year Andi and I found out our eyes didn’t adjust well to the very dark houses when it is still light out. I literally felt blind last year in the first few houses and it wasn’t as enjoyable.

We decided this year to do a few scare zones and The Ghostbusters House since this was not a real dark house. It was based on the Frozen Empire film which is the newest in the GB series. I had watched the movie prior to the trip.

First we walked through the Renaissance Festival gone bad, this was a scare zone.
View attachment 913592
View attachment 913598
We walked through the Zombie swamp? Scare zone.
View attachment 913599
This year Universal did a couple areas featuring characters from movies. This was really a good photo op area. Here are characters from Blum House productions like Megan, The Black phone, and The Purge.

Here are pictures of these zones.
View attachment 913597
View attachment 913596
View attachment 913595
View attachment 913593
View attachment 913594
View attachment 913591
We also walked through Diagon Alley and the Death Eaters were out so we caught some of this.
View attachment 913590
Next, we started our houses with Ghostbusters! I liked it! The production value in each room was awesome.

We continued on with the houses.

Our average wait time was under 15 minutes with the EP, a couple more popular houses were maybe 15-20 minutes for us. The houses stand by lines all posted 50-90 minutes. Let’s continue to Tip through the Tulips

Oh EP is priceless!!! I don`t care what anyone says, we would never do the event without it, so I`m glad you found it as good.

The death eaters get such good reviews from everyone, they really do fit in well with the event, I wish they had them all year round, they would be incredibly popular.

Love Andi`s picture with Meghan above!!!

Still Tip Toeing through the Tulips …

The scariest house was Insidious with Tip toe through the tulips playing in the background! Very creepy and terrifying jump scares everywhere!

It was a great night.
View attachment 913614
View attachment 913616View attachment 913620
View attachment 913615
My favorite house!
We had brought our refillable cup from last year and just that week the big wigs at Universal said don’t accept these anymore to all the bartenders! Such a bummer because the cups had been refillable up to the week we got there. So no more using last year’s mug from now on.

We bought the new cup for this year and would usual get two drinks and split the drinks 3 ways using the old cup!

I didn’t write down the different drinks we tried. I really liked everything. Nothing was outstanding and nothing was bad!

We also used our gift cards we had purchased in February at Mardi Gras, which was really nice to have! Between the 3 of us we had $300.00 in gift cards for the food and drink booths. We spent it all by our last day on Saturday.

It was busy but I didn’t think the crowds were too crazy this year. It helped that we went on Wednesday and Thursday with the EP.

We had finished all 10 houses around 11:00pm. I decided to head back to the hotel. The girls had another plan! I had heard you could add EP unlimited to your EP later in the night if it wasn’t to busy. Well it was only $30 for the upgrade for each girl so they did it. They planned on staying until the closing at 2am.

I picked up some Vodoo donuts and headed to the boat launch. I was back to the room around midnight. I only got a picture of the donut box, lol I must have been tired. I picked up the Vodoo doll with raspberry jam, the Captain crunch, little pink, and a regular glazed
View attachment 913612
Here are some of the T shirts we saw tonight for this year’s event. I ended up buying a couple T shirts!
View attachment 913611
View attachment 913619
View attachment 913613
View attachment 913617
The girls stayed and did all 10 houses again.

They did stop for a little snack. It was a chocolate Cherry dessert from The Insidious booth.
View attachment 913618
They got back to the room around 2am. Their feet were really sore! They walked over 38,000 steps! It was hot and humid tonight with a few sprinkles of rain but nothing major! The rain actually felt good because of the heat!

Stay tuned for more Universal fun coming up soon.

“Not with 3 barrels on him”

Most folks seem to say Insidious was the best house of the year and yep, that Tiny Tim song is very creepy, but now I have it in my head and can`t get it out lol.....

Shame about the refillable cup, hadn`t heard that this year.

Again, most folks say the same about the food and drinks, nothing amazing which is quite disappointing, they could do so much better, the food used to be not too bad way back when.

Glad the girls enjoyed staying later, I don`t think we ever stayed till that time and yes sometimes a sprinkling of rain at that event is very welcome! I love how happy you all look in your pictures and look forward to hearing about the rest of your time at Universal!!!!

38,000 steps.....wow!!!

 

[disneyAndi14]

I agree with you about the covered windows. I would have asked for clear windows, too.

It really put a damper on the room and was really an eye sore!

That was a good plan. It is hard to adjust to the dark when it is bright sunlight outside.

It worked well this time around! Lessons learned

The EP was definitely worth it. Was this one of the earliest parties of the season?

It really was worth the price. We would only have been able to do 5 houses at the most! It ran every night except Mon/Tues from 9/1-11/1 so a long run!

That was a bummer, especially since you went to all that trouble to save and return with the mugs.

I know especially since it just changed when we arrived.

Wow! But they are young enough for it.

Yes, I couldn’t have done all 10 houses again. The houses are set up on the studio backlots and you walk a ton!

Sorry your room situation took a bit to sort out. Sounds like it was good in the end.

I’m glad we could see out our window! The construction was really booming this week but overall we avoided most of it!

admire you for doing the scary stuff. The most I will do is checking out the new area in Epic Park in May. People jumping out at me is too much for me.

It really is amazing how well the productions are and that keeps me from getting to scared I do jump easily so 2 nights of this is very exhausting!

 

[disneyAndi14]

Glad they sorted a room for you, yes, a poor view is better than a completely covered window and happy they gave you a discount for your trouble.

Same! The covered window was so distracting! Universal TMs really do try to work with you to get it right!

It is a lovely hotel.

I love the bigger rooms especially with 3 in a room!

A common complaint about the food booths are the long lines and we found that our last few visits to HHN, they are getting more and more popular, so eating before hand is a good idea. I do love the look of those cocktails!!

We joked they should have EP for the food booths as well

Oh EP is priceless!!! I don`t care what anyone says, we would never do the event without it, so I`m glad you found it as good.

I agree, we wouldn’t do the event without it! If I lived down there or had a month to do the event then maybe we wouldn’t need it but for us it is needed

The death eaters get such good reviews from everyone, they really do fit in well with the event, I wish they had them all year round, they would be incredibly popular.

I loved the eerie feeling in Diagon Alley and the Death Eaters are really cool to watch. We did see the show on the stage I just couldn’t get good pictures of that

Love Andi`s picture with Meghan above!!!

I really liked the photo ops this year! I am so terrified walking through the scare zones most of the time I really don’t get very good pictures

Most folks seem to say Insidious was the best house of the year and yep, that Tiny Tim song is very creepy, but now I have it in my head and can`t get it out lol..

It was done really well and very scary and creepy!

Shame about the refillable cup, hadn`t heard that this year.

Of course the year we were going to try it out and they stopped

Again, most folks say the same about the food and drinks, nothing amazing which is quite disappointing, they could do so much better, the food used to be not too bad way back when.

The couple things we tried the second night were good but nothing great except the twisted tater!

Glad the girls enjoyed staying later, I don`t think we ever stayed till that time and yes sometimes a sprinkling of rain at that event is very welcome! I love how happy you all look in your pictures and look forward to hearing about the rest of your time at Universal!!!!

I couldn’t believe they did all 10 houses again!

 

[disneyAndi14]

“Not with 3 barrels on him”

9/12/24

It was Thursday and we all slept in until about 9am.

Donuts, cold brew coffee, and yogurt were the breakfast options we had. The Vodoo Donuts hit the spot.

Our plan was to spend time at Universal Studios today.

We got ready and headed to the boat launch. Such a lovely way to travel to the parks! I love the boat transportation.

I have us getting on our first ride at 11:15am. We decided to do Villians Con. It is a shooter style attraction. You are on a conveyor belt system with a heavy gun and you shoot at things, lol I don’t really know what I am shooting at. Andi’s gun quit working during the ride and we let the TM know and she let us go again. We did have EP but it was still nice to get right back on. I’m not a huge fan of this attraction. It is okay nothing special and I don’t know how little ones hold up these big old guns not that kind, lol

We wanted to check out one of the Tribute Stores. There was the Halloween Tribute Store and The retro 80’s video/arcade Store.

Today we checked out the retro one.

It was very cool and it had props and nods to Jaws! My favorite all time movie ever!! I can quote this movie from beginning to end. Andi and Jack love this movie as well. I forced them to watch it with me through the years!

One of my favorite quotes is “I can do anything I am the chief of police”. I also love the title of this post, not with three barrels on him! Of course the song show me the way to go home…Love that song! The movie has great acting, music, horror, and a big old shark!

Both Andi and I were excited to see the Jaws area.

We just browsed and didn’t buy anything.

The Mystery Machine was outside so I got a picture of the girls.

We moved on to ET next. Kait loved this ride! I knew she would.

We also stopped in the Sponge Bob store!

Next stop was checking out the new Dreamworks area.

This is designed for young children with a play area, splash area, Shrek meet and greets, and a Troll area with a kiddie rollercoaster. There is also a Kung Fu Panda show and a Puss and Boots cat cafe.


It is a cute area, we didn’t ride the coaster because even with EP the line was long. It is a very small coaster and loads slowly.

We headed out.

I saw the animal actor show was starting so we decided to watch this.

I really enjoyed the show. The animals are all from shelters and are picked out to work on films and to be a part of this show.

We walked through the Simpsons area and took a little spin on Twirl and Hurl! Think Dumbo with a more crude approach

Next, we did MIB. I love this ride. It is like Buzz on steroids!
Follow me to the next post….

 

[disneyAndi14]

We wanted to watch the new Mega Movie parade. It is a new parade at Universal.

We found a spot by Mel’s Diner. It was a good spot except the lady next to Andi had terrible body odor and she kept raising her arm up to wave at the actors in the parade.

Peeeew she was ripe! Yes it is hot and humid but wear deodorant people please!

Despite the smelly lady, the parade was awesome!

Best Universal Parade in my opinion!

Back to the Future


Ghostbusters

Minions

ET

Jaws, with Chief Brody and Quint on the float



Jurassic Park/World

There also was a couple other floats I wasn’t as familiar with, I think Sing with a pig? and Kung Fu Panda.

We headed back to the resort for a little rest and pizza from Sals. The pizza at Sals is very good and located right at Portofino.

We decided on a margarita pizza with onions and mushrooms.

The pizza was very tasty. We also had some of our chips and dip as an appetizer. We took a little rest and headed out for one more scary night.

It was time for our 2nd night of HHN.

 

[Wood Nymph]

We got ready and headed to the boat launch. Such a lovely way to travel to the parks! I love the boat transportation.

I think it was very smart of Universal to have boat transportation from their resorts to their park.

It was very cool and it had props and nods to Jaws! My favorite all time movie ever!!

Jaws is a great movie. The book is excellent, too. There are always things in a book that don't translate well to the screen.

We found a spot by Mel’s Diner. It was a good spot except the lady next to Andi had terrible body odor and she kept raising her arm up to wave at the actors in the parade.

Stinky neighbors are the pits. We had a very smelly guy near at Fantasmic in Sept 2023. It really ruined the show for us, especially for my sister-in-law. I don't think we will ever be able to get her back there again.

Best Universal Parade in my opinion!

The parade is awesome. I love the floats.

 

[Stacybaeasm]

I just learned about a play you might be interested in seeing (if it is ever produced near you.) It is called "The Shark is Broken" and it is about the making of Jaws. The 3 characters in the play are Richard Dreyfuss, Robert Shaw, and Roy Scheider. A friend just worked on it and recommended it. The 3 characters are sitting on the boat, waiting for the mechanical shark to want to work, and talking about their lives.

 

[Steppesister]

I had lots to catch up on since I was able to last time! So much fun you've posted about!

My plan is to get a hot butter beer to sip on while watching the castle show! I have never seen the Hogwarts castle show.

I had no idea they had this! How fun!

Liesa @Steppesister arrives today and will be staying with me at SF for 2 nights. We plan to have dinner at Strong Water Tavern this evening. I love this place! We have to celebrate Liesa’s Nurse Practitioner Degree! A few drinks will be had!

I'm sure of that! Really excited to try this place out; the menu looks so good!

12/4 Depending on the weather, I may spend some time at the pool with Liesa and I will also be going into the parks one more time to get all the Holiday vibes.

If the weather is crappy, I may head to resorts to see what they have out for holiday decorations. But yep, pool, drinks, a book.... Ahhhh!

Liesa and I will meet up for dinner on Citywalk. We are thinking Big Fire. It will be new to both of us.

Always great to try new places! I'm hoping the weather is cooperative and there is some outside seating. If not, looking forward to the menu anyway! Lots of good stuff on there.

I do think we have to check out the Coconut Club, it will be Christmas themed with Holiday drinks.

SAY WHAT?! This sounds amazing! Although have no idea what or where it is! Do tell!

magical menagerie

YES!! Never seen that before!

We will head to DHS in the evening to start our Skyliner crawl. We hopefully will have several people joining us! Irene, Liesa, and maybe KariLynn and Ariane. Our stops will be Brown Derby lounge, Banana Cabana at CBR, Bar Riva at Riviera and Crew Cup at YC.

Such a fun group! Sad to miss Ariane, and Kari won't arrive now until the 8th. I hope Sue can join in and it'll be nice to see @irene_dsc (it is her, correct?)

12/7 Epcot, right now Susan and I have a 8:30am Garden Grill breakfast ADR for the CP that evening at 8:15pm.

If you don't end up at your other dinner, I'd love to see you guys at EPCOT since I'll be there. A pre-show sip somewhere?

The Parmesan Herb fries, I love these! A little tip, these are not on the lounge menu but you can ask for them, because the fries are on the Primo Piatto menu.

YUM!! Those sound great!

Choice of Parmesan-Garlic Sauce or Chipotle-Agrodolce Sauce with Truffle Aïoli. Yummy and the best chicken strips I have had on property!

as does this! I may get that on our Crawl.

We walked through the resort and I picked up my favorite cold brew ever! The Almond Honey cold brew. This is delicious. The whipping cream is housemade with honey! I sipped on this as we made our way back to the BWI via the Skyliner!

Holy heck, yummy!!

They enjoyed the atmosphere and the food.

I did too. Great place and good food.

I said no to the peanut butter, didn’t make sense to me.

Just... no. That's just weird!

We headed back down to see if it was possible to get a room that didn’t have all the painting going on outside.

I get to the front desk and right when the TM was looking for something else their Internet went down. Wondering if the construction crew hit something? They were totally helpless without the Internet . We went and sat in the lobby and it took over an hour to get the Internet back up and running.

What a colossal mess. Glad it got worked out but what a pita.

I decided to try the chicken taquitos. I love the ones at Frontera Cocina. I liked the ones here but Frontera beats Antojitos in this selection.

Super looking forward to our meal at Frontera!

We got ready and headed to the boat launch. Such a lovely way to travel to the parks! I love the boat transportation.

It super is. I plan to use it for my pool hopping day(s).

We found a spot by Mel’s Diner. It was a good spot except the lady next to Andi had terrible body odor and she kept raising her arm up to wave at the actors in the parade.

Peeeew she was ripe! Yes it is hot and humid but wear deodorant people please!

 

[irene_dsc]

Such a fun group! Sad to miss Ariane, and Kari won't arrive now until the 8th. I hope Sue can join in and it'll be nice to see @irene_dsc (it is her, correct?)

Not me! (And imagine my surprise to be mentioned in this post, lol!) No Disney trips on the horizon for me...