First time to Universal Orlando resort trip report

[Buh]

Greetings Disboards! In the last couple of weeks I got back from a wonderful vacation staying at the Disney World resort, and while on this vacation, I had the pleasure of spending two days playing in the parks at the Universal Orlando resort, where I had never been before.

Just a brief preface to the report: The people involved in this trip were myself (20s), younger sister (late teens) and my mother (we'll pretend she's in her 30s). I have lived in Southern California my whole life, and even possibly have/currently worked/work for a popular amusement park of sorts over here on the West Coast.

I have been to Universal Studios Hollywood many times, but it's hard to compare a movie studio turned theme park to two theme parks (one previously apparently masquerading as a movie studio). Despite this, I will be making sporadic comparisons throughout. I have an extreme nostalgia for USH and in general I’ve always felt that Disney and Universal are the two best at fully immersing guests in their rides and attractions in their theme parks. Needless to say I was very excited to be going to Universal Florida!


DAY 1 - Islands of Adventure

Islands of Adventure was the first park we visited on day 1. Like 95% of the people who go to the park, I was excited to see the Harry Potter area and experience the new ride (despite that everything at the park was a new ride to me).

My sister wasn’t feeling too well so she stayed behind at the hotel for about half of the day, while my mother and I took a Mears car from our hotel to Universal, and within half an hour we were outside the park.

Now begin one of only a few comparisons between USF and USH. Despite having much more space, and two parks, CityWalk in USF was surprisingly small. It was still flashy and very cool, but it did seem way smaller than the Hollywood counterpart. I don’t know if this was my imagination, or if I just avoided looking through every nook and cranny of the place, but it did seem smaller. Not a bad thing, just an observation.

So we arrived about half an hour before Islands of Adventure opened and only had maybe 10 groups in front of us in the line we were standing in. I thought the layout of the main portion of the resort was very cool. The lake in the middle separating IoA and USF was very pleasant, and at night, the CityWalk lights made the whole place come alive.

The Florida humidity was surprisingly low at this time in the morning, and my back was only mildly sweaty (for those of you who wanted to know). After about 20 minutes of standing still, the park opened and we entered the park very quickly. Like every other person going into the park, we headed towards Harry Potter. I didn’t know the layout of the park, nor had I ever looked at a map, but luckily it was easy to spot Hogwarts once you get to the large body of water that amasses over the entire center of the park.
As we were heading to Potter, my mother made the wonderful statement that she had to pee and I certainly wasn’t going to deny her request and then force her to wet her pants in line, so off we went to a bathroom (one right before the Dr. Seuss area to be more specific). After only a few minutes, the urination had finished, the hands had been washed (I hope) and off we were to find the ride.

I am not a huge Harry Potter fan, though I read all the books, enjoyed most of the films, and saw all but the last one in the theaters, and my mom and sister are the same way. I am a huge fan, however, of the designs of the buildings in the film, with their slightly surrealistic old time British look, and great theming is always a plus for me. So off we went through Seuss landing, which I will talk about later, and past the Lost Continent, which really did look very nice and like a place I wanted to explore after Potter.

I’d seen videos online of the area, but in person it was even better! What a well themed, beautiful area, about as straight of the movies as you could get. By the time we got to The Forbidden Journey it was only about eight minutes after park opening, and the line was sixty minutes. When I want to experience an attraction, lines don’t bother me, so off we went to experience this massive queue, and what a queue it was. The outside portion isn’t overly exciting, but it moves quickly, and once you get inside, there are some great areas. The giant room with the talking paintings, the library with Dumbledore, and the room where Harry, Ron and Hermoine sneak in and make it snow were my three favorite areas of the queue, but in general the whole line was great, and not one person seemed to mind waiting in such an engaging area.

The ride itself tops the queue, as I thought it would. The whomping willow and the portion with the dementors was probably my favorite part, but the whole ride is great and one of the best out there. Where I normally don’t like seeing every ride being cloned between Disneyland and Disney World, I am happy that Harry Potter is eventually coming to Hollywood. It’s a great experience and will make the park that much better.

The only thing I did not like about the attraction was the free lockers. I understand completely that with the ride system that they have, there’s no space to put your stuff, and they certainly don’t want anyone losing their items and forcing them to cycle out the ride, but for the amount of people riding vs. the number of lockers...there’s just not enough. They need to make the gift shop a little smaller and the locker area a little bigger, because it is ridiculously crowded and poorly thought out. I did, however, appreciate that the lockers were free.

After the ride, we spent some time soaking up the atmosphere and getting wasted off of frozen butterbeer, before finally finding a second attraction to enjoy.


To be continued very shortly...

 

[Eureka]

I'm reading.....we were down there a few weeks ago and had a great time. Looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts.

 

[Metro West]

Keep going....you're off to a great start!

 

[macraven]

waiting to read more......

 

[-Hope-]

I love your storytelling style, can't wait to read more!

 

[Buh]

Thanks for the comments everyone who commented! I'm having a dandy time recollecting my trip, and will hopefully get both days written out fully within the next day or two.

Day 1 contd...

Before going into the park and knowing all the attractions, the two that I was most excited to experience were Potter and the Spider-man ride. I rode Transformers over in Hollywood sometime last summer, and I was so impressed I went on the ride through single rider four times in a row before the other member of my group forced me to stop. And the internet buzz is that while Transformers is a great ride, Spider-man is better. So off we went backwards through Lost Continent and Seuss Landing to get to the Marvel area.

While walking, we noticed that the Cat in the Hat had a 5-minute wait, so we jumped in the line, which consisted of one group in front of us. We zipped so quickly through the queue I dont really remember it at all. But the ride itself was...interesting. The Cat in the Hat animatronic was pretty frightening looking and Id imagine many small children come off the ride frightened (but I could be wrong). Some of the scenes were pretty cool, and I liked that the whole ride took you through a house, so it had a somewhat intimate feeling for a quick dispatch dark ride. I was caught off guard (as was my mother) by the amount of jerkiness on it. Harry Potter put me on the verge of motion sickness (still awesome though), while this pushed me over the edge and gave me a headache. Despite tossing me around, it was still a pretty good kiddie ride, and if the line hadnt gotten way longer later I might have ridden it again.

After that pit stop, it was a straight walk to Spider-man, which had a posted 35-minute wait, though it was actually much shorter. Aesthetically, I didnt care for the Marvel area at all. To me, it looks kind of like an outdoor mall or something. And this is a problem I had with a few areas in the park. Most areas look great, so the couple areas that arent nearly as well themed seem tacky in comparison. My own pickiness aside, the ride itself was very good! I personally might like Transformers a little more, but that doesnt stop this from being one of the very best rides around, and it definitely met my expectations.

In between Seuss Landing and Marvel Super Hero Island I had picked up a map somewhere, so while in line for Spider-man I decided that I had no real desire to ride Storm Force Accelatron, which might be the greatest ride ever, but it didnt sound too appealing. Also on the chopping block was Dr. Dooms Fearfall. I like roller coasters and drop rides, but my mother doesnt at all, and of all the thrill rides in the park, that one seemed the least interesting, but again, it might have been great, I just never experienced it.

After the Spider-man ride, we decided we wanted to go on Poseidons Fury, having no idea what it was. So off we walked, again through Seuss Landing. My mom thought the High in the Sky Trolley ride sounded cute, and after the surprisingly enjoyable Cat in the Hat, I agreed that it could easily be another rip snortin good time. We waited a half an hour in what was a very strange outdoor queue all winding around some sort of giant Seussian machine before finally getting on the ride...definitely not one I would ever want to do again, unless the line was nonexistent and my feet hurt. What seemed like randomly placed storytelling over an outdoor tour of Seuss Landing, with a couple show scenes thrown in randomly. I suppose some of the sights up 15 feet in the air were nice, but the ride itself seemed so thrown together, I didnt even really know what I had experienced. We both kind of looked at each other and shrugged after the ride. It probably wouldnt have seemed so bad if the line had been shorter, and less hot. But it wasnt.

So off to The Lost Continent we went, far away from the classic trolley ride. On the way to Poseidons Fury, we noticed Mythos, the restaurant where we had reservations for later. Awesome looking exterior! I was surprised they had a restaurant as one of the main focal points of the area, but that doesnt take away from its awesomeness, or the areas. Poseidons Fury had a posted 30 minute wait, and neither I nor my mother knew anything about it, though the lady out front told us it was a tour. Theme Park Insider on my phone showed me that the ride had an average 6 rating from users, which I believe was the same rating for the trolley ride. I dont normally necessarily agree with Theme Park Insider, but the users ratings are good for setting up my general expectations.

After a relatively short wait, we were ushered into the first room to meet Taylor, our guide. The guy playing Taylor surprised me, because he was fairly naturalistic, and in shows, generally you end up with people really hamming it up. Quickly though, the hamming began. I rolled my eyes, and cynically said Ugh at least a couple times but as the attraction went further, and as we moved from room to room, I began to enjoy it more and more. By the time the door opened to the walkway with the water ceiling, I was thoroughly impressed. Despite the corniness of the final battle scene between Poseidon and Lord Badington (or whatever his name was), the water and fire effects were very entertaining, and the whole room opening up to reveal the water and screens was unexpected and kind of cool. So by the end, this one won me over. I liked it quite a bit, corny acting aside. And from the get go I loved the massive facade!

Ive found with some of these attraction ratings on theme park sites, the truly awful kiddie rides (like the Trolley) are often excused as being for small children and are given decent ratings, where the big expensive rides/shows (like Poseidon) are looked down on if they arent as good as they could be, and theyre given lower reviews than they should. Id give the whole show a solid 7 or maybe low 8. Not bad at all. After the show, mother had to potty again, so I explored the Lost Continent for a few minutes, enjoying the Arabian inspired design and soaking up the wonderful atmosphere, in addition to the Florida humidity.

Coming very soon: Convincing my mom to ride Jurassic Park.

 

[Buh]

Day 1 still going....

It was about 1 in the pm, and after looking at the map, I felt that we had gone on every ride my mom would be willing to go on. She hates roller coasters and large drops, and the other rides I was interested in riding all had those. We talked to my sister, and she was getting picked up at 3:50 to come to the park. So from the Lost Continent to our next destination, which I decided would be Jurassic Park, I tried to convince my mom to ride, by making bogus comparisons to the tame drop on Disneyland’s Pirates of the Caribbean. I think I kind of wore her down with my illogical reasoning, but knowing what she likes, and how steep the drop is in Hollywood, she declined to ride. I had failed, but that was fine, because I would (hopefully) ride Jurassic Park when my sister came down.

On the way to Jurassic Park, the Dragon Challenge coaster had a 10 minute wait, so off I went while my mom stayed behind to go find a pretzel. I’m used to long queue areas to get to rides, but this was crazy. It seemed like the queue just kept going and going. I remember reading that this coaster used to be part of the Lost Continent and was rethemed to Harry Potter, so perhaps the reason for the long queue is that you are walking from the Wizarding World to the old location which is out of the way. Or maybe I’m wrong and this ride has just always had a ridiculously long queue. Either way, it looked nice, and the Goblet of Fire was a nice touch. When I actually got to the ride, there was no line at all and on the blue side I went. And it was a good solid coaster with some nice drops. As I’ve probably implied before, theme and grandeur are more interesting to me than thrills, but I do love a good roller coaster too, and this I would definitely qualify as a good roller coaster. Thumbs up from me.

After walking three miles back to the Wizarding World, it was off to Jurassic Park. Instead of riding Jurassic Park, however, we went to the Visitor Center. I liked this area a lot. It wasn’t an exact recreation of the center from the movie, but instead it was set up like a museum, with unique games around, and a live presentation going on. A cast member (is this what they call the Universal workers?) was talking about a baby raptor which was just born and was wiggling around in it’s egg. She told some facts about the raptor, and had a small child name it. Totally immersive, and it really felt like a dinosaur had just been born. I thought this was great, and I’m sure some of the kids even thought this was real.

After standing out front of the Visitor Center for a few minutes, we continued on to Toon Lagoon. On the way out, my mom became very interested in the Pteranodon Flyers ride, which as she put “...doesn’t look that scary, it looks kind of fun.” We decided that we’d keep going and ride that one later. Toon Lagoon is the other area that I wasn’t a big fan of looks wise. It was better than Marvel Island, but this area too looked very off the shelf, except for the Dudley Do-Right mountain. That was very nice looking, and the ride looked like something I had to do. My mom was definitely not going on, so I went through the single rider line and got on in 5 minutes, while the standby line was 75 minutes. The gods must have been shining down on me, because not only did I get the back row, but I was also placed behind a very large man, who, throughout the ride, commented on how lucky I was to be behind him, and he was right. That man took 90% of the drenching that rightly should have hit me.

I enjoyed how the ride started, with the sepiatone forest critters. Scene wise, that was about as good as it got though. The figures aren’t full animatronics, which is fine, and the plot is nearly nonexistent, which is also alright. It’s more like going through short vignettes from various Dudley Do-Right cartoons. The execution was kind of bland to me, but in the end it’s a flume ride with the purpose of thrilling the guests with a nice drop, and that it did have. In fact, it had a few drops, each one more enjoyable than the last. It was a fun ride, though not any kind of classic like Splash Mountain.

At this point, the sun was at full force and people all around seemed to be exploding from the heat, so my mother and I decided to take cover inside a comic themed counter service restaurant. We didn’t want to eat, as we would be going to Mythos is just a couple hours, so we just got drinks and sat down to look at the map. This is when I realized that Pteranodon Flyers, the ride that didn’t look “that scary”, was actually meant for three year olds looking for mild thrills, and that in order to ride, you need a kid with you. My mom thought this was too funny and began cackling like a crazy person, probably to cover up the fact that she was also disappointed because the ride did look like a lot of fun to her. We decided it was too late to make it to the Sindbad show, which we ended up missing out on. There was really nothing else that we both wanted to do, though my mom was perfectly content waiting for me on any ride. And here lies one of the weaknesses of the park, and one reason why this wouldn’t be a great “family” park, and that is the lack of rides for anyone shorter than 4 feet, or anyone that’s a coward. If you don’t like big drops, then there are about 7 rides/shows in the park you can experience. This is no different than Six Flags or Knott’s Berry Farm, and really no different than USH, but it felt different than the latter, maybe because there was no lengthy studio tour in this park. Luckily for me, I like coasters and big drops, but for those who don’t, this park probably doesn’t have a whole lot for you. But let me be slightly more positive in saying what it does have is generally great though.

Popeye and Bluto’s Bilge-Rats Barges had a long line, and I didn’t feel like getting soaked, so it was off to the Hulk Coaster. The line was very short, and the queue was good in setting up the story. What I enjoyed most about the coaster though wasn’t even the coaster itself, which was very good and thrilling, but instead was the fakeout at the beginning. The ride fakes you into thinking it’s a chain lift coaster and you hear the clinks of the chain until midway up the lift you get shot up. Completely unexpected for me, and pretty funny too. The coaster was one big awesome blur, but what stayed cemented in my mind was the fake chain lift.

We had a small amount of time to kill after this, so we headed back to Lost Continent and sat down waiting for our reservation at Mythos.

Coming soon...interesting Mythos lunch, and the arrival of my sister (too exciting).

Thanks for reading thus far!

 

[macraven]

dueling dragons aka dragon challenge has always had the long queue.
no change in that when it was renamed.

 

[schumigirl]

Just caught up with your trippie.........glad you had such a great time, looking forward to reading more.

Glad you enjoyed the fake chain lift moment on the Hulk.......it is so good.......love it

 

[WildGinger]

Love your report! Can't wait to read more!

 

[Buh]

macraven - Thanks for the info. My mind was trying to justify that long long queue through my own delusions.

schumigirl - Yeah, it's been cemented in my mind. Truly the greatest fake out of all time.

Wildginger - Thanks! Can't wait to get the rest out!

Day 1 Cont’d...

After sitting outside Mythos for a few minutes we finally went in and got to our table right away. Our waiter was very nice, and reminded me somewhat of a clothes salesman at an upscale mall or something. My mom and I both ordered soups as appetizers to our meals, and very quickly we received our meals, but no soups. This was fine with both of us, and we just told the waiter that we hadn’t received the soups, but it’s okay, because we’ll just eat the meal and probably get dessert. He was seemingly distraught over this, and gave us a long apology. Neither of us were upset by any means at the lack of soup, but he brought us the soup shortly after this and again apologized, telling us our soup had been comped. We told him he didn’t have to do this, but he wanted to, so that was nice. Long story short, he apparently was so torn apart by this late appetizer, that throughout the remainder of the meal, he kept coming over and telling us that he was comping something else, and every time we both said “No, it’s not a big deal at all, you really don’t have to!”, but he felt he must. So, in the end we only paid for our entrees (and a large tip for the waiter). He comped our drinks, appetizers and dessert. My mom and I thought this guy was just hilarious, and it wasn’t like he wasn’t a good waiter. He came by frequently and always had refills. This late appetizer apparently destroyed his ego, or something, and he was so upset that we literally got our meal for half off, despite much protesting from ourselves, and no complaining at all about our late food. It was very funny to us, but a good experience nonetheless, and our waiter was very nice and the food was pretty great.

As we waved goodbye to Mythos and our waiter, my sister arrived in the park. The time was now about 5, and the park closed at 8, so she wasn’t exactly going to get a full experience of the park. First thing’s first, we headed to Jurassic Park, but on the way she noticed a short wait for the Dragon coaster, so off we went through the lengthy queue, and this time I went on the red side. Equally as good as the blue side, and fun coaster.

After this we headed over to Jurassic Park, which had gone down to a 10 minute wait, so my sister and I jumped in line. I love the Jurassic Park ride in Hollywood, and in general I love the film Jurassic Park. It came out when I was very young, and it shaped my early dreams of being a paleontologist, a dream which was dropped by the time I was probably around eight. Anywho though, this version was a lot like the original Hollywood version, though I would say the one in Hollywood is a little better. I prefer the falling Jeep to the falling raptor cage, and maybe I just wasn’t paying attention, but the Florida ride seemed to only have one T-Rex, while Hollywood’s has two (one being a giant head pushing through the ceiling). Still great fun though!

After this we walked towards Spider-man, because both my mom and I thought she should experience it. My sister gets extreme motion sickness, and she’s a drama queen, and the pairing of the two is not a good combination. It takes very little to push her over the edge and give her a debilitating headache, so she was wary of riding Spider-man, and on the way there, Dudley Do-Right only had a 25-minute wait, and she thought it looked fun, so off we went.

This was the first time I’d gone through the actual queue of the ride, and what an awful queue it is. It was as though they took a bunch of crawl spaces and put some lame parody posters up. We probably waited in the room with the talking bear and beaver head for 15 to 20 minutes, which grew quite tedious. But, as we moved closer to the head, I was pleasantly surprised to hear Dom Deluise’s voice. And then the beaver talked and I asked “Is that Charles Nelson Reilly?” We grew up watching the Match Game in reruns, and after a quick fact check, it was indeed the late great Deluise and Reilly. Despite bad dialogue and jokes, I was happy to hear the both of them cracking any jokes from beyond the grave.

The ride itself was the same as before. I noticed a few more details, like one of the Dudley figures is unfinished, and you can see the bolts coming out of his stomach, and going up one of the lifts I believe there was a joke referring to the crappiness of the backstage area you can see (though I don’t exactly remember the sign joke). Still, it was amusing that at least the Universal creative team were poking fun at their work (I think). We both got soaked, and my mom decided that instead of Spider-man, we should go on Potter again, which was fine with me. Again, the ride was amazing, though it made my sister very sick, or realistically it probably gave her a mild headache which definitely made this the last ride of the day, as she wasn’t feeling to well.

So off we went, possibly coming back tomorrow, as we had two day parkhoppers. I said this earlier, and I will say it again now, but this is overall a very nicely themed park with some of the very best rides I’ve ever been on. With that said too, I think this park could use a few more really awesome rides, as most parks could. Many reviews I’ve read have had people saying the IoA is waaaayyyy better than USF, and that people don’t even need to go to the other park. I’m not going to state my opinion on that quite yet, but I will say that Islands of Adventure is a good thrill park, and it seems like local teens would probably like this park quite a bit, with four great coasters (and a kiddie one), and a lot water rides. I liked this park a lot, and we had a great time, but alas, tomorrow was time for the “other lame park” as some feel about it.

We ended the night with a bounty of authentic Chinese cuisine from Panda Express at Citywalk, and some yogurt drinks from the local yogurt shop (don’t remember the name). We were picked up by Mears again, with all the wonders that would await us tomorrow dancing through our skulls (though more than anything we were tired and not thinking about that at all).

Coming soon...Day 2 - Universal Florida

 

[wiigirl]

Following along!

 

[macraven]

still reading

 

[Buh]

Day 2 - Universal Studios Florida

Our second day to Universal, we decided to take things a little slower, and we took a slightly later Mears car, getting to the park about 20 minutes after opening. I remembered reading somewhere that Universal Florida is empty in the morning because everyone heads to Islands of Adventure, which seemed plausible given the crowds the morning before. And true it was.

This park reminded me a lot more of the Hollywood park, as there were many shared and similar attractions. I liked the layout of the park, which, similarly to IoA, was mostly built around a giant lake. As excited as I was to go to Islands of Adventure the day before, I was equally, if not more to come to this park. There were more rides I wanted to experience here, and some extinct rides/shows from Hollywood that I wanted to relive.

I had decided that the first ride we should do was E.T. Adventure. This is a ride I used to love at USH, but unfortunately, the powers that be closed it in the early 2000s and replaced it with the Mummy coaster. The Mummy coaster in Hollywood doesn’t hold a candle to E.T., and going on the ride again for the first time in ten years reaffirmed my position. It was pretty much exactly as I remembered, though I had some vague memories of differences, and watching a Youtube video of the Hollywood version proved this to be true. To me, this is a great dark ride. E.T.’s home planet is a little corny, but it’s still creative and fun, and I love the forest queue. I’m sure many people could care less about this ride, but I hope it isn’t one they’re planning on getting rid of soon. E.T. is a true Universal classic, and at one point was the highest grossing film of all time. Unlike at the Disney parks, seemingly nothing at Universal is sacred. Rides that people love and that are classics are gotten rid of. Surely the new rides bring more people into the park, but at the same time it might prevent people from bonding with the park if all their old classics are gutted and replaced.

My sister was hungry, so we decided to get some food after E.T., but on the way, we noticed a 15-minute wait for Transformers. I’d been on the ride in Hollywood last summer and thought it was great, and who can pass up such a short line for one of the greatest rides around? My sister waited in the line, but decided not to ride because of her motion sickness. My mom thought the ride was great, but she said she might have liked Spider-man a little better. The two rides are very similar, but each one has it’s own positives. Spider-man has more non-movie sets and effects, and Transformers has some truly amazing video effect scenes (like being pulled behind the one Autobot, or being eaten by the giant toothed Transformer). Both my mom and I hate the Transformers films, but the ride is excellent.

From here we went to eat at Mel’s Diner, a counter service restaurant which can also be found in Hollywood. I’m a huge fan of American Graffiti, and also a pretty big fan of 50s and 60s music, so it’s always a pleasure to be immersed in the atmosphere. The food was...ok. About what you’d expect. For the sake of keeping things moving, I am going to omit the various bathroom breaks that were taken on this day. I know generally people are excited by hearing when my family had to pee, but it’ll save some time if I don’t mention it (after right now).

So anyways, we had decided in Mel’s to go to the Universal Monster Makeup show. This one had good ratings on various sites, and I had read that they take guests onstage, so I made sure that we sat in the middle of the row where it would be slightly more difficult for them to pick any of us. The room before the show was interesting and fun, and seeing all the pictures and various props from monster movies was pretty cool. When I think of Universal pictures, I personally think of a variety of monster movies, in addition to some great Spielberg pictures (E.T., Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List, etc.), so it was nice to have a show actually about Universal, as opposed to a property borrowed from a rival company (Transformers, Harry Potter, Beetlejuice). The show itself was fun. It was a wee bit corny, but the actors did a fine job, and there were many laughs to be had with the guest interactions. The show itself was actually very similar to a show in Hollywood formerly called “Special Effects Stages”, and later changed to just “Special Effects Stage”. It’s definitely it’s own unique show, but they share similar bloodlines, and the giant wolf creature at the end makes appearances in both shows. Overall, it was a lot of fun.

From here, we wandered aimlessly looking for the Mummy coaster, which was tucked away in a corner, luckily right across the street from Finnegan’s restaurant, where we had reservations for later. The line was ten minutes, so my sister and I went in, while my mom waited behind. It’s been said many times before, and I’ll say it again, the Mummy coaster in Florida is way better than it’s Hollywood counterpart. But, they are also very different. The Hollywood version does not have the “cursed movie set” plot, and instead is themed to Imhotep’s temple. The show scenes in Hollywood are also different, and some cool scenes from Hollywood are omitted here, and vice versa. Where this one succeeds is in it’s unpredictability. You go through some show scenes, hit a wall with scarabs, go backwards, and then get shot into the coaster. Right when it might be over, Imhotep shows up again and (in a very neat effect) has fire shoot out of the ceiling before a final shoot into a foggy final seconds of coaster. The Hollywood version goes through more show scenes at the beginning of the ride before reaching an Imhotep animatronic that shoots you into the coaster portion. Similarly you hit a brick wall with Scarabs, but in Hollywood, the coaster goes in reverse for quite a while before reaching the eclipse of the sun at the end. Really, they are just completely different rides, but Florida’s version is much more impressive to me. Good stuff!

We came outside to my mom being thoroughly impressed by the Blues Brothers who had just performed in the area. She raved about how good they were, and how great the female singer with them was for the rest of the day.

From this point on, we more or less followed the park around and rode the rides/watched the shows that were closest to us.

So next up on the list of attractions was Twister...Ride it Out. Comparisons abound, this one is a lot like extinct attraction “Backdraft” over in Hollywood, which was taken out to make room for Transformers. The internet in general doesn’t seem to like this one too much. I must be easily impressed because I enjoyed it quite a bit, as did my mom and sister. I liked the forced perspective set, and the effects were pretty decent. It wasn’t like the greatest thing ever, but it was a good use of special effects, and it was thoroughly engaging. I think I enjoyed this a wee bit more than Backdraft, but they’re both about on par.

From here we began the long trek to our next attractions...but what will it be?

Continued soon...reliving childhood memories with the Beetlejuice show.

 

[zebsterama]

Thanks for the awesome reporting!

It's very engaging . Looking forward to the rest.

Cheers,
Zebsterama

 

[Eureka]

LOVED the Beetlejuice show!

 

[Buh]

Sorry for my long unexplained absence. I'm sure many of you were on the edge of your seat for the past 10 days, and here's the thrilling conclusion (sort of)

Day 2...finished! (sort of)

From Twister we trekked to the Beetlejuice show. This is one I definitely remember from my childhood, with fairly fond memories. The show was taken out of Hollywood I believe sometime in the late 90s, but here it still remains. The exterior in Hollywood I recall was made to look like a graveyard, and the show was indoors. As anyone who’s ever been to the park knows, this one has a different exterior and is outdoors with an overhang. This show would definitely benefit being indoors, as it makes it feel more like a permanent attraction, and not a temporary venue. The show itself is probably the cheesiest thing in the park. It’s so goofy and ridiculous, and it walks the fine line between dumb fun and horrible cheese. I enjoyed it, perhaps partially out of nostalgia, but this is definitely not a show I wanted to see again for a while.

From here we went to Disaster, which was another ride/show with mediocre ratings from theme park aficionados. After standing out in the hot sun for a short while, we were taken into the first room to meet Lonny, the production manager. The guy playing Lonny was great and played the role so completely straight. The casting of the film was fun and entertaining, and equally entertaining was the next room with Christopher Walken hologram as the director. As a whole, the attraction was great, and the aspect I liked least was the ride portion. It takes away from the cool scenery and neat effects when you’re flailing around like a crazy person. Again with the comparisons, the ride portion is very similar to the Earthquake part of the Studio Tour in Hollywood.

After leaving Disaster, we headed toward Men in Black: Alien Encounter, getting a view of the future Harry Potter area along the way. This project looks massive, and hopefully will bring more people into this park. I know I hope to see it in the near future.

Anywho, Men in Black Alien Encounter was one of the few attractions in this park that has no comparison at all to anything in Hollywood. This was a completely brand new attraction to me, and while I knew it was a shooting ride, I didn’t know much else. Like Harry Potter, the ride started with free lockers, which also meant hordes of people. I’d imagine the free lockers are utilized so the ride wouldn’t have to cycle out if something fell onto the track, but really this ride could have easily had safety pouches. Anyway though, the queue for this ride was fantastic. Felt just like you were walking into MIB headquarters. The ride itself was pretty good. It was an interesting twist on the shooting rides to have two cars fighting against each other. Even though it was probably necessary, I didn’t care for how wide open the track was (me nitpicking). I don’t know what it was, but the openness of the track kind of took away from the intimacy of the ride. But it was still fun. Kind of a big blur of weird going’s on. This is the attraction that I remember the least, mainly because so much stuff was constantly going on that it’s hard to recall everything.

From here, we went back and fought to get my sister’s and mom’s items from the lockers, shoving as many people to the floor as we could, before heading to The Simpsons Ride. I am a huge fan of the Simpsons, and could probably trivia-off with the best and still hold my ground, but, I’ve been on this ride many times in Hollywood, and typically movie rides don’t change from park to park, so this wasn’t a must-do for me. But we did it nonetheless, with a posted 40-minute wait time (which was actually closer to 20-minutes). The clips in the queue are always wonderful, with practically half of the “Itchy and Scratchy Land” episode playing. And the videos made for the queue are also delightful, as are many of the jokes on the ride, my favorites being (and I paraphrase) “My bosoms are slapping me in my face!” and “There’s nothing you can do, you’re about to die!” “You sound like my doctor.”

Outside the ride was the Springfield portion of the park which was fun to explore. Moe’s Tavern especially looked awesome, and I loved the giant Simpsons figures around the area. It was essentially a food court with great theming, and if you’re going to have a food court, why not theme it to the best? Thoroughly wonderful!

We only had an hour or so before our reservation for Finnegan’s at this point, and it also began sporadically raining very heavily, and then dying off. We thought we might go see the Universal Animal Actors show (also in Hollywood), but it’s start time didn’t match up right with our reservation, so instead we went on another spin on E.T. This time, the ride was even better because of a longer queue. Normally longer queues don’t equal a better experience, but this time we got to experience all the cool effects in the wooded queue, including E.T.’s teacher Botanicus popping up, and the government agents. Truly this is a ride I could do again and again. Supposedly Spielberg was upset when they removed the ride in Hollywood without his permission, so hopefully that means as long as there’s a breath in Spielberg’s body, the ride will remain open.

When we got off the ride it was pouring heavily. We took what was probably the longest route to get back to Finnegan’s, heading backwards past Simpsons and Disaster, stopping under overhangs along the way to avoid being pummeled by the heavy water fall. We got over to Finnegan’s early, and they took us in about 15 minutes before our reservation. I enjoyed the ambience of this place, and hearing live music from the other room was a treat. Our waitress talked us into the Universal Cinematic Spectacular Dining Plan, and since we were all interested in seeing the firework show, it seemed like a good deal, and it wasn’t too much more money. The food here was very good, but my sister wasn’t feeling too well, so the after meal ride was the bathroom and look for sweatshirt in gift shop ride. While my sister and mom did that, I did single rider on the Mummy, which got me on in about 3-minutes. The longest I ever saw the line for the Mummy was 15-minutes, and it was a semi-busy day. Because of the short lines, I also never experienced the queue, or the story really. I get that it’s supposed to be a haunted set, and Brendan Frasier is playing a jerkified version of himself, but I never watched the pre-ride video for more than 10 seconds. Again, a very fun ride!

As I exited the ride, my mother and sister happened to be in the Mummy gift shop, so we met up and decided to ride Despicable Me. When the wait was 80-minutes, we decided not to. Despicable Me is coming to Hollywood shortly, so I don’t mind waiting for it to arrive over here. We then scoured the Despicable Me gift shop looking for a Minion sweater, but they were completely out of everything except for extra large. Perhaps it’s my affinity for the Universal parks, or maybe the history of Universal, but I’m glad to see that Universal finally has a very profitable (and well liked) movie series in Despicable Me. The other movie studios always seem to have bigger hits than Universal, so it’s nice to see Universal release what probably is/will be a minor classic/cult classic in the animation genre.

Anyways, the rain was still going and was as bad as ever. We head into the Lucy: A Tribute (formerly found in Hollywood) building to dry off. Inside, we watched some clips, played the trivia game and had a swell time. You can tell when the park was built from this attraction however. Lucy had just died, and a tribute area was in order, featuring what are now extremely dated games. But it’s a nice area nonetheless.

When the rain died slightly, we went over to Terminator, which was starting soon. This attraction was recently taken out in Hollywood, so it was good to see it alive and well. It was no different than it’s deceased west coast counterpart, and was equally as fun and whimsical.

My sister, still not feeling well, wanted to go gift shopping, so I did single rider on the Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit Coaster. The single rider queue was posted as 20-minutes, and the current time was probably around 7:50 in the pm. I figured I’d get through this line, maybe another ride on the Mummy, and then we could head over to our reserved table for the fireworks show. Unfortunately, the 20-minutes posted was way off. Being the optimist I am, I waited, assuming the line would pick up. After 40 minutes, and being nowhere near the front of the line, I decided to leave. It was more important to make the fireworks show than to ride what looked like a pretty cool coaster. As I exited backwards through the crowds, I noticed the queue times hadn’t changed. Still it said 20-minutes. I’d say an hour would’ve been a better estimate.

Having not ridden the ride, I’ll say that the coaster is in a location that looks like it was shoehorned into a small space in the park, and from the opening date of 2009, that’s probably about right. The queue of the ride is pushing against the outside of the park, and while the ride looks fun, it isn’t a perfect aesthetic fit for the park in my opinion. But as long as it’s fun, who cares.

My sister, now feeling much better, wanted to try single rider in the Mummy line, and I too thought this sounded grand. The single rider line was probably about 10 minutes, as opposed to the no minutes earlier wait, so as we walked the queue, and got to the end, we decided to turn around, for the sake of getting a good spot for the show.

The reserved area for the fireworks show was apparently new, and it was also very nice. It was right on the water, and we had a server who brought us various flavors of cupcakes and Squishees, which came with the price. I enjoyed the pre-show fountains that made figures out of water. I have seem too many of the nighttime Disney shows, my favorite by far being World of Color over in California Adventure. Compared to any of the Disney shows, this one is very mediocre. The fireworks don’t do a whole lot, and the fountains do a whole lot less. The most enjoyable part (as it should’ve been) was the climax of the show, probably in large part due to John Williams’ E.T. score playing. I’m hoping this show will be tooled and fixed throughout the years, but as it stands, I can’t see park regulars staying to see the show regularly, and if the show remains the same, I know I have no real desire to see it again. Even Morgan Freeman’s voice couldn’t save the show from mediocrity. On a positive note, if you are planning on seeing the show despite it’s inferiority to other better nighttime shows, the dining option isn’t a bad deal. The seating area was nice and a great view. As I was exiting the park, I read a review on my phone of the show basically saying not to compare it to other shows. Unfortunately, with a nighttime spectacular especially, that’s hard. When you’ve seen fireworks shooting out at breakneck speeds, and amazingly choreographed fountains, then seeing something so much less at such a major theme park seems disappointing. Maybe it’s also because Universal produces such excellent rides, with their recent output putting Disney’s recent output to shame. But nighttime show-wise, Disney is heads and shoulders above Universal.

As we left, we said goodbye to the Universal parks, which gave us two full days of great fun. Before leaving of course, we headed to the crowded gift shop near the entrance, which clearly wouldn’t be closed until about midnight.

As we left the park, a worker asked us if we were free for a brief survey. We had two hours until our pick-up came, so we said sure, why not. We were taken into a small room, where the young man surveyed me (as I fit into the age range) for a good 15 to 20 minutes about my opinions on the park. This was actually fairly enjoyable, as it was a good way to get my opinions out of my head, and it killed time pretty effectively. After the lengthy survey he thanked us and we left. This was fine with me, but I think that, perhaps a better way of showing gratitude towards people who just took a 20 minute survey, they should give out Universal keychains or something. Not anything I cared about, but I’m thinking that some people probably won’t want to spend that much time expressing their opinions.

Anywho, these two days were great, and even it the hot sun and heavy rain, we were having a great time. Coming very shortly I'm going to give some boring statistics and stray opinions, and then end this thing.

Thanks to those of you who've read this far!!!

 

[CPA_ESQ.]

Nice write up.

I agree with you if you spent 20 minutes giving feedback - they should give you a free picture, a key chain, or something small.

We got $15 or $20 each for watching the last episode of the office and giving feedback.

This was in Universal Studios in the New York section - they have a TV shop store front and they do tv focus groups inside there.

We spent the $ on booze and beer

 

[macraven]

We got $15 or $20 each for watching the last episode of the office and giving feedback.

This was in Universal Studios in the New York section - they have a TV shop store front and they do tv focus groups inside there.

We spent the $ on booze and beer

early october, i was asked to watch the tv show for $30.

 

[CPA_ESQ.]

early october, i was asked to watch the tv show for $30.

Did you do it? If you did - what was it?