Has Anyone done the Harry Potter Exhibit

[mtmbyck]

Is it worth adding a day in March to go and see it? It is at Islands of Adventure correct?

 

[amw]

Is it worth adding a day in March to go and see it? It is at Islands of Adventure correct?

Haven't been yet, but it's not an "exhibit", it is a whole section of the park like Fantasyland with rides, restaurants, stores - all themed to Hogwarts and Hogsmeade. You can look at the Universal Boards for more information and pictures. It seems to be drawing a lot of people away from WDW for a day.

 

[GrtWtNorth]

IMO, it's worth going to check out the two Universal parks, with or without the Wizarding World of Harry Potter "land". Like the Disney parks, you can experience them at a super-fast pace in a day or two, but if you want to enjoy and absorb the details, I would suggest 4 days for these parks.

 

[GrtWtNorth]

FYI, there will be some kind of Harry Potter exhibit at the studio where they film the movies in London. However, this won't open for at least another two years (when the 8th movie is finished). There are very little details about this attraction, but speculation and rumour lean towards an escorted / guided walk-through tour of the studio sets (assuming they are not all destroyed for filming the battle of Hogwarts).

 

[minnie56]

My DD has done it mutilple times and thinks it's the best ever...but she has an annual pass for Universal so it's not a waste to go in just to see the WWOHP. I would follow what another poster has said and at least get a park pass and plan on enjoying the whole park!

 

[mtmbyck]

I guess I should have qualified my question....we did Universal and IOA 2 years ago instead of Disney and regretted it. While there were more thrill rides, it lacked the magic and family fun that Disney offers - just our opinion. There was hardly anything that we could all go on together - other than ET and Jaws. I just figured if HP is absolutely amazing and a must see (DD's don't even watch the movies) then we'd squeeze it in - they would love to do the Hulk again while I sit and worry......

I will say this - while the lines were unbearable at Disney parks, we walked on almost everything at both US and IOA. That was a treat.

I find the Universal website poor at desribing the themed area - perhaps not enough live shots yet.....I'll have a look at Youtube.

 

[amw]

perhaps not enough live shots yet.....I'll have a look at Youtube.

I find the trip reports in the Universal section of the disboards to be really detailed.

 

[BraMax]

We just got back from 11 days in Orlando. We spent 2 days at Universal and 6 days at WDW. Our reason for going to Universal Studios was for the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. My oldest is 10 and a huge fan and my other is 7 not a total fan but both of them loved it. The ride that goes through the castle is the coolest ride I have ever been on. My husband loved the Dualing Dragons' roller coster (kids weren't tall enough 54"). The whole theming of the park was great. Also since we were there in Aug/Sept we went on all the water rides to cool off but in March not sure what the weather is like. They do have another new coaster on the Universal side called Rip Rockit my husband loved that one too.

 

[KINGBOBOFTHENORTH]

Is it worth adding a day in March to go and see it? It is at Islands of Adventure correct?

Yes. While some still feel Spiderman is better, nearly everyone feels Wizarding World of Harry Potter is the #1 theme park ride in the world now!

BobK/Orlando

 

[dvcdisney]

We spent 7 days at Universal this past Aug. It was very busy, but it's worth a visit. The Forbidden Journey is a great ride. I was surprised how well done it was. They do still have a lot of kinks to work out though since several times during our visit, it had to be shut down.

The only thing I didn't like is that it didn't have Express Pass for the ride, but it does have a line which I'm sure will be for that purpose in the future.

We stayed at Portofino Bay so we were given the opportunity to enter the part an hour earlier. We tried this one day and the line was extremely long. The next few days, we just went in and out of the area during the day without lines. So, needless to say, we never did do the early hour again.

So, I do think it's worth a visit.

 

[LittleFlounder]

I know my 2 nephews would love to take one day to go to WWOHP when we go to WDW in Feb 2011, but I've crunched the numbers and it would cost the 3 of us $270 for admission, and then transportation from Disney, $40 there, $40 back in a taxi. Thats $350 for 3 of us to go, before food and souveniers! I just can't fork out that much for HP! They love HP, but I think we can wait a couple years until maybe they add more to it and it becomes less busy. They'll have to make do with Mickey.


.

 

[coastgirl]

We're planning to go in February. My 10 yo is a total fan, as am I, and dh and dd enjoyed the movies. We're not doing Disney parks this time, but the Orlando flex pass seems like a great deal. We're taking 10 days or so and the flexpass gives us 14 days of admissions to 5 different parks. It is expensive for one day, but like Disney, gets cheaper with more days. Way cheaper, in the case of the multi-park two week pass...

 

[jenvin]

We've scheduled our first 4 nights of our trip to universal/ioa (3 days in the parks). HP will be one our main objectives, DS12 is tall enough for the dragon ride but DD8 isn't yet, she's been topping up her milk every day since we decided back in May to go on this trip, hoping to grow 2 more inches by December

She actually did have a bit of a growth spurt during the summer, and with shoes she might just be under 54"... 3 months left, you never know!

So for us we added an extra day in universal to make sure we had enough time to get to HP, but we're going on a pretty long vacation so we've left plenty of time for WDW too.

Jen