How Many Ways Can I Explain This? TR July 2016 -7/24, DCA Pt 1

[amalone1013]

We carried on!

The pier is the official end of Route 66. There was a shop all the way out at the end full of Route 66 merchandise.

We watched people at the trapeze school for a bit.

A food cart I tried to covertly take a picture of. I don't know why I cared about being sneaky! I was just so taken by the Japanese food on top of hot dogs, I wanted to send it to my friend. I don't even eat Japanese food...

At the end of the pier, there's a restaurant and a police station!

This is the top half of the restaurant building (or part of it, the side that looks out towards the ocean). I couldn't help but think it would be so neat for a small party (like a wedding reception? )

Love the old cars with rafts tied on top!
​

I attempted to revive my high school selfie-taking skills, but Zack was having a little trouble...

That's better! I don't know why he had so much trouble, I was fine!

Someone took pity on us and offered to take this shot.

Hi Brittany!

I spy a photo opportunity!

Almost...

There it is!
​

I knew there was no way Zack could be so close to any type of roller coaster without riding it, so our next stop:

​

Fair warning: these are not cheap rides. They are either $5 or $8 per person per ride, or you can buy a wristband for $30 per person. We were only interested in three rides, so we just got enough 'credits' for those... at the tune of $48 total! But we don't do this every weekend?

I waited for this picture

We rode the Ferris Wheel... and something terrifying happened!

It was also... educational!

(The Pacific Wheel soars 130 ft above the Pacific Ocean and stands over 9 stories high)

It was converted to the world's first and only solar powered Ferris Wheel in 1998 (not sure if this is still the only one?)

It was upgraded in 2008 with over 160,000 LED lights

They were setting up for some concert series that night, which involved multicolored inflatables - you can just see one on the left.
​

We also rode the roller coaster, which freaked me out a bit because you could feel the whole pier shake slightly every time it hit the brake zone at the end.

Finally it was time to go. We spent about 5 hours here before the grueling drive to our hotel in rush hour traffic. I snapped two more building pictures as we left...

​

Before I got scolded for not navigating

It took about two hours to get to our hotel in Glendale

Econolodge - always in my budget!

Can I point out that those are the only bags I brought along? My Vera duffel, and my big tote bag which I dropped my day purse into so I could go carry-on only on the plane. I was very proud of myself
​

After we checked in, we headed to CityWalk to meet Dr B for dinner, and the hostess played a mean joke on me. It only took us about 10 minutes to get to Universal from the hotel. It was around 8:30pm, but Dr B was coming from farther away and got caught up in the lovely LA traffic. Zack and I stopped in to Bucca di Beppo and asked the hostess what the wait was. She told us there wasn't one currently, but of course she couldn't predict what it would be like in 20 minutes. We walked around a bit until Dr B got there (no pictures - I was so tired!), then headed back to the restaurant. There were a few people in the waiting area, and Zack and I had noticed a lot of people coming out of the park while we were wandering... I went up to the same hostess and she told me 45 minutes I'm pretty sure I looked like this: . Thank goodness she was pulling my leg!


That pretty much wraps up Day 1! Tune in next time for... Ground sloths and physics and baseball hats, oh my!

 

[auntiegem]

Two things:

Those are some amazing packing skills you have there.

Poor Brittany!

 

[emilyhuff]

We are staying at that econolodge in Glendale on night 1 of our trip!!! Good to hear that it isn't a terrible place to stay! DBF was very concerned.

 

[kelmac284]

Loving your report. We are from Nor Cal so we drive a lot and did the Santa Monica Pier a few years back. We also stayed at the Queen Mary and loved it. We actually went for the tours and ended up getting a room. We got a big suite which we hadn't planned on but it just worked out that way. We didn't get our tours free though. :/ But we loved the tours. We did the history one and the ghost tour. Of course then I was so freaked and we went to bed and I heard all this stuff at night and I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I didn't get much sleep but it turns out we were right under the kitchen LOL.

Looking forward to your next update!

 

[amalone1013]

Those are some amazing packing skills you have there.

Thanks! I was even more with myself impressed coming back! DF did carry-on also, with a backpack and a rolling suitcase. I had packed a tote to bring things back, because my Vera duffel can survive being checked. But we were there over the whole SW flights getting cancelled, so to be safe we did carry-on home, and somehow made even all of our new goodies fit!

We are staying at that econolodge in Glendale on night 1 of our trip!!! Good to hear that it isn't a terrible place to stay! DBF was very concerned.

We were a bit too, honestly. But it was really a great location for Universal, a nice grocery store across the street, by a high school... There were a few closed motels a couple blocks up the street that looked a bit sketchy, I won't lie, but overall the area was fine. I wasn't worried getting back late at night. And the rooms were clean and semi-updated... New counters/tub, new bedding, new tv, older furniture/carpet. It was clean, no sign of creepy-crawlies, and the bed was comfy. And the price couldn't be beat!

We didn't get our tours free though. :/ But we loved the tours. We did the history one and the ghost tour. Of course then I was so freaked and we went to bed and I heard all this stuff at night and I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I didn't get much sleep but it turns out we were right under the kitchen LOL.

Haha! I wish we had gone on a tour... We had some debacles so we ended up having less time than I originally thought (one of those things that, had it been just us we would have been fine, but with a large group it was more difficult). Originally I was like, when will we be back here? But now I'm thinking, we'll have to go back sometime to do tours, and DF wanted to spend lots more time in the engine room.

 

[chunkymonkey]

The Santa Monica Pier is really fun! I haven't been for a while but it's really nice to be by the ocean and have so much to see and do. Great pictures!
Wow you went on a trip that long with only a carry on? Bravo!!

 

[amalone1013]

The Santa Monica Pier is really fun! I haven't been for a while but it's really nice to be by the ocean and have so much to see and do. Great pictures!
Wow you went on a trip that long with only a carry on? Bravo!!

Thanks!

I learned to travel light on my London/Paris trip last year. I'm so glad, but it's really hard

 

[amalone1013]

Friday
La Brea Tar Pits
​

Our day started off with a trip to the grocery store for breakfast and snacks for the week. And wine. That was very important. Thank goodness California is one of those heathen states that sells alcohol in the grocery stores We had two other errands before meeting up with everyone at the Burbank airport: stop at Costco to check for Catalina Ferry gift cards, and return our rental car. If you remember, it was cheaper for Zack and I to do a one day rental from LAX to BUR than to add an additional day on our original reservation... We were getting muffins, and I couldn't bring myself to pay $6 for 4 tiny muffins, when I knew we were going to Costco and could get a dozen giant delicious muffins for $8. This tidbit will make sense later

We dropped the food off at the hotel, double checked the rental car was empty, and headed to a Costco near the Burbank airport. Our 15 minute detour to Costco totally paid off because they had the ferry gift cards (and muffins), which saved everyone 20%

Then to the airport... We missed the rental car return twice (it was hard to see!), and when we finally made it into line we started cracking up... Here we were with a completely empty rental car, dropping it off at the airport, no luggage... just muffins. We get out and Zack asks the guy, So where do we pick up our next car? Pretty sure he thought we were weirdos.

Finally we met up with everyone, got our cars, and were on our way! Though the time was peppered with Little J alternating between asking for a muffin, or begging everyone for a dollar for the vending machine We stopped at the hotel to drop everyone's bags off in our room since theirs weren't ready yet (around noon). Little J immediately started asking for a pop or chips when he saw our grocery store haul... So we figured it was time to head out. We went to a nearby In n Out for lunch (mmmmmmmmmmmmm) and then headed off to the Tar Pits!

​

Spoiler Alert - the pits are not actually tar, they are asphalt. Natural asphalt seeps up through faults, and forms the pits. Spanish explorers in the 1700s named them Los Volcanes de Brea, or the Tar Volcanoes. La Brea is Spanish for tar, and the name has stuck.

​

The whole lower area here is a tar pit, going up to the palm trees. The closer side is just covered with leaves and dead pine needles. The large pits are like this because they have been excavated for fossils.
​

Zack uses the force on a giant sloth?
​

The park area is free to walk around, only the museum requires admission. There's a few tours included in museum admission. The park is very pretty and green - lots of people were hanging out, picnicking, walking their dogs... just watch out for asphalt seeps! It's still coming up!

We got there just in time to catch the Excavator tour, which really made the experience for us. We learned so much more in 45 minutes than we probably would have on our own. I'd recommend catching it.
​

The first fossil ever found - a saber tooth cat fang

There's a large lake pit - I can't remember why it was like this. It may have been because at one point someone was 'mining' the asphalt and selling it to people?
​

Methane bubbles up through the tar, and you can see the bubbles. We saw a few in the pits, but you would see lots in the lake pit. I'll spare you my 8 million pictures of trying to capture one and instead give you this gif google photos put together for me:

​

Apparently I didn't take a picture of the Observation Pit from the outside. It was the original 'museum' - it was a round building with a spiral staircase, built over a tar pit and staged with real fossils. It had been completely excavated, but the placed the fossils as they would have been found - the methane kind of churns the tar, so skeletons become jumbled. Here's inside:

We headed into the NEW museum:

The skeletons get discolored from the asphalt.

For Brittany
​

There was a lab were you could watch people cleaning up fossils - painstakingly cleaning tar off of tiny bones and gluing broken pieces back together. All of the work is done by volunteers. I didn't get any good pictures of that

There are two current excavations going on:

​

Project 23 is the newest excavation. In 2006, the LA Country Museum of Art (next door) started work for a new parking garage... and found fossils! Everything was placed into crates and moved into the park, and volunteers have been going through them ever since. There are 23 crates and they were on crate 14. You can watch them sort through fossil material outside, and then it goes to the lab in the museum for fine cleaning.
​

​

This is the other project, Pit 91. It has been excavated on and off since 1915. You can see how they have roped it off for a grid system, and the different levels of plywood corresponded to different levels of the grid.
​

​

We (Zack and I, and his parents) really enjoyed our time at La Brea Tar Pits. It's something we might do again, as we could have spent a bit more time, or done the other tours. Others in the group... not so much... which we expected. This one of the many times we told them they should do something they would enjoy, but they tagged along instead. They were also a bit grumpy because they tried to follow us through traffic which didn't work (not a surprise) and because we didn't stand by our car and wait for them We walked into the park... we all had phones, they were supposed to call when they got there. It wasn't that big of a place.

Anywho, I'll leave you with a few pictures. Zack is a sucker for souvenir photos:

Here we were supposed to be stuck in a tar pit... Zack's parents missed that and just looked nice. Zack did not appreciate me trying to pull him into the tar

Next Time: Griffith Park and Observatory!​

 

[amalone1013]

It's been too long, but I hate to leave things unfinished (and I haven't even gotten to Disney!), so here we go!

Griffith Park and Observatory​

After finishing at the Tar Pits, it was about a 20 minute drive to Griffith Park. I was a bit surprised there wasn't more to the entrance, just a 2 lane road to turn in to. We knew we were going the right way because we kept getting glimpses of the observatory!

Parking was difficult. The true lot is really small, so people we parked on the sides of the road. We ended up going past the observatory and back down the other side of the hill before we found another lot for a picnic area, and then had to trek up the hill.

A few views along the way:

A bit smoggy...​

That's better!
I think we were parked with the cars in the lower left corner... It was a bit of a climb!​

Finally, we made it!

​

Not only can you come up here to visit the observatory, but you can also see the Hollywood sign! I was pretty happy with this because we didn't make an effort to see the sign last time we had been out here.

​

I really enjoyed the observatory and could have spent longer there. It was a beautiful building, had beautiful details inside and out, and there were ton's of science exhibits - 3 levels. Everything but the planetarium show was free, which I was very surprised by once I saw everything inside.

Murals on the ceiling when you entered

​

Here are just two of the exhibits:

Tesla Coil Science Demonstration - not a great picture, but they did a demo with it.

Giant light up Periodic Table of Elements!

​

There was a sample of each element, and you could push buttons on the board to light up different families (is that the right word? I was more into biology than chemistry ). I would have played with this for awhile, but I didn't think that would be too nice with all the small children enjoying it.
​

​

There are several telescopes around, a live image of the sun, historical items, all sorts of things. The lower level was completely dedicated to space exhibits. I also liked the camera obscura, which continuously moved 360* and projected an image of the skyline onto a table in the building. It would be easy to spend half a day or more here.

I love building details. I spare you my pictures of the ironwork over the windows
​

We headed up on to the roof to admire the view. There was a large telescope up here that you could go in to see, but the line was over an hour long so we didn't have time.

Hey, I know those guys!

When you looked one way, you saw LA...

When you looked the other way, it was like wilderness... Griffith Park is huge!

I got a kick out of this little stand of Palm Trees right near the top of the hill.

Zack's dad enjoys the views.

​

Eventually, it was time to head back to Citywalk and meet Dr B and his girlfriend, Bt, for dinner. We ended up at Hardrock Cafe with everyone, where I enjoyed some sangria

​

Eventually some people wanted to head back to the hotel and get checked in, since at that point we had only stopped by to drop everyone's luggage in our room. Big J and Sz made a big deal of hurrying out of the restaurant... and then stopped in the hat store to buy Little J a hat which took around 30 minutes. It seemed it was less about getting to the hotel, and more about someone begging for a pro-hockey hat.

Eventually we made it back to the hotel, got everyone's luggage sorted out, and... drank a little wine with Zack's parents and Auntie L in our 'living room' before hitting the sack. We survived the first day with minimal drama!

Next up, Universal Studios!​

 

[Frozen2014]

Haha, that's awesome! I love my spreadsheets. This trip has an excel workbook with about 10 pages... I also have a monster one I started trying to compare discounts and scenarios for our Disneymoon next Fall to WDW.

Lol...great to hear someone else is like me. I'm still 7 months away from our LA/Disney trip and also have about 10 tabs on my planning spreadsheets.

What an amazing trip you had. Thanks for sharing!

So speadking of which your report is so helpful as I'm in the mist of the planning and have La Brae Tar Pits and Griffith Observatory, as well as Santa Monica Pier on our list. Funny thing is, I'm not even clear on what La Brae is, but keep hearing it's so great. Have noted to do the Excavator tour. (Will have to check out your pictures since I'm at work now and for some reason, they are not showing)

 

[ErinF]

I really enjoyed seeing your pictures and hearing about Griffith Observatory. I wanted to do that the last (my only) time we were in LA 2 years ago, but we never really had time since we were mostly there for DL. We're headed back in June and I am making it a priority this time! Our one full day off will be a Sunday, so I'm hoping the traffic won't be too horrible for the drive from Anaheim up there. And maybe if we go first thing in the morning and get there around 10 when they open, parking will be easier? I can only hope!

 

[OregonMomToWDW]

I have been to DL many times, but have never made it to the tar pits (learned about them a lot in school growing up) or to the Griffith Observatory. Although, when people ask me what else to do in LA besides Disney, those are always my first 2 things to recommend. Someday, I will get there myself.

 

[scrappydew]

Love your trip report! I would love to explore more of CA the next time we are out.

 

[TexasErin]

I just stumbled upon your TR and can't wait to read more! The big pup on the left reminds me of our Great Pyrenees who passed away last year. The person we bought her from said she was a full-blooded Pyrenees, but her hair was very, very shaggy and tangly. What kind of dog is that? They are all adorable!

I just started reading your report and can't wait to read more. We will be at Disneyland end of next month and DD has said she would love to see some of Hollywood. We've been to DLR twice, but haven't seen anything else in CA.

The Backstory
​

Zack and I met in college, and after graduation I moved back home (different state) for about a year. Zack moved back in with his parents, as our long-term plan at the time was when I moved back out to our college state, we would get a place together. When I moved, I was still job hunting, and his parents offered to let us stay wit them until I found a job. That job started as a temp to hire position, then around when I hired on Zack changed jobs, and then I changed jobs, and then we got engaged...

So now we are hanging around until the wedding. Originally I was concerned about moving out ASAP because I wasn't sure how it would go, but it actually has worked out very well. We all get along quite well and I'm definitely the favorite future child-in-law. His mom often jokes she won't have anyone to talk to after we leave.

They won't take any money from us though, so I try to make dinner a lot, and bring home dog treats from work. It's helped us a lot too because we've been able to save for the wedding/honeymoon (disneymoon)/possibly house, and pay extra on our student loans. And it's nice to know that I get along with them so well!

Anyways, this led to our Disneyland trip (in part). After our 3 magical days in 2015, we were thinking of going again. Zack proposed the idea of a family trip, because the last time his family (with his brothers) went anywhere they were all still in high school. Zack and I had also planned on doing something for his parents when we moved out for letting us stay with them, so we decided we would cover all park/attraction tickets for them. We're going to do something else too, since we'll still be there another year after this trip. It'll be hard, I think, because it was pretty hard to argue them down about the tickets!

We conferred in secret with his brothers to find a good date for everyone before telling Zack's parents. Dr B is already out in the LA area. Zack's parents have three cuddly monsters who would need a babysitter while we were gone, so we asked Auntie L. Her response was the best, but sad at the same time: she got a sad look and said quietly, "but I like Disney."

Three cuddly monsters​

Well, it ended up that K is too popular (at least, that's what I told him) as he had already booked all his vacation time for weddings - all destination weddings. Guess his friends are too cool to get married here in the US. Since he wasn't able to take time off, he will now be watching the monsters. So we asked Auntie L to join us and she was overjoyed.

We had a week in mind, and knew who would be joining us! It was time to come up with a solid plan!
​

 

[kelmac284]

Nice update. We live up North so we do LA quite a bit and I have done both of these and they are both fun. We did the LACMA and tar pits quite a while ago. Looks like they have some new things. My girls were pretty young so def may have to go back there. We are waiting till the new Academy Award museum opens and will prob go down and check out that, LACMA and the car museum. Loved the observatory as well. We went in 14 to tour the Disney Studios and took a day and did this and went to the carousel in the park that walt sat at to get his ideas for Disneyland. So much fun stuff like that to check out.

 

[amalone1013]

I'm so sorry I haven't updated or replied to anyone! Work/Life had some really busy times!

Lol...great to hear someone else is like me. I'm still 7 months away from our LA/Disney trip and also have about 10 tabs on my planning spreadsheets.

What an amazing trip you had. Thanks for sharing!

So speadking of which your report is so helpful as I'm in the mist of the planning and have La Brae Tar Pits and Griffith Observatory, as well as Santa Monica Pier on our list. Funny thing is, I'm not even clear on what La Brae is, but keep hearing it's so great. Have noted to do the Excavator tour. (Will have to check out your pictures since I'm at work now and for some reason, they are not showing)

This is a really late reply, I apologize! I was in the same boat with La Brea... didn't really know much, my fiance brought it up. I really enjoyed it! Also I hope the pictures showed up!

I really enjoyed seeing your pictures and hearing about Griffith Observatory. I wanted to do that the last (my only) time we were in LA 2 years ago, but we never really had time since we were mostly there for DL. We're headed back in June and I am making it a priority this time! Our one full day off will be a Sunday, so I'm hoping the traffic won't be too horrible for the drive from Anaheim up there. And maybe if we go first thing in the morning and get there around 10 when they open, parking will be easier? I can only hope!

I think going in the morning would be much better for parking. Not that I'm experienced in that or anything haha. If I had realized how bad parking was going to be, I might have hit that first. La Brea has it's own dedicated lot and it wasn't full when we were there. I was just trying to minimize backtracking - LA traffic is no joke!

I have been to DL many times, but have never made it to the tar pits (learned about them a lot in school growing up) or to the Griffith Observatory. Although, when people ask me what else to do in LA besides Disney, those are always my first 2 things to recommend. Someday, I will get there myself.

Our first trip to CA, people where like, oh did you go to Hollywood? Did you see the sign? Did you go to the beach? We did none of those things. We did Disney, Universal, Warner Bros, and 2 days in San Diego... At first I almost felt bad, and then reminded myself, to each their own! Those are less 'my thing' but I did want to see the sign just because so I'm glad I did on this trip! I recommend both of those places to people now (along with Catalina Island, or the USS Iowa battleship if they're into those things). Griffith and La Brea are low cost too, so I don't feel bad if they don't enjoy them

Love your trip report! I would love to explore more of CA the next time we are out.

It's such a fun place, I just can't handle the traffic! I really want to go to Northern California though... preferably fly into SoCal and drive up the coast, or vice versa!

I just stumbled upon your TR and can't wait to read more! The big pup on the left reminds me of our Great Pyrenees who passed away last year. The person we bought her from said she was a full-blooded Pyrenees, but her hair was very, very shaggy and tangly. What kind of dog is that? They are all adorable!

I just started reading your report and can't wait to read more. We will be at Disneyland end of next month and DD has said she would love to see some of Hollywood. We've been to DLR twice, but haven't seen anything else in CA.

Hello! We didn't see much of LA besides Disney, Universal, and Warner Bros on our first trip lol. So I wanted to see a bit more this time!

So all three dogs are Goldendoodles (Golden Retriever Poodle mixes). Bodie is the one on the left, Allie on the right, and Maggie is the brown one. Bodie and Maggie are from the same parents, just differnt litters. We have family that has Bodie's brother and Maggie's sister, and the coat is different on all four of them. Some are wavier, some really tight curls, they have different face shapes, body builds... It's funny how that works out.

Nice update. We live up North so we do LA quite a bit and I have done both of these and they are both fun. We did the LACMA and tar pits quite a while ago. Looks like they have some new things. My girls were pretty young so def may have to go back there. We are waiting till the new Academy Award museum opens and will prob go down and check out that, LACMA and the car museum. Loved the observatory as well. We went in 14 to tour the Disney Studios and took a day and did this and went to the carousel in the park that walt sat at to get his ideas for Disneyland. So much fun stuff like that to check out.

What is the car museum? My fiance would be into that We recently found out his brother is getting married next year (the one living in CA) so darn we might have to make a vacation out of it! I'd like to see the Walt Family Museum - I'll have to check the hours for my planning since they're a bit limited. I'll be looking into the other things you listed here too!

 

[Frozen2014]

I'm so sorry I haven't updated or replied to anyone! Work/Life had some really busy times!


This is a really late reply, I apologize! I was in the same boat with La Brea... didn't really know much, my fiance brought it up. I really enjoyed it! Also I hope the pictures showed up!


...

Thank you for responding. Not too late...am now 3 months away (so getting there). Yes, the photos showed up...and neat with the animated one!

Enjoy your trip back to CA!

 

[amalone1013]

Universal Studios
Part One​

We got up bright and early the next morning, though I think a few people were less excited for that plan. We ended up getting Express Passes for Universal, which included early entry for…

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter! ​

I was so dang excited about this. I’m a huge Potter fan. I grew up with Harry, I was the same age as him as the first five or so books were released. When they were building the Orlando version, my college roommate and I followed a blog from a local who was documenting construction. Yes, like nerds

Early entry started at 7am, and I think we were pretty close to on time. We headed back to WWoHP with the rest of the crowds. It was a bit gray and dreary out, but not really chilly. I didn’t take many pictures of Hogsmeade at this time, I was too focused on getting to class! I made up for it later.

Really, the grey skies kind of add to the European feel. See DLP castle photo from intro post

The outdoor queue, which was full later in the day.

​

This was where we hit our first family snag for the day, heading into Forbidden Journey. We had mentioned to everyone before that we could go through the regular line because it would be short, and then be able to come back and ride it again with the Express Pass, when the line was longer. Also, in all of the planning and emails and in person talks, we stressed the fact that the Express Pass was only good once per ride, and expensive, etc. I bet you see where this is going...

Little J goes marching up to the Employee scanning passes. Thankfully, the employee was nice and told him, I don't think you want to use that yet because the line is pretty short. So we had a moment of Big J and Sz freaking out that the Pass was only good one time. And being pissy about it. We were like, Yup. What else could we do?

A sidenote, the locker area for this ride is a mess and stressful. There's no clear in/out, when you exit the ride you have to fight the people heading for the line to get back to the lockers... People jumping lines for the finger scanner machines. Ugh.. <-- The stages of me in line to attempt to get a locker

I'm glad we had the early entry thing so we could ride this twice, because the line got really long after the park opened. We maybe waited 20 minutes? But it gave us time to see some of the details in the indoor queue. This version was 3D but I'm pretty sure I read that they took that away last Fall or so, but the 3D glasses looked like Quidditch goggles The queue is really dark though, and every so often you would hear:

BAM! *Ow!*​

As somebody ran into a trash can. You couldn't see them until you were right on top of them, and they were always in the darkest corners of the queue.

I thought the ride was really cool, and it ended up being my favorite for the day, though I'm a bit biased (see big Potter fan note at beginning of post ). Everyone else enjoyed the ride also - well, almost...

Zack's dad hasn't been on an amusement ride in years... so he wasn't quite ready for Forbidden Journey to be the first one of the trip! He closed his eyes as soon as you go in the fireplace

We also went on Flight of the Hippogriff, which was cute. I don't think any of the shops, etc were open yet.

We headed to the Studio Tour for our first official ride when the park opened. Our main reason for this was they added a nighttime Studio Tour, but we were told we could only use the Express Pass on the tour once. So we wanted to hit the Tour early and use the pass for the nighttime tour. We had confused family members who wondered why we weren't heading to the Lower Lot rides, I'm sure you can guess who they were. I don't think the Tour was Sz's thing, because we knew she had no interest in any shows on their NYE Florida trip. She didn't want to see a show at SeaWorld, I mean is there much else to do if you don't do the shows? I've been to the San Diego one and San Antonio, but not the Orlando one.

Here is a poor sideshot of the Simpsons ride while we waited for the tour to open:

​

Soon, we were off! Once they opened the escalators we were down and on one of the first trams in no time. It's been too long now, so I don't remember a ton of the fun facts they share on the tour.
​

Some of the city sets

Not a great picture but you might recognize the building above from a few shows/movies.

We ran into a rather large primate and a friend

They have some Jurassic Park vehicles, which Zack always enjoys because it's one of his favorite movie series. Sidenote: We were pleasantly surprised by how Jurassic World came out... I guess now they're doing JW2 and some of the JP original cast is going to be in it?

We were caught in a sudden downpour

And there were a few other things. I enjoy the Studio Tour ​

After we finished it was around 9am, and we headed down to the Lower Lot. As we went down the escalators, we watched the Raptor Encounter, because it was pretty new then. I tried to talk Zack into going, but he wasn't interested. He's not too into characters, etc, but he'll go... but the line was pretty long all day and personally I didn't care much to get in line. Fun to watch though.

​

Trying to go off almost year old memories here... Wow it's been long. Maybe I'll finish this TR within a year lol. I think we rode the Mummy and the Jurassic Park River Ride without Express Pass, because the lines still weren't bad. You know how usually on water rides, a few people get soaked and everyone else gets a light spray/mist? Not on this trip. And when we got off, they had EMPTY paper towel dispensers. It was early still! Bad show. We all got hit directly in the face/chest. I like water rides, don't get me wrong, but their water looked dirty. It actually left dirty spots from where the water dried on my bra... gross.

I think that was around when we grabbed lunch at the Jurassic Cafe. It was a madhouse! They do burgers and chicken, the food was fine but nothing special. We lost Big J, Little J, Sz, and Auntie L in there, but I went up a staircase and found the entire upstairs patio was empty. You can see the red umbrellas above the cafe sign to the right of the JP arch. That was nice because it was quiet, we had shade from the umbrellas, and the weather was nice. Not too hot.

​

After lunch I think we hit those two rides again with the Express Pass, and the Transformers ride. We also watched a few minutes of the Transformers meet. I've always seen good interactions with them.​

​

We went to the Animal Actors show, which is a favorite of mine because I love animals. It's cute and entertaining. If you have the Express Pass, they let you in first to find a seat. In 2015 we also got to stay after and ask questions and take pictures with a few of the animals (like in my intro picture). This year they didn't do that. I think Sz actually stuck this one out, though not happily.

Then we did the Despicable Me ride - Minion Mayhem? It's fun but I think the theater setup it has takes away a bit from the ride motion, compared to the setup of the Simpsons Ride. No pictures of the front, fail! But here's a few of Super Silly Fun Land, which is an adorable area. It's got a kiddie ride or two, splash park, and playground. There's also quite a few Minion statues around.
​

​

There were Minion characters meeting too, and also maybe Minions/Gru meeting near the ride entrance? Across from the Super Silly Fun Land entrance is a themed restaurant, Gru's Lab, something like that. We didn't eat their this time but did in 2015 and I had a delicious grilled cheese with pulled pork on it They have lots of adorable Minion desserts too.

At some point we hit the Walking Dead walk through attraction. This had only opened a month or so before, and (almost) everyone was really excited because they were fans of the show, even Sz. Overall though, the general consensus was a let down. The outside was themed, though randomly in one of their street areas, like the buildings on either side looked normal. I guess I forgot a picture during the day so I stole this one from my nighttime pictures. The queue had theming, but once you got in it was mainly black rooms with props and some AA zombies, some actors. It's not my thing anyways (haunted houses, I've seen several seasons of TWD), but it seemed underwhelming and short. Glad we could use the pass for it.
​

​

​

More to Come!​

 

[Raeven]

I was so dang excited about this. I’m a huge Potter fan. I grew up with Harry, I was the same age as him as the first five or so books were released.

Me too (well I was a little younger than Harry when they started) but I'm a huge fan too!

And there were a few other things. I enjoy the Studio Tour

Someday I have to get out to the one in Hollywood and try this!

 

[kelmac284]

Liked your update. We like Universal but to be honest the one in Hollywood is a little boring to me. We have done it so many times and it just doesn't seem to have that much stuff. We love IOA in Orlando and we even did the universal side this last year because of Daigon Alley and it was really cool. They have so much more back there. We will prob do Universal though when we go down at Thanksgiving because we plan on doing a lot of museums and such and my kids need something kid centered.

The car museum I was talking about is the Peterson Museum. You can google it but it is right next to LACMA. It looks pretty cool. We did it years ago but it has been re-done and is supposed to be pretty good if you like that stuff.

The Disney studio I was referring to was the one in LA that you have to get special passes to see. It was amazing and we had to join D23 to do it and then they only have one every so often. I am so glad we were able to do it. But we have also done the Disney museum in SF many times as we live very close to SF. It is also really cool.

Look forward to your next update.