Info about Universal Orlando in January

[Nan]

I tried to do a search and find some info that had already been posted about this, but it wouldn't work. Anyway, has anybody out there been to Universal Orlando in late December or early January? If so, what was the weather like? What were crowds like? My daughter's 18th birthday is Jan. 1, 2003, and she wants to go to Universal to celebrate. Thanks

Nan

 

[kellymonaghan]

Late December will be crowded, but after January first, the crowds thin out considerably. Hours will be shorter, however, with parks closing at 5 or 6.

Weather is really hard to predict at that time of the year. It can be very pleasant (60s, 70s) but "killer" freezes can happen, too.

 

[Robinrs]

My son's birthday is January 5th and we've gone for the past two years.

Like kelly said, it's a crowd nightmare before the holiday but you'd think the place was literally vacuumed after January 2nd.

Unfortunately, the hard freezes followed us the last two years. I brought record temps to Florida! I remember one day the heat of the day was 45 degrees! It didn't help that all the natives kept telling me "this is not normal temps for this time of year"... especially since it usually jumped back up to the 60s the day we we would leave!

This year we're going the first week in December instead of the last because of DIS CON. Hopefull the freeze won't follow us this time!

 

[Antonia]

How do people ride the "wet" rides in the winter - rides like Dudley Dooright and especially the Bilge Rat barges? We were soaked to our drawers, if you know what I mean. Of course it was in the 90's, but we wondered how people ride those rides in the winter.

 

[MsDisney]

Originally posted by Antonia
How do people ride the "wet" rides in the winter - rides like Dudley Dooright and especially the Bilge Rat barges? We were soaked to our drawers, if you know what I mean. Of course it was in the 90's, but we wondered how people ride those rides in the winter.

Well....I see them walking around soaking wet...jeans and all! Not MY idea of fun! One thing you could do is bring a change of clothes and wear a poncho...but what I have is a pair of water-proof pants (they are black, windbreaker type material) that I got from the camping dept. at Wal-mart and a waterproof jacket with a hood...between the two of them, they keep me dry. The only problem is shoes...you're definitely going to want to have a pair of waterproof ones along to change into for the wet rides, unless you like wet feet!
They have lockers you can rent and some for use for a certain amount of time for free to store your dry stuff.
You definitely want to do them all together and get the wet stuff off!
Me, I prefer to stand on Me Ship the Olive and squirt the people on the ride...that's much more fun!!!

 

[dcookies]

We went in January 2001 to US (no wet rides to worry about). What I remember -

It was nice during the middle of the day, but in the a.m. and afternoon we needed sweatshirts.

It was smoky - there was a fire somewhere nearby - a few miles away it was a beautiful clear day, but in the parks it looked overcast from the smoke.

There were NO crowds - everything was a walk-on, except MIB, which had about a 10-15 min. wait time. After our first time, we just went back through the single rider lines (about 5 or 6 more times - love that ride!!). Keep in mind, we were there the third Saturday of the month, so the holiday crowd had died down significantly. I think you'll have more crowds the closer to the holidays you are.

The park did close early, but since there were no crowds, we were able to do everything we wanted.

 

[Robinrs]

Originally posted by Antonia
How do people ride the "wet" rides in the winter - rides like Dudley Dooright and especially the Bilge Rat barges? We were soaked to our drawers, if you know what I mean. Of course it was in the 90's, but we wondered how people ride those rides in the winter.

A couple of those unseasonably cold days the wet rides were shut down and every ride that even spritzed you was turned off. If we got wet on those days we would've had to CRACK our clothes off...

 

[RUN]

I've gone at the end of January to Orlando the last four years. The crowds aren't terribly bad(under an hour for spidey and hulk all day), and the weather has been fine except for in 2001. It was 50 degrees or so, not that cold, but the Orlando people acted like they were going to die. All the other years it had been 70+ degrees. Basically on the colder days they turn all the waterfalls off on Popeye so you only have the rapids to get you wet. It doesn't make much of a difference though, you'll still get drenched.

 

[pathubia]

We lucked out this past Jan. we were there from the 18th to the 21st. The days were warm and dry, 70-80, the nights were chilly. We went on the wet rides and sopped around afterwards.

Patty

 

[Nan]

Thanks for all the great info. As usual, you guys are the best!!!
I really hope for the 70 - 80 type weather!!

Nan