Cruz Family
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2005
- Messages
- 3,530
We are just back from a ten day trip to WDW and was a little disappointed with the 2 days at USO.
First let me start by saying we still had a good time. We enjoyed IOA over US by far, but it just did not live up to our expectations.
My biggest gripe was over the 2 days we were stopped by five different people with offers to visit time shares. We pretty much ran away from at least 4 or 5 more before then could even start their sales pitch. We found this just rediculous, after paying good money to be there the last thing we wanted to do is have to duck away from salesmen. Besides the timeshare people each time we would come to or from the garage we were haunted by then Universal credit card people. "No thank you I do not want your free cheap bag for signing up" Boy was that annoying!
The last thing I want to do is sit here and compare US to WDW but, throughout WDW we saw dozens of Disney vaction club booths and never seen them approch anyone.
As for the parks themselves, at US we thought the Mummy was great, MIB was good, and Shrek was also pretty good. A major disapointment for us was Mels drive-in we saw it from the outside on our 1st day and decided we had to eat there for lunch the following day. A 50's burger joint how cool is that? WRONG, BIG MISTAKE! As we walk in we expect to hear some kind of great 50's music, and what is playing? That great 50's tune Say, say, say by Micheal Jackson and Paul McCartney, Oh wait a minute or was that the 80's? Hummm, I dont know they are so similar! Any way the food stunk as did the atmosphere, big let down there! Overall we thought US was pretty sad.
As for IOA the rides were better, the Popeye ride just blows away Kali River Rapids. Hulk and DD were very cool. The themeing was great but I did not like the way the park is set up. The layout doesn't allow you to travel to and from the different parts of the park. Because it circles around water (like Epcots world showcase, but on a much larger scale) it is almost impossible to backtrack to reride your favorites.
Another thing I did like was the lockers outside some rides (especially the free ones) and not needing a key, they are controlled with your thumb print.
It also seemed like the rides were down quite often though. On our second day we got to toon lagoon at about 9:30, we wanted to ride Popeye but it did not open untill 10am. We decided to run over to the Jarrassic Park area and ride the bird things (sorry I do not remember the name). After we got all the way up there and waited about 10 min. the ride shut down, we asked if it would be long and they said just a few more minutes. After waiting another 15 we decided to leave and head back to Popeye. By now it was 10:15 but Popeye was still now open. We waited about 15 min but decided to leave before out locker cost us another $2 and we have yet to ride anything. When we got to the locker it would not open and we thought we lost our minds because we were all sure this was where we left our things. I spotted someone working at some near by lockers and asked him for help, he said he would be there in a couple of minutes. I waited and waited then saw him comming my way, but I turned to tell my husband he was comming and when I looked back he was no where in site. I found another person standing at the Dudley do right ride and she called a girl over to help. Finally we had someone competent and she opened our locker, gave us a new one at no charge, and called the popeye ride to see if it was up and running. It was, so she gave them our name and sent us over so we could go right on the ride. It was kinda funny because when we got there the guy took us around the back way (which was quite a walk) and when we got to where we get on the ride, there was only one family standing in line for it anyway. I guess it's the thought that counts!
Overall even though we had a few bumps in the road we did have a good time. We have not decided if we will return on our next trip in 2008 but if we do we will just do one day at IOA. I do want to thank all the US/IOA experts that helped me plan, it really did help. We really wanted to love the parks like so many of you do but for us (even my 13 yr old son) Disney still rules.
First let me start by saying we still had a good time. We enjoyed IOA over US by far, but it just did not live up to our expectations.
My biggest gripe was over the 2 days we were stopped by five different people with offers to visit time shares. We pretty much ran away from at least 4 or 5 more before then could even start their sales pitch. We found this just rediculous, after paying good money to be there the last thing we wanted to do is have to duck away from salesmen. Besides the timeshare people each time we would come to or from the garage we were haunted by then Universal credit card people. "No thank you I do not want your free cheap bag for signing up" Boy was that annoying!
The last thing I want to do is sit here and compare US to WDW but, throughout WDW we saw dozens of Disney vaction club booths and never seen them approch anyone.
As for the parks themselves, at US we thought the Mummy was great, MIB was good, and Shrek was also pretty good. A major disapointment for us was Mels drive-in we saw it from the outside on our 1st day and decided we had to eat there for lunch the following day. A 50's burger joint how cool is that? WRONG, BIG MISTAKE! As we walk in we expect to hear some kind of great 50's music, and what is playing? That great 50's tune Say, say, say by Micheal Jackson and Paul McCartney, Oh wait a minute or was that the 80's? Hummm, I dont know they are so similar! Any way the food stunk as did the atmosphere, big let down there! Overall we thought US was pretty sad.
As for IOA the rides were better, the Popeye ride just blows away Kali River Rapids. Hulk and DD were very cool. The themeing was great but I did not like the way the park is set up. The layout doesn't allow you to travel to and from the different parts of the park. Because it circles around water (like Epcots world showcase, but on a much larger scale) it is almost impossible to backtrack to reride your favorites.
Another thing I did like was the lockers outside some rides (especially the free ones) and not needing a key, they are controlled with your thumb print.
It also seemed like the rides were down quite often though. On our second day we got to toon lagoon at about 9:30, we wanted to ride Popeye but it did not open untill 10am. We decided to run over to the Jarrassic Park area and ride the bird things (sorry I do not remember the name). After we got all the way up there and waited about 10 min. the ride shut down, we asked if it would be long and they said just a few more minutes. After waiting another 15 we decided to leave and head back to Popeye. By now it was 10:15 but Popeye was still now open. We waited about 15 min but decided to leave before out locker cost us another $2 and we have yet to ride anything. When we got to the locker it would not open and we thought we lost our minds because we were all sure this was where we left our things. I spotted someone working at some near by lockers and asked him for help, he said he would be there in a couple of minutes. I waited and waited then saw him comming my way, but I turned to tell my husband he was comming and when I looked back he was no where in site. I found another person standing at the Dudley do right ride and she called a girl over to help. Finally we had someone competent and she opened our locker, gave us a new one at no charge, and called the popeye ride to see if it was up and running. It was, so she gave them our name and sent us over so we could go right on the ride. It was kinda funny because when we got there the guy took us around the back way (which was quite a walk) and when we got to where we get on the ride, there was only one family standing in line for it anyway. I guess it's the thought that counts!
Overall even though we had a few bumps in the road we did have a good time. We have not decided if we will return on our next trip in 2008 but if we do we will just do one day at IOA. I do want to thank all the US/IOA experts that helped me plan, it really did help. We really wanted to love the parks like so many of you do but for us (even my 13 yr old son) Disney still rules.
about this) but if we could arrange for complimentary tickets through Fairfield, we would LOVE 
to add another day. 
