Oct 1st - 5th @ Universal RPR

[Foladar]

Alright, going to try and get all these reports done
Stayed at Universal's RPR 1st - 5th, AKL 5th - 8th, and Corando Springs the 9th.

 

[Foladar]

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Our first day, we left Saturday around 7am from Miami to Orlando (driving, ugh) .. we arrived around Noon and got gas, went to Amtrak to pick up family, then headed to RPR.
ALL rooms with Park Views were taken. We received a special 'PARKing lot VIEW" .. great. Wasn't the best, wasn't the worst, wasn't what I asked for, sadly. After waiting, eating at McDs, it was around 3:30pm. We checked in, went to our room. Headed to CityWalk, IOA to get APs for family & HHN tix. Got all seven tickets for HHN and their APs, it was nearing 6pm. We head into the park, used our APs to get the guests in (didn't know we could) .. and we were lost. No idea where to go, they let us into the park, I think around 5:45pm or 5:50pm. I didn't take many pictures at all (stupid me) .. but we visited our first house, Demon Cantina. Loved it, only ones in the house, minus a scareactor in front of us. Saw our friend @ the entranceto Demon Cantina.

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Next up (after seeing a family member get scared when one of the ladies in here breathed on her neck) was The Skool, great house. Short house, but great. Demon Cantina was too dark in some areas, as was The Skool in one area (in which we were told "NO! GO THAT WAY!" by a little girl).

Well, we took one more photo which was outside of Demon Cantina (had some trouble with the dark and taking photos in the rain)

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We then stopped to eat at Burger Digs (a few of us were starting to get sick, not feeling well cus the flu was going around) .. then headed back to Bill & Teds, great show! Was my first time, too actually watching it. After that, headed to the entrance for the Terra Guard? show with the queen and sacrafices. Watched it, show was "eh" .. ran for cover when the rain came pouring down, we were all crowded together. Headed back to the RPR after this, was about 8pm or so, lines were getting long too.

 

[Foladar]

We got up late the 2nd day due to being up all night chit chatting in our new hotel. Made it out around Noon, ate at Hard Rock and took the tour, amazing. Forgot to take pictures at all today. Got into the parks between 3-4pm. Short day, 3-4 hours left in the park so we headed to Shrek 4D. They loved it, except the spiders. Onto Jimmy Neutron, first time for me here, never tried it. Was pretty, cool, they loved it except for the "dancing" in the end.

After this, we headed towards the exit (those photo things look nice) .. we managed to see some of Street Breakz. We headed out just before it ended, to head over to the Blues Brothers (figured if we headed after, it would be more crowded) .. we sat on the curb and watched the show, relaxing. Then we went ahead and sat down on the benches near Mel's while waiting for the Horror Make-Up show. After this, it was getting late, so we walked over to MIB and rode it several times (four i think) .. then headed on out of the park and towards the hotel.

 

[Seaera]

I arrived the same day as you! But we arrived late that night around 1:00 a.m.
We ended up standing in line for 1/2 hour to check in and noticed everyone ahead of us were having confrontations with the check in person. When we finally arrived to the desk to have our turn she says to us, "Oh please don't hate me. We have no rooms left, the hotel has been overbooked!" Can you believe it? This was a special trip for us (1st anniversary) and we'd been up travelling all day as we're from the west coast of Canada and this is not what we wanted to hear. She stated that she has to move us to another hotel. In my head I was thinking this was fine as long as it's HRH or PBH...but no...she says we're going to be staying at the Peabody. Uh...that wasn't going to happen and we told her so. We were not going to stay off-site - we picked this place basically to have front of the line privileges, etc. So she went into the back room to speak to the manager (we had actually heard her tell the previous guest that he would have to come back in the morning to speak to the manager as there was nobody available then....hmmmm). Anyhow, she then comes out and says that we're in luck and there is now a room available for us. It turned out to be a club room! So it actually worked out really, really well for us, but I do think it was totally unnecessary for us and everyone else in line that night to be put through all of that (including the stressed out check in person). If we didn't say anything, we would have been shipped off to the Peabody! I know that hotels often overbook, but if they do, I think they should be prepared to send people to a comparable hotel (which is an on-site hotel in this instance). Or at least be willing to bump people up a room grade to accommodate them without having to put everyone into panic mode first.
I wonder why it was so busy that weekend?
All in all loved the hotel and loved the parks! Had a great time and would love to go back!

 

[allie&mattsmom]

We checked into the RPR on Oct. 6th. It was sold out/over booked b/c we found out there were 1800 Best Buy people there for some sort of convention.

 

[Foladar]

I arrived the same day as you! But we arrived late that night around 1:00 a.m.
We ended up standing in line for 1/2 hour to check in and noticed everyone ahead of us were having confrontations with the check in person. When we finally arrived to the desk to have our turn she says to us, "Oh please don't hate me. We have no rooms left, the hotel has been overbooked!" Can you believe it? This was a special trip for us (1st anniversary) and we'd been up travelling all day as we're from the west coast of Canada and this is not what we wanted to hear. She stated that she has to move us to another hotel. In my head I was thinking this was fine as long as it's HRH or PBH...but no...she says we're going to be staying at the Peabody. Uh...that wasn't going to happen and we told her so. We were not going to stay off-site - we picked this place basically to have front of the line privileges, etc. So she went into the back room to speak to the manager (we had actually heard her tell the previous guest that he would have to come back in the morning to speak to the manager as there was nobody available then....hmmmm). Anyhow, she then comes out and says that we're in luck and there is now a room available for us. It turned out to be a club room! So it actually worked out really, really well for us, but I do think it was totally unnecessary for us and everyone else in line that night to be put through all of that (including the stressed out check in person). If we didn't say anything, we would have been shipped off to the Peabody! I know that hotels often overbook, but if they do, I think they should be prepared to send people to a comparable hotel (which is an on-site hotel in this instance). Or at least be willing to bump people up a room grade to accommodate them without having to put everyone into panic mode first.
I wonder why it was so busy that weekend?
All in all loved the hotel and loved the parks! Had a great time and would love to go back!

Amazing, no wonder there was no park view rooms! There were -alot- of people there, definitely. I'm glad we didn't check in that night instead, we had enough trouble as it was when we checked in around 1-2pm. I don't blame you, I wouldn't leave to Peabody either! I want my onsite, it was our first time there

We checked into the RPR on Oct. 6th. It was sold out/over booked b/c we found out there were 1800 Best Buy people there for some sort of convention.

That would explain why when we asked for another day, we couldn't get one (and we've been checking for the 5th or 6th for a few months now) .. oh well Hope you enjoyed your trip too!

 

[Foladar]

Well, we got up late again on Day 3 .. (this is a coming trend)
We headed out to NBA City, waited for family out front.
I ate the chicken tenders, disgusting .. plain and simple.
The rest of the family did enjoy their food, though.

As we were running extremely late today (it was near 4-5pm) .. we headed into the park and it .. rained. This happened -every- day. I expected it, though, that's why we planned the parks so long. We headed over to Animal Planet, using today as an "explore" day and relaxing. Watched AP, they loved it. We headed over to MIB, again. Of course, we love this ride!! We had to spread the love to the rest of the family.

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Managed to beat them the majority of the time (except once) .. my high was around 575,000. Believe we rode MIB four times today, too. After this, we headed to Back to the Future, as my mom -loves- this ride, and wanted to have the family see it. They enjoyed it, a bit bumpy but enjoyed. As it was nearing 7pm (already, I know) .. we headed on out of the parks and out to CityWalk, as we decided to just shop and roam around. We headed on over to the hotel after this, enjoyed our day!

 

[Foladar]

Well, today was our final full day at Universal. We only planned checkout for the 5th (oh, if only we knew what was going to happen on the 5th) .. we got up early for us, around 11am and I decided no CityWalk restaurants today since that was causing us to lose an hour or two. We headed straight into Universal today, and right onto T2:3D. They loved this ride, and of course, we left this ride hungry. I figured they would enjoy Mel's, loved the new look and they enjoyed Mel's as much as I did. I love their chicken strips! After Mel's, we headed on over to Beetlejuice and used our FOTL since our other family members weren't with us. I've seen the show of course, enjoyed it as did they. We managed to do alot this day, and I reminded them for the rest of the trip, "See how much we can get done if we can get here early" .. (yeah right)

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After Beetlejuice, we went over to Earthquake ... they really liked this ride, and they were somewhat scared? at first, but I reassured them it wasn't as bad as it sounded. After this, we went to .. you guessed it, MIB. Won again, of course!! I've never rode ET, but we just -had- to do it to complete the park, so we went on ET and it was .. enjoyable as a classic. We had a few things left to cover, so we headed back towards the Mummy area, hit the Mummy threeeee times (the oldies chickened out). We just couldn't stop riding the mummy, so we didn't... LOL. Then our final ride .. (drum roll) ..

Twister..

They did enjoy it, although after riding it several times now - it does get repetative. Figured I hadn't taken enough pictures, so I took another, so insert random picture.

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We finished off the parks with a little Lucy Tribute, as my aunt is a big Lucy fan. She just -had- to visit it, figured it was closed, but I insisted it wasn't (it was around 6:45pm) .. so she enjoyed it, and we headed out to City Walk. We ate at another restaurant in City Walk, Nascar Cafe this time. Another YUCK restaurant in my opinion, sorry. Their waiters aren't well informed, atleast with what I've seen, since I was told there was 'no difference between these chicken tenders except one had mashed potatos' .. yeah right, it looked/tasted more like chicken wings while the other was actual chicken fingers .. /rantoff. Anyway, we had an overall great time @ Universal!

Edit: still oct 5th (day 5) to do for this trip report, and through the 8th for the rest of the trip (disney) .. so more to come!

 

[Foladar]

Well, figured I'd finish this up.

Day 5, we woke up and checked out with no problems, the bell hop was very polite and nice with us - even said our next hotel was beautiful (Animal Kingdom Lodge) .. and boy, I didn't expect it to look -that- beautiful.

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We got to AKL, and we were told .. "our room would be ready in a few minutes" .. remember the time, 11:30am .. We managed to check into our room after finally seeing mousekeeping leave the area (we wanted to check into room, freshen up, and head to parks but this didn't work) .. well Epcot was delayed another day after I managed to transfer their tickets to Sunday instead, and they even saved $14. We'd finally gotten checked in around 3:30pm, even though it said check-in was 3pm but we didn't let that (or all the rain) discourage us. We used this extra half-day leftover to explore the resort and relax.

 

[Patch'sD]

Thanks for the report. if i ever want to know what the parks are like in the morning I know who not to ask.

Thanx

 

[Foladar]

Thanks for the report. if i ever want to know what the parks are like in the morning I know who not to ask.

Thanx

Hehe, they're very uncrowded in the mornings, that's why I was mad when we couldn't get there on time (10am at the latest) since we had FOTL, I figured we could take our time but wanted to be there early so we could go back for lunch or to Citywalk. I went two times earlier in the yr (Feb and May) and it was very uncrowded in the mornings then.

 

[Minniespal]

Enjoyed reading your trip reports ~ Thanx for posting.

 

[robvia]

Great picture of the AK lodge.

I was at HHN October 1st and got soaked waiting for the 08:30pm B&T show.

Wow, you wake up late. You'd be better off coming during the busy time starting July 4th. The parks stay open later.
And yeah, everyone is not that impressed with park food. I tell everyone it's ok considering how many people they serve. Mythos is great, but that's a 2 hour meal.
Since you drive up, you'd be better off packing a cooler with drinks, and bringing doughnuts. That way you can eat in your hotel room and get an early start.

 

[Foladar]

Great picture of the AK lodge.

I was at HHN October 1st and got soaked waiting for the 08:30pm B&T show.

Wow, you wake up late. You'd be better off coming during the busy time starting July 4th. The parks stay open later.
And yeah, everyone is not that impressed with park food. I tell everyone it's ok considering how many people they serve. Mythos is great, but that's a 2 hour meal.
Since you drive up, you'd be better off packing a cooler with drinks, and bringing doughnuts. That way you can eat in your hotel room and get an early start.

Yep, we bring a cooler always, and if it's normally just me and my down south (florida) family - we do just that, eat early at McDonalds and get to the parks by 830am. But it was my aunts first time (and first trip in a loongggg time) so she got to decide what was done Wanted her to enjoy it, definitely.

 

[Motherfletcher]

I was intentionally avoiding reading HHN spoilers this year so didn't read this report until we got back. We had a little problem getting the room or upgraded room we wanted at RPR this time too. I think it was the dogs though. We had to have a Tower 2 room which limited view. She worked hard to find a room with a view but it wasn't ready at 4 so we took any room.
I even asked for Eric Moller but he had transfered to another hotel.
Sounds like you like chicken strips/fingers as much as my daughter.
Glad to hear MIB was working well enough for ya'll to win. The first time I rode it this trip I got around 600K and there was only one other guy in the car behind me. We didn't have an opposing car so the guy in back was shooting our exhaust port and I was struggling while spinning like a top. The sensors on the Big Bug weren't registering and at the Will screen it said we had an average of 31K and the nonexistent opposing car had 100K. It didn't get much better all week. I really got hot when it registered our car as Bug Bait and the 3 of us didn't have less than 380K individually.
Sounds like you didn't get to see much of HHN? 2 houses? Ouch!
They are doing the Hard Rock Cafe tour again? Last time we were there they said it was no longer running. Back by popular demand? I like it when they first open and no one is there. You see something new every time.
AKL is fun. We have stayed there and not even went to the parks.
We always eat at the McD's on Sandlake and head to the park about 8. The kids think it is a tradition that shouldn't be broken.
Glad to hear ya'll had fun in spite on the rain, views and late check ins!

 

[Seahag]

AKL looks beautiful!!!! Thanks for the report

 

[robvia]

We had to have a Tower 2 room which limited view. She worked hard to find a room with a view but it wasn't ready at 4 so we took any room.

Same thing happened with us. We took our dog and ended up in room 2111. There really is no view of the parks for people with pets, because they are in the first 2 floors of tower 2, which is below the parking lot. Didn't really matter for us. After we looked out the window once, we closed the blinds and never looked out again. Our room was in the middle of everything, close to the ice machine and the dog park.

Yeah, the more people you bring on a trip, the slower things will become. Nothing wrong with this. But when the wife and kid talk about going with other friends, I tell them no, it will complicate everythng too much.

When the wife and kid sleep in, I goto IOA early and take a thrill ride tour, then come back for them.