"Oh...look...another cupcake." A Nov/Dec Birthday Trip Report

[FeFeMJ]

Intros:

The cast:

Patricia (Mom): Single mother.... my mom is an RN and never really got a vacation, except visiting her parents for a couple days a year.

Jason: My brother, 27, also a credit union employee, but in a different section. He got married in 2009. So not only did we celebrate my birthday at Disney, but also his first anniversary with....

Jodi: My best friend and my brother's wife! She's 24 and also a credit union employee as a loan officer.

Felicia: Me, a 22 yr old student and credit union employee. Disney obsessed, but before this trip I hadn't been since 1995 when my grandparents took all of the grandkids.



How this trip came about:
I love to travel! And I am always the instigator of our vacations. Until now it's always been just Jason, Jodi, and me going on them due to my Mom's work schedule. We spent a week in Atlanta 2 years ago and a week in New York last January. But, since I planned this vacation so far in advance Mom was able to join us!

I booked through AAA. This was a two week trip. We visited Universal, Sea World, Bush Gardens, and (of course) Disney!

 

[FeFeMJ]

Day One: The Drive Down
Day One Continued: Check In
End of Day One: Medieval Times
Day Two: Universal Studios Part 1
End of Day Two: Universal Studios Part 2
Day Three: WWoHP
End of Day Three: Islands of Adventure

 

[FeFeMJ]

Actually our vacation began on Thanksgiving. We had a nice dinner with our family at my grandparents house and then we went to see Tangled in 3D. Mom and I stayed at Jason and Jodi's that night so we could leave straight from their house. We all went to bed at about 9:00 (after watching Punkin' Chunkin' from my brother's DVR) so we could get wake up nice and early.

Originally we were going to wake up at 5:00 AM and leave as soon as we got ready and got in the car (hoping to be out of town by 6:30). However, I woke up at 4:00 and could not get back to bed. Come to find out Jodi and my Mom were awake as well. So the girls all got ready and then we sent Jodi to wake up my brother so we actually ended up leaving right after 5:00. After a quick stop at Dunkin' Donuts we all settled in for a long trip. We took my car (2010 Mitsubishi Outlander), but Jason drove.

We only made one stop on the way down for lunch at Chipotle in Gainesville.

We arrived in orlando at our first destination at about 2:15.

Jodi, Mom, and I at decided to go to Universal when we found out about:

For the first 3 nights of our trip we stayed at the Hard Rock Hotel.

To Be Continued...

 

[FeFeMJ]

When we arrived at the Hard Rock our room wasn't ready yet, so we decided to walk around and entertain ourselves.

We went out by the pool area and found some pingpong tables.

We played for a couple of hours and by 4 we were hot and wondering what was going on with our rooms. Jodi and I went up to the front desk to find out and they apologized and said our rooms were almost ready. They then provided us some coupons for free drinks. We got our drinks and sat down in the lobby to wait.

About 30 minutes later we had our room assignment and we headed up to room...

The room was really nice and we really enjoyed our stay... I would definitly stay here again (and the Universal front of the line access is a great perk!).

Our view...

After we got to our room we freshened up and got ready to head to dinner.

Up next... Medieval Times.

 

[FeFeMJ]

We had dinner reservations at Medieval Times for a 7:00 showtime.

We picked up our tickets and found out we where in the Black and White section. We still had a little bit of time before seating so we went to the bar and ordered drinks.

Jason and Mom got huge souvenir glasses of beer and I got a Strawberry Daquiri. After we got out drinks they began to let us begin seating. They called each group one at a time and we got to boo the other groups and cheer for our section.

We had the front row of our section. I was kind of worried about the food from what some people on the boards had said, but I really liked it.
We started out with some tomato bisque and garlic butter toast. Followed by a spare rib, roasted chicken, and herb baked potato half. Dessert was the pastry of the castle (an apple turnover).
Our knight didn't win, but we still had a lot of fun booing the bad knight. (In our show it was the green knight, but I'm not sure if it changes with each show.) Our knight did win a few of the beginning competions and got some carnations he could throw to the audience. Jodi and I were very excited to get one.

After the show we began the adventure of getting back to the hotel. Jodi was the designated driver this night and I sat up front as the navigator. We also had the GPS (and Jason giving instructions from the back seat), but somehow we still got a little turned around. We somehow missed the exit and had to turn around. It took us about an extra 20 min to get back.
When we got back to the room we all showered and went to bed.

 

[Zarabear]

Subscribing! Can't wait to read about all the rest of your adventures. XD

We went for our FIRST trip in Sept, and it was my son's 8th bday. We know about the cupcakes! It was never-ending!


~Zara

 

[TanzUnited99]

Am subbing and looking forward to reading more!

What a fun way to start your trip by watching Tangled 3D!

on having to wait on your room for so long but at least you got free drinks!! Am looking forward to hearing how you utilised those front of line passes

 

[FeFeMJ]

Subscribing! Can't wait to read about all the rest of your adventures. XD

We went for our FIRST trip in Sept, and it was my son's 8th bday. We know about the cupcakes! It was never-ending!


~Zara

Am subbing and looking forward to reading more!

What a fun way to start your trip by watching Tangled 3D!

on having to wait on your room for so long but at least you got free drinks!! Am looking forward to hearing how you utilised those front of line passes

 

[FeFeMJ]

On Saturday we woke up at about 7:00 in order to get ready for our first day at Universal. We had decided to spend our first day at Universal Studios and save Islands of Adventure and the WWOHP for Sunday. We went downstairs at the Hard Rock and had breakfast at their resteraunt, The Kitchen. They have a pretty nice breakfast buffet. After breakfast Jason, Jodi, and I took dramamine to hopefully avoid any motion sickness.

The Hard Rock is just a short walk or water taxi ride away from the parks. It was a nice morning so we decided to walk. We soon came upon this...

After picking up our 2 day passes and our lanyards to keep them in, we waited about 10 minutes for the park to open. We hurried over to our first ride of the day.

The Rip Ride Rocket. We headed here first because this is the only ride the the Express (or Front of the line) passes don't work at. We had our first argument of the trip as Jodi announced that she would definitly have to swing by the bathroom before riding and Jason was afraid we'd have to wait in a long line if we didn't hurry. As we hadn't looked at the park map yet at all it took us about 10 minutes to find a bathroom (actually Jodi and I never found it, Jason found us and pointed it out to us. Apparently we are not very good at finding things... or following directions.) After all of that we walked up to the ride and Jodi saw the nets hanging under it. She announced that she would not be riding it after all as she did not want to ride anything that had a net to catch you in case you fall out. So, Jason and I were the only ones to enjoy this ride. It was great getting to choose our own songs to listen to.

As it wasn't very busy we decided to be spontaneous and just do things as we felt like it. We did Twister next.

On the way to the next ride we saw our first Christmas tree of the trip.

Next we rode the Mummy. Mom didn't realize it was a roller coaster and decided to ride it as she loves the movie. She was very unhappy when she got off as she hates roller coasters. We walked around for awhile after this until the next showing of Disaster. We had alot of fun with this show and the rest of the trip we would quote from it. One of us would say "And we are..." with the rest of us chiming in "moving on!"
Next we headed to Jaws and I was sure to have Jason and Jodi sit on the left side as I knew that was the side that would get the wettest.
By this time it was about 11:00 and we decided to head to lunch. We all wanted a burger so we headed to

.

The food here was good, but they weren't the best burgers we've ever had. (This trip we decided that the food at Disney it actually way better than the Universal food.)

 

[kelleigh1]

Fantastic report! I love all the photos and it's so easy to read!

 

[TanzUnited99]

Sounds like a great day at Universal Studios so far!

Rip Ride Rocket looks scary...don't think I would be brave enough to ride it

on seeing your first Christmas tree of the trip...look forward to seeing pictures of the others.

 

[myheartlivesatwdw]

Love the report so far!!!!!!

 

[FeFeMJ]

Fantastic report! I love all the photos and it's so easy to read!

Thanks! We had definitely have plenty of photos.... Mom, Jodi, and I all had our cameras. It's amazing how different people take pictures of different things, we only have a few duplicates.

Sounds like a great day at Universal Studios so far!

Rip Ride Rocket looks scary...don't think I would be brave enough to ride it

on seeing your first Christmas tree of the trip...look forward to seeing pictures of the others.

Rip Ride Rocket was definitely scary! That's actually why it was the best first ride, I wasn't really scared of going on anything after this. On the part that you go straight up you are laying on your back and you kind of slip back in the seat, felt like I was gonna fall out. And it didn't help that my brother was saying things like.... "Just imagine if we started falling backwards right now..."

Love the report so far!!!!!!

Thanks!

 

[Disney_Jill]

Great pictures! While I love Disney so very much, I love US/IOA too. I just can't spend as much time at US/IOA. I could easily spent 10 days at WDW but really 3-4 days at Universal is enough, esp. with the express pass. We stayed at Hard Rock last year and liked it. I preferred Royal Pacific, though, but I love all things tropical. We loved Rip, Ride, Rocket and the Mummy.
Sounds like you are having a great trip so far.

 

[FeFeMJ]

After lunch we headed over to Men In Black.

We all really loved this ride! Jason won, but I didn't expect anything else because he is the gamer of our group. Mom also did really well with Jodi and I bringing up the rear in points.
We decided to head over to The Simpsons Ride next.

Worst mistake of the trip! This was by far our least favorite ride and everyone, but Mom got off feeling sick. She had her eyes closed the whole time though. (She's scared of heights and doesn't even like to have the illusion of being on a roller coaster or anything.)
After this we went on ET, which was Mom's favorite ride of the trip and we also did the Terminator show. I was still feeling ill, but everyone else had recovered. They did some shopping while I sat outside on a bench. After Jason bought a new hoodie we decided to watch the 4d Shrek show before heading back to the room for a rest.
On our way out of the park we bought 2 churros and 2 pretzels to share. We ate them as we walked back to the room. We ended up napping for a couple of hours before we got ready to head out for the night.

We had tickets for the Blue Man Show at 6PM. It was a great show and we were in the poncho section...

For anyone who doesn't know who the Blue Man Group is you can find some videos on youtube. The show was very funny and very entertaining. Jason and Jodi had gone to a show in Boston, but it was the first time Mom or I had seen them. I thought that the ponchos were for paint they use in the show, but it's actually mushed up bananas that you're in danger of on the first 3 rows. Gross....

Jason and Jodi with the band

Me and a blue man

I bought a program and after the show you have a chance to get all the blue men to sign it. They sign it with their paint.... one did a thumbprint, one did 3 fingers, and one does a handprint. It takes forever for the paint to dry though! It was still wet when we got home from vacation.
After the show we headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner.

We ended up just sharing a couple of appetizers and the dessert parfait shots.

In this picture you can see the hoodie Jason bought earlier in the day. It was the Joker from Batman. Everywhere we went during the trip he constantly got comments on it.
After dinner we just walked around Citywalk taking pictures.

One the way back to the hotel we passed by a Burn Notice poster and Jason and Mom just had to get their picture taken with Michael Weston.

We went straight to bed when we got to the Hard Rock. All of the girls couldn't wait to go to WWOHP the next day!!!

 

[linnell]

Subscribing!

You are braver than me, I wouldn't go near the Rip Rocket ROllercoaster!!!

 

[TanzUnited99]

It's a shame you guys did not enjoy The Simpsons ride.

on getting to see The Blue Man Group! I really want to see them but don't think we can fit it into our plans this time. Am also glad you managed to get a picture with one of the guys and get your programme signed

Looking forward to hearing about WWoHP!

 

[FeFeMJ]

It's a shame you guys did not enjoy The Simpsons ride.

on getting to see The Blue Man Group! I really want to see them but don't think we can fit it into our plans this time. Am also glad you managed to get a picture with one of the guys and get your programme signed

Looking forward to hearing about WWoHP!

I am going to apologize in advance for all the WWoHP pics. We were so excited it seems we took pictures of everything...

 

[TanzUnited99]

I am going to apologize in advance for all the WWoHP pics. We were so excited it seems we took pictures of everything...

Don't apologise...you can never have too many pictures Looking forward to seeing them

 

[FeFeMJ]

One of the other benefits of staying at a Universal hotel was getting into WWoHP an hour early. We woke up at 7:00 and were waiting at the gate at 7:45 to be let in. Jodi and I had beat Jason and Mom there because we were so excited, so we were a few people ahead of them in the line.

We grabbed a map and were on our way to the WWoHP!

We hurried through the entrance and were soon standing in line waiting to be let into the castle to walkthrough and then ride the Forbidden Journey.

Mom took our stuff and when we split at the "chicken exit." The ride was amazing. We thought about going on it again, but there was already a 40 minute wait when we got off (later in the afternoon it was about an hour and a half... so we never did ride it again).
After the ride we wandered around the gift shop for a little bit and bought some stuff.

Outside the ride they had a wand cart.

Jodi bought Hermione and Dumbledore's wands.

Jason and I then rode the Dragon's Challenge. Then Jodi dragged us both on the Flight of the Hippogriff.
After we finished up the rides we decided to walk over to the Three Broomsticks to find out if we could get in for breakfast, snapping a few pictures on the way.

The Hogshead is connected to the three broomsticks so we decided to look around it before breakfast.

Luckily they still had some openings at the Three Broomsticks.

Jodi and Mom had the Continental Breakfast (A colorful array of fresh fruit served with croissants accompanied with assorted jams) and the pumpkin juice.

Jason had the Pancake Breakfast (Three fluffy buttermilk pancakes, crisp bacon, and link sausage with butter croissant) and butterbeer.

I had the American Breakfast (Fresh scrambled eggs, breakfast potatoes, crisp bacon, and link sausage with butter croissant) and butterbeer.

We all though it was ok, but nothing amazing.