One day - both parks

[g-dad66]

We will have only one day (Monday, March 16) for both parks -- no Early Entry.

Our tentative plan is:
1) Do Harry Potter main ride in Park #1
2) Take train to Park #2 and do Harry Potter land
3) Do all of the rest of Park #2
4) Take train back to Park #1 and do the rest of the park

If this seems like a workable plan, which park should be Park #1, and which park should be Park #2?

Or is there a fatal flaw in this plan?

Bit of background: we did both parks in one day in March 2013, but Harry Potter was only in IOA then. We had saved Harry Potter for the end of the day, and when we got there, Forbidden Journey was broken down. Fortunately, it came back up before the park closed and we were able to ride -- but we don't want to risk a repeat of that, and hence our reason for starting with both Harry Potter lands this time.

 

[macraven]

studios will open one hour prior to iOS opening

the train wil begin when ioa is opened

spend that first hour in the park before you do the train ride.

 

[g-dad66]

Thanks, macraven, good advice, I appreciate it.

So I'm now thinking that we should do Hulk and Spiderman first before doing Forbidden Journey. Then take Hogwarts Express to Universal.

I figure that with Universal having the early park entry, the Gringotts wait will already be bad by 9:00, so might as well start at Islands, where no one will have an hour's headstart on us.

Anyone else have any advice on this?

 

[macraven]

since you will be in the parks during spring break, do ioa first.
the early entry peeps will have done DE and gringotts already and some may hit the train to go over to ioa at 9:00.
that back area of hp will fill up before noon with the ones that did ee at the studios.

i don't know if both parks will have early entry for the time period you are going.
check the website up to the time you go to see if that will be the case.

schools all over vary their spring breaks.
i don't see the 16th as crowded like it will be at the end of march.
maybe you will get lucky and not have large crowds or waits when you go that monday.

if you start at the front of ioa and hit hulk, spider, dr doom, you should be able to knock those rides off in no time.

if single rider line is open for the hulk, use it.
i haven't seen spidey with srl open until there is a crowd there but, it has been years since i went to the darkside during spring break.

when you get closer to your date, check the website and threads to get an idea of crowds you can expect.
also recheck the park hours in case the opening times change for the parks.

since you are park hopping, you can hit ioa then the studios.
if need be, you can always return to ioa at the end of your park day.

 

[ladybugx]

My sister and I ran into the opposite issue regarding rides being broken down. Yesterday, Escape from Gringotts was closed from the time the park opened (including early admission, although we didn't have early admission) until around 1 p.m. At one point, a team member was telling everyone they didn't know if the ride would open at all for the day, and it was a mess.

We opted to head over to Hogsmeade and get on Forbidden Journey in the meantime, which added an additional Hogwarts Express trip to our plan since we had to come back for Gringotts then go back again to Hogsmeade, where we wanted to eat lunch. We did luck out and just happen to have been about to leave Diagon Alley for the second time when they opened Gringotts, so we rushed over to the single rider line and were able to literally walk straight onto the ride in about 2 minutes while the rest of the park crowded around the regular entrance. I think traveling between the two parks is what ate up a good bit of our time, so it's good that you plan to minimize trips back and forth...at times, the wait just to ride the Hogwarts Express over can get pretty long.

We didn't get to hit everything we wanted, but we did get to do a lot in one day. The single-rider line is definitely a godsend if you're doing both parks in one day. It saved us so much time. We were able to do Forbidden Journey twice, three trips on the Hogwarts Express (plus one park transition we walked because the HE had a 40-minute wait), Mummy twice, E.T. once, Men in Black once, Gringotts once plus three separate trips to Diagon Alley, Spiderman once, Jurassic park once, Disaster once, Twister once, lunch at Three Broomsticks, a castle tour, and probably some stuff I'm forgetting.

 

[g-dad66]

Thanks, macraven and ladybugx, for the additional info. I'm thinking that my current plan might be a reasonably good one.

I have read that the main concern about the Gringotts wait is when the ride has been down for quite a while.

I have also read to keep an eye on the Gringotts wait-time in order to take advantage of whenever the wait-time might not be too high. I have downloaded the Universal app, but apparently I can see wait-times only when I'm in the parks.

Is there any other app that I should consult for reliable wait times?

 

[ladybugx]

The app wasn't always accurate for us as far as the Gringotts ride, but we didn't pay that much attention to it once we got to ride either. I just know it first told us there was a 100-minute wait when it was closed. Then, after saying the ride was closed for a couple of hours, it randomly stated there was a 15-minute wait, so we rushed over only to find that the ride was still closed and had never opened. :/

 

[bumbershoot]

DH ha found that undercovertourist's app is more accurate than universal's this week.

 

[johnvree]

Normally, I would say if you only have one day, why rush through two parks? Take your time and enjoy one. But with HP in two parks, that doesn't work. They've forced you to park hop. Brilliant!

 

[ladybugx]

Normally, I would say if you only have one day, why rush through two parks? Take your time and enjoy one. But with HP in two parks, that doesn't work. They've forced you to park hop. Brilliant!

Yep, we really only wanted to do the Harry Potter stuff and Studios, but we didn't have that choice. It stinks for single day-ers. It would be awesome if they offered a one park + Harry Potter option, but that would obviously cause issues with people constantly needing their tickets scanned to make it around the park.

 

[RebeccaRabbit]

We just got back from Universal - went for four days during a relatively slow period (early January), and were not able to see everything in the two parks during those four days. Granted, we are a bit pokey and take afternoon breaks every day. But I'm not seeing how it's realistic to do everything in two parks in one day... The HE takes a bit of time with the line, loading and unloading, and ride - it would probably be faster to walk (5 min) from one entrance to another if you want to switch parks. Also, walking from the entrance all the way back to the HP areas takes at least 10-15 minutes, especially if you are fighting crowds. so if you want to pack the most in to a day, it might be best to minimize walking and riding HE.

I would say start at Studios asap and do Gringotts - lines got longest there from what I saw. Then take HE over to IoA. Lines were only 20-30 min or so on FJ when I saw them mid-morning - Gringotts was like 75 at the same time of day. HP areas were NUTS by mid-day - can barely walk around in there. Get out of there by late morning and do rest of stuff in IoA, exit park on foot and walk over to tour non-HP part of Studios in evening, if time/energy permits.

I'm not sure what kind of crowds you'll be looking at in May, but I can only assume it will be worse than January...