anewvance
<font color=red>Who needs a birthday for birthday
- Joined
- Feb 8, 2001
- Messages
- 3,506
I'll be reviewing Royal Pacific on the US resorts page but thought I'd review US both parks and Hard Rock Cafe on here....
We spent more time in Universal then in Islands of Adventure yesterday and it was HOT HOT HOT out. When we first got there, it was very empty. We rode Jimmy Neutron without a wait, my kids LOVED this one. The girls and my dh went on the ride part and ds and I were on the stationary benches.
Then we headed over to the Mummy so dh and I could take turns going on (my all time favorite movies are the Mummy series so this ride ROCKS!) The wait for this was already 30 min, I guess everyone headed here first. So thank heavens for the FOTL passes, show our hotel keys and we were on, we both rode in literally 20 minutes total.
After the Mummy we headed over to the kids area and went to go on ET. It was empty so we didn't need FOTL. My kids thought it was cool that we had to give our names and got the cards to hand in. But when it was time to get on, my 5 year old flipped out so dh had to wait with her. My ds and older dd loved this ride. So when we got off, we child swapped and dh rode with the other 2 again.
After we visited characters from Madagascar, we got in the FOTL line for the Barney show. One instance of how small of a world it is, we were waiting in the pre show area and a woman who I sort of recognized me came up to me and said "you all go to St Juliana school don't you?". Her dd is in between my girls, going into 1st grade and my older dd knew her because she read to her during the year. So the girls had fun chatting before the show. When we got inside and seated Mr Peek A Boo saw Ian's birthday pin and he announced it to the audience and got everyone to sing. The show itself was adorable, my son loved it! After the show, Ian got to meet Barney... very cool.
When we came out, there was an 80's retro show going on on the little stage in the kids area and Scooby Doo and Woody Woodpecker and Curious george and few other characters were out there so we watched the show and afterward they were posing for pictures and autographs. My son is in love with Curious George so we had to wait in line to see him and my son absolutely loved it!
From there we decided we were quite hungry and very hot so we went to the 50's diner (Mel's I think?) for lunch. The line was VERY long but we grabbed a table and dh got our food. I had chicken strips that were very good. My husband saw a sign that said if you used your Mastercard to pay for your meal and ordered a large coke (which we were doing anyway) then you get the $10 refillable souvineer cup for free... awesome deal!
After dinner we went back to the kids area to see the Animal Actors Live show. We got there right when it started and it was quite a cute show. After the show, we let the girls play in Curious Georges play area. My son had been sleeping through our lunch and I packed some up for him so he was eating while they played. And then he played in a little toddler area in there, going up and down the slide. Next thing we knew Curious George was in the play area with the man in the yellow hat. My son flew over to them. There weren't alot of kid around so my son had them to himself for a long time, they were playing with all the equipment in there.... very cute.
Got the kids dressed and we called to see if our room was ready yet and it was so we headed back towards the exit. On the way, the kids wanted to go back on Jimmy Neutron again so this time dh sat on the bench with ds and I rode with the girls... cute ride. When we got off, we got to meet Spongebob. My son is currently obsessed with Spongebob, he even had a Spongebob birthday party today!
We went back to the hotel and found our room and had our luggage delivered. We rested for a little awhile and headed back on the boat towards Island of Adventure. This place was PACKED! You could barely move around. With the kids, all we really wanted to do was Seuss Landing. We walked over to the new Trolley ride but they weren't open for soft opening so we went on the Carro seus el and rode twice. The girls wanted to ride Red Fish Blue Fish but there were sprayers and we really didn't want to get wet.
So we headed to Cat in the Hat. The wait line was 45 minutes for this ride, this is when we LOVED FOTL... we basically walked right on. This is an absolutely adorable ride. My kids LOVED it. We ended up getting off and getting back in line to ride 3 times.
We were pretty much done with IOA at this point and were quite hungry. So we headed out of the park to eat at Hard Rock Cafe. There was no wait and were immediately seated. We had the absolutely best waiter ever. He was so attentive and was great with the kids. DH and I ordered the ribs/chicken combo and it was so delicious. The waiter made a big deal about Ian's birthday and after dinner he brought him a huge sundae. We ordered a brownie sundae which was heavenly. We had to roll out of there.
After dinner we decided to go back into US. We wanted to see Shrek 4-d. The line moved slowly for this one (we used FOTL but it all ends up in one line waiting to get into the theater). And the kids were really hot and unhappy at this point. We got in to see the show, my 5 year old absolutely LOVED it. After the show, we did some shopping and headed back to the boats to go back to the hotel.
It was 8:30 at this point, the parks closed in a half hour. The line to the Royal Pacific Hotel was huge! Turns out there was only one boat running. I mean, there are 100 people in line and only one boat running!?!? It took 20 minutes to run there and back and we had to wait for 2 boats. By the time we were getting on the boat, there were over 300 people waiting. People were asking the guy who was operating the dock what was going on but never got a direct answer. There were some ticked off people in that line! I know they have the path back to the hotel, but after hiking the park in the heat all day, hiking back to the hotel is the last thing you want to do.
Anyway, we got back to the hotel by 9:30 and went up to the room. The pool area was still happening but by the time we got up there, the kids were pretty much begging us to go to bed so we were lights out and asleep by 10pm.
All in all, I don't think i'll be going back until the kids are older. There is just enough to do in a day but we really didn't DO all that much. And i'd go in December. I don't even go to Disney in the smack dab of summer... it's just too hot! The things that we did do were very cute and I think my kids had a blast and that's what counts.
We spent more time in Universal then in Islands of Adventure yesterday and it was HOT HOT HOT out. When we first got there, it was very empty. We rode Jimmy Neutron without a wait, my kids LOVED this one. The girls and my dh went on the ride part and ds and I were on the stationary benches.
Then we headed over to the Mummy so dh and I could take turns going on (my all time favorite movies are the Mummy series so this ride ROCKS!) The wait for this was already 30 min, I guess everyone headed here first. So thank heavens for the FOTL passes, show our hotel keys and we were on, we both rode in literally 20 minutes total.
After the Mummy we headed over to the kids area and went to go on ET. It was empty so we didn't need FOTL. My kids thought it was cool that we had to give our names and got the cards to hand in. But when it was time to get on, my 5 year old flipped out so dh had to wait with her. My ds and older dd loved this ride. So when we got off, we child swapped and dh rode with the other 2 again.
After we visited characters from Madagascar, we got in the FOTL line for the Barney show. One instance of how small of a world it is, we were waiting in the pre show area and a woman who I sort of recognized me came up to me and said "you all go to St Juliana school don't you?". Her dd is in between my girls, going into 1st grade and my older dd knew her because she read to her during the year. So the girls had fun chatting before the show. When we got inside and seated Mr Peek A Boo saw Ian's birthday pin and he announced it to the audience and got everyone to sing. The show itself was adorable, my son loved it! After the show, Ian got to meet Barney... very cool.
When we came out, there was an 80's retro show going on on the little stage in the kids area and Scooby Doo and Woody Woodpecker and Curious george and few other characters were out there so we watched the show and afterward they were posing for pictures and autographs. My son is in love with Curious George so we had to wait in line to see him and my son absolutely loved it!
From there we decided we were quite hungry and very hot so we went to the 50's diner (Mel's I think?) for lunch. The line was VERY long but we grabbed a table and dh got our food. I had chicken strips that were very good. My husband saw a sign that said if you used your Mastercard to pay for your meal and ordered a large coke (which we were doing anyway) then you get the $10 refillable souvineer cup for free... awesome deal!
After dinner we went back to the kids area to see the Animal Actors Live show. We got there right when it started and it was quite a cute show. After the show, we let the girls play in Curious Georges play area. My son had been sleeping through our lunch and I packed some up for him so he was eating while they played. And then he played in a little toddler area in there, going up and down the slide. Next thing we knew Curious George was in the play area with the man in the yellow hat. My son flew over to them. There weren't alot of kid around so my son had them to himself for a long time, they were playing with all the equipment in there.... very cute.
Got the kids dressed and we called to see if our room was ready yet and it was so we headed back towards the exit. On the way, the kids wanted to go back on Jimmy Neutron again so this time dh sat on the bench with ds and I rode with the girls... cute ride. When we got off, we got to meet Spongebob. My son is currently obsessed with Spongebob, he even had a Spongebob birthday party today!
We went back to the hotel and found our room and had our luggage delivered. We rested for a little awhile and headed back on the boat towards Island of Adventure. This place was PACKED! You could barely move around. With the kids, all we really wanted to do was Seuss Landing. We walked over to the new Trolley ride but they weren't open for soft opening so we went on the Carro seus el and rode twice. The girls wanted to ride Red Fish Blue Fish but there were sprayers and we really didn't want to get wet.
So we headed to Cat in the Hat. The wait line was 45 minutes for this ride, this is when we LOVED FOTL... we basically walked right on. This is an absolutely adorable ride. My kids LOVED it. We ended up getting off and getting back in line to ride 3 times.
We were pretty much done with IOA at this point and were quite hungry. So we headed out of the park to eat at Hard Rock Cafe. There was no wait and were immediately seated. We had the absolutely best waiter ever. He was so attentive and was great with the kids. DH and I ordered the ribs/chicken combo and it was so delicious. The waiter made a big deal about Ian's birthday and after dinner he brought him a huge sundae. We ordered a brownie sundae which was heavenly. We had to roll out of there.
After dinner we decided to go back into US. We wanted to see Shrek 4-d. The line moved slowly for this one (we used FOTL but it all ends up in one line waiting to get into the theater). And the kids were really hot and unhappy at this point. We got in to see the show, my 5 year old absolutely LOVED it. After the show, we did some shopping and headed back to the boats to go back to the hotel.
It was 8:30 at this point, the parks closed in a half hour. The line to the Royal Pacific Hotel was huge! Turns out there was only one boat running. I mean, there are 100 people in line and only one boat running!?!? It took 20 minutes to run there and back and we had to wait for 2 boats. By the time we were getting on the boat, there were over 300 people waiting. People were asking the guy who was operating the dock what was going on but never got a direct answer. There were some ticked off people in that line! I know they have the path back to the hotel, but after hiking the park in the heat all day, hiking back to the hotel is the last thing you want to do.
Anyway, we got back to the hotel by 9:30 and went up to the room. The pool area was still happening but by the time we got up there, the kids were pretty much begging us to go to bed so we were lights out and asleep by 10pm.
All in all, I don't think i'll be going back until the kids are older. There is just enough to do in a day but we really didn't DO all that much. And i'd go in December. I don't even go to Disney in the smack dab of summer... it's just too hot! The things that we did do were very cute and I think my kids had a blast and that's what counts.
