So how do Disney fans survive Universal Orlando? For our family, each one of us had at least one thing that we were big fans of that made it worth it to go check out. Universal Studios had the new Transformers Ride for me and Springfield for Tom. Islands of Adventure had Jurassic Park for EJ and Harry Potter for Trinity. For our first full park day, I chose Universal Studios because according to Touring Plans.com it was the least crowded. Even though it was going to be a 8 out of 10 day, I was determined to get there before the gate opened so we could be the first ones at Transformers.
I was just so excited that I ended up waking up at 5am. I just laid there for a while with my eyes wide open until I heard someone rummaging around in the kitchen. Thinking, the only person that would be up this early would be EJ so I decided to go out to see if he needed something to eat. It turned out that it was my Dad that was making all that noise, trying to find a snack before he went back to bed. He had a puzzled look on his face and asked, "What are you doing up so early?" I replied, " I'm just too excited...you know for Transformers..." He paused for a moment and then laughed. I stayed up and we chatted for a bit while he looked at the newspaper. I turned on the news to catch the weather report before I decided to wake the kids up. Dad went back to bed and I went in the kids room to go get them. When I walked in I saw EJ sitting up just staring over Trinity. I whispered, " She's not going to wake up by staring at her, you have to do this-" I pulled the curtain back and said "Good Morning

!!" (yeah, I'm just too chipper for my own good." Trinity grumbled and me and EJ went into the kitchen to fix breakfast. Every morning was pretty much the same. I was the first one up, made breakfast for me and the kids and Tom made his coffee and did this...
Ahhhh, doesn't this look so relaxing...
After everyone was fed and fueled up for the morning, the 4 of us headed out to Universal Studios, while my parents took another day to relax and do the owners tour so they could get their discount tickets. The drive to Universal was not that bad. I clocked it about 20min to the parking deck and a 15 min to the gate.
Taaa Dahhh-We made it to Citywalk in record time.
There's the Icon for Islands of Adventure. We will see you soon!
Now we are at the Studios!
As we walked toward the gate when I realized we were pretty early.
Like twenty minutes early
I gotten everyone there too early according to Tom and the kids were apparently "bored to death" as we had to wait to be able to walk in.
Soon it was 9am and the flood gates were opened. As you will soon learn about me, my park style is commando style! We get there as early as we possibly can and stay as late as we can. So since Transformers was brand-spanking new, everyone knew that was the first thing we were getting on.
Hello Despicable Me, we will be back later, or will we....
There it is! I can see the Autobots symbol!
Wonder what this thing is? Oh well, we will have to find out later. I'm on a mission!!
We walked in the entrance and saw that it had a 10 min wait. YESSS!!! So we fast walked through the queue lines and I snapped a few pics along the way.
The AllSpark.
Part of Megatron's arm from the first movie.
We were given our mission to protect the AllSpark.
We picked up our 3-D glasses and away we went! And let me tell you, this ride was so awesome! Everyone gave it a big thumbs up. It was similar to Spiderman where it is a ride simulator where we move about different rooms and given different scenes. But the updated technology and having Decepticons chasing you the whole time made this way better than Spiderman! With our adrenaline pumping, we headed outside for our next mission. But not without taking a picture with Optimus Prime. I was trying to get Trinity to "prime" with me but apparently I was just embarrassing her. Ugh, tweens!
When we got out of Transformers, we walked by The Mummy. The kids really wanted to go for it and I didn't bother to tell them about the roller coaster part so they could be surprised. I have no pics of this because they make you but your bookbags and loose items in the free lockers near by. But believe me, everyone liked this one too. Except Trinity got a little freaked out when it turned into a roller coaster. I wish I had my camera because our picture at the end showed me with my arm infront of her to protect her somehow. What can I say, it's the mommy reflex.
After Trinity calmed down we moseyed on over to Disaster which is one of the few older attractions I never got to do. So let me tell you, I did not miss anything. It is actually pretty lame, so when we got out of there the kids were ready to something "fun" again. I knew that Despicable Me is pretty popular so I suggested we try to see that now before it gets too crowded. By the time we go there, it was already at 60 min

!! So where did we head off to next? To Be Continued.....