POR was pretty crowded Saturday night...

[jaguar9748]

Spent the weekend in Orlando with my teens at Universal Studios. They got totally bored with Universal Studios so Saturday night we took the "long drive" from Universal Studios to Disney.

Downtown Disney was packed! It was great to see so many people there!

Drove over to Riverside for dinner. The main parking lot was crowded! Lots of folks in the store shopping. The bar area was really full - Bob is not back. Wait time for Boatright's was 15-20 minutes - every table was full! Best of all, the entire food court has reopened and all of the usual choices are back. We ate in the food court - it was yummy as usual and it was really crowded! What a great sight to see!!

Went to Magic Kingdom today - the park was hopping. Long waits at most rides.

Yep, it was good to see so many folks back at Disney and POR...

 

[cottontail]

Hi:

Just wondering cause you mentioned the kids were bored, have you been to universal before, as we are thinking of swaying from disney this time to do a day or two at IOA and universal studios, we have never been there before, but we do love wdw.

We are looking at staying there to get the front of line access, maybe we only need to be away one night from disney with the room key front of line pass.

Deb.

 

[Bstanley]

Especially if you haven't been in awhile.

If you were visiting when the parks stay open later you could probably do all the attractions at both IoA and USF in a single day using the FOTL privilege, but it would be a long day. If your 'time budget' allows taking 2 days it would make for a nicer visit. You would only need to stay at a Universal hotel for one evening to get 2 days worth of FOTL.

We stayed at HRH and it was a 5 minute walk to the USF gate and a 10 minute walk to IoA - very kewl. Next trip we will probably give the Royal Polynesian a try - it's a 5 minute walk to IoA and 10 to USF

 

[cottontail]

Hi:
I think that is what we will do, if we had more time I wouldn't mind staying for a few days at tha hardrock, it looks nice too,

I don't know what it is but I hate to leave the wdw resort, I must be addicted to it or something. We have not been down for 6 years, so that is probably part of the reason I want to take in so much wdw as possible. thanks for the info,

Does anyone know how early we should go and book in to the hrh and get our room key?

Deb.

 

[Bellina]

Can you tell me more about the food court?

What are their specialities? What is good to order?

 

[jaguar9748]

cottontail: The kids liked Universal (18 and 17), but they just got bored with it. It was not crowded at all so we were done in 4 hours. They both said that it didn't have any magic like Disney. If the crowds are in your favor you can definitely do both parks with a 1-night stay. The Hard Rock Hotel is the closest. Portofino Bay is behind it. Transportation from both hotels to the parks is by boat. Both hotels look fine. We stayed off Universal property which was fine.

bellina: The food court has 5 sections: 1)bakery and ice cream shop - yum - need I say more!, 2)Southern food section - ribs, taco salad, etc, 3)Italian section with yummy pizza, spaghetti, etc., 4)Burger heaven with burgers, chicken, grilled cheese, fries, etc. and 5)a self service area with salads, drinks, potato salad, coleslaw, etc. All areas are open all day. During breakfast there are breakfast specials, pancakes, breakfast pizza, etc. I have always considered the food court to be quite good!

 

[Bstanley]

We 'checked in' at 8:30am just to get our 'Resort Guest' cards that you use for the FOTL access, then went and bought our park passes and still managed to arrive at USF in time for the gates to open at 9:00am. We were not able to get the room at that time, but the check-in folks are used to it. That afternoon we went back and got our room keys, etc.

ADVICE - It is MUCH faster to walk to USF from HRH than it is to take the boat. Rather than going to the boat dock, just walk toward the pool bar and take the path that leads around the right of the slide. This will lead you to a walkway next the end of the HRH parking lot. This walkway goes straight to the USF Arch/gate. It takes no more than 5 minutes. Also when you are walking back to the HRH - do not believe the sign, when you get to the fork in the walkway turn to the left (back the way I just described to the pool entrance). If you follow the sign you will walk all the way around the resort to the boat dock. If you just want to ride in a nifty launch, do so, but it is a 'slow boat' fer shure.