Flew into Orlando from DC, thurs June 7th..got in around 8pm..contrary to what I had heard, Orlando is a very nice airport..compared to Dulles Airport (DC) the shuttle system is a breeze..
My sister (14), her friend (also 14) and my brother (11) were already waiting at baggage. They had gotten there from Pompano Beach FL about 2 minutes ago..talk about good timing..(Pompano is about 3 hours from Orlando). Mom had stayed in the car so out we went and we were on our way.
Got to the Universal Clarion for the first night's accomodation since I was too cheap to spring for HR for 3 nights (we were only going to the parks Fri and Sat.).
Hotel was nice enough..our window leaked and the toilet ran when we first got there but they took care of both...Clarion is a nice enough place..clean and cheap (pricewise..)..good enough for just a place to sleep...
Went out and got some pizza Thursday night.. there was a PapaJohn's on TurkeyLakeRd near Hollywood Blvd I believe.. our favorite pizza and very close..
Got up early (8am is very early to me) so we could do early check in for HRH and get our FOTL passes. Self parking was very easy to find at the HardRock and we were at the front desk by 8:30. I got two passes for FOTL. The clerk told me you only need one for the group but I did not know if we were going to split up so I got two..
Took the water taxi over to IOA. This taxi was great, especially after walking in the parks all day. Used the FL lottery promotion for two-day passes so for 5 people, two-day passes totalled $250.00..not a bad deal at all..
Note- for us, they only seemed to care that my mom, the one buying the tickets was from FL. I'm 24 and never was asked for ID and there was no problem with the kids...
My sister and her friend are thrill junkies (as am I) and since my mom and brother do not care for coasters, I knew I was destined for a weekend of thrill rides. This was confirmed as we started off with three straight rides on the Hulk. Used our room keys for FOTL, which on this particular Friday was just entering thru the exit area. As has been reported before, we got many crazy looks walking up the exit but didn't really care. Hulk is a very smooth ride and the launch the first time was very unexpected and very cool. I did feel a little queasy after three straight rides but that is to be expected with all the loops and twists and turns. As far as whipping you around or rattling you, there is none of that on the Hulk.
We probably would have rode more but wanted to be fair to the non coaster folks so we met up with them and did Spiderman. Very cool ride. Hard to describe it but it is awesome 3-D and very good simulation of height and drops.. Here, the FOTL actually had its own queue and was very nice. Didn't feel intrusive or "backdoorsy" as many of the rides did. We only did Spiderman once because I think more than that in a row would not be good on the stomach (and I have an iron one).
After that we hit Dr. Doom, nothing special, also had its own FOTL queue which was easy to find and not intrusive. Ride could use some tweaking. Not good for a thrill ride but got a nice view of the park.
After Marvel, we all hit the water rides. Dudley Do Right was alright. Here, the FOTL dumps you into the main line with quite a while to go. We waited about 15 minutes with the main line. (yes FOTL spoils you very much) The ride itself was alright..final drop was steeper than I thought but fun. Then hit Popeyes Raft Ride. On this one, FOTL seems very intrusive. First time thru, we went in thru the Express and it just dumped us into the middle of the line. We kinda had to cut into to main line ourselves..not fun considering the people we had to cut in front of were in the same boat as us
. The FOTL could be designed a lot better on this one. Anyways, the ride does get you soaked - seemed like every waterfall landed square on my head. The kids liked this one a lot so we rode again and this time there was an employee where the two lines merged..better, but still not great. After Popeye, we hit Jurassic. FOTL here was good- 2 separate lines.. however, the ride broke down as we were about to get on...they sent 30 empty boats thru and finally we got on. better safe than sorry I guess..ride was okay but to me nothing special. also, make sure your knees are tucked under the bench in front of you as both my mom and i nailed ours on the drop.
After that it was off to dueling dragons. Here again, the FOTL was kinda confusing and intrusive. Basically, you go up the exit (weird looks again) and then get into another situation where you in essence cut in front of everyone else. they had someone here helping but the people who had been waiting seemed a little peeved..
Once we got to the ride we chose Fire first...incredible ride...again, very smooth and a lot of cool moments with the dueling aspect. We did Ice quickly after that (a good thing about this one is that it dumps you right near the entry for Express so you can ride over and over very easily). Both rides were so good that we rode each three times.
Then hit the Flying Unicorn with my brother since he hates looping coasters...note: if you over or near 6 feet tall, stay away from this one..leave it to the kids...I am 6' 6" and still feeling the effects of the knee cramping and back pains...
We had done all we wanted to do for the day in IOA and it was still before noon (FOTL rules..) We decided to try to hit everything we wanted at USF so we could have a leisurely second day doing repeats and others that weren't top priority. Park hopping was no problem and we got right in..
All the FOTL queues at USF were much better than at IOA with one or two exceptions. Hanna Barbera was the first...cute little ride for the kids but did nothing for me. FOTL here was good, got in through an out of the way back entrance.
Next was BTTF. This ride had good FOTL procedures. Clearly marked entrances led to a merge with the other line. However once we merged with the other line it was chaos. It seemed like 15 groups came in and out b4 they let ours in. At least the girl on the monitors was pretty cute (even though she is probably pretty old now
) The whole Biff character got old and stupid really quick but the ride itself was great.
Next was MIB. This was a great ride with great theming. My little bro liked it a lot. I won't spoil anything but it is very cool and very well done. Kids (esp. boys) all seem to love this one. FOTL was very easy and melded well with the regular line.
Hit Jaws after this..FOTL was very good here.. two separate lines...Ride did nothing for me but make me hot..sat on the left hand side and the flames were VERY hot. Also, the Jaws attacks were rather boring...just not my cup of tea. There were also several odd smells throughout the ride. I am glad we only had to wait 5 minutes for this one.
Next up was Earthquake which was pretty lame by my standards. Actually, the first two parts were boring, the actual Earthquake ride and theming was pretty good.
Here, FOTL was good too, two separate lines. The whole ride was ruined for me by Charlton Heston, a celebrity I cannot stand, so maybe I am biased...
At this point, we are all tired even though it is only 3pm. FOTL lets you do so much and still have time left over. We decided to get a quick bite to eat at the Latin Quarter. They were only serving lunch so they had a very limited menu. Still, what we got was very good. The pulled beef sandwich and the rottiserie chicken were both excellent and our server was good, consistently filling up our chips and salsa.
After dinner we checked in real quick and dumped our stuff in the Hard Rock room. Room was a lot like the Hard Rock in Vegas..as everyone has said..very nice, modern room. (Does anyone know where they get those cool drinking glasses-- I want some and they weren't in the gift shop!!) Hit the pool immediately and stayed for about three hours...great pool with a great slide...could be a little deeper but I guess that is good for the littler ones..
Also played a lot of beach volleyball. We started out two on two but eventually a bunch of people joined in with us..everyone seems to be very polite and cordial at the Hard Rock, even the guests, which is rare... I think the atmosphere just lends itself to friendliness
After all this we were pretty tired so we all hit the room for the night..did sneak out to get a couple of drinks at Velvet but after getting the bill for 2 jack and cokes (around $13) I drove out to a gas station for a 12 pack (less than the two drinks at Velvet). drank most of those during the NBA finals game 2 and slept very well even though I got the floor
Will try to write part 2 soon...didn't realize it would be this long..will tell in that one why the Hulk or Spidey multiple times is not recommended with a hangover...
drew
(haven't written this long w/o cursing in a while)
My sister (14), her friend (also 14) and my brother (11) were already waiting at baggage. They had gotten there from Pompano Beach FL about 2 minutes ago..talk about good timing..(Pompano is about 3 hours from Orlando). Mom had stayed in the car so out we went and we were on our way.
Got to the Universal Clarion for the first night's accomodation since I was too cheap to spring for HR for 3 nights (we were only going to the parks Fri and Sat.).
Hotel was nice enough..our window leaked and the toilet ran when we first got there but they took care of both...Clarion is a nice enough place..clean and cheap (pricewise..)..good enough for just a place to sleep...
Went out and got some pizza Thursday night.. there was a PapaJohn's on TurkeyLakeRd near Hollywood Blvd I believe.. our favorite pizza and very close..
Got up early (8am is very early to me) so we could do early check in for HRH and get our FOTL passes. Self parking was very easy to find at the HardRock and we were at the front desk by 8:30. I got two passes for FOTL. The clerk told me you only need one for the group but I did not know if we were going to split up so I got two..
Took the water taxi over to IOA. This taxi was great, especially after walking in the parks all day. Used the FL lottery promotion for two-day passes so for 5 people, two-day passes totalled $250.00..not a bad deal at all..
Note- for us, they only seemed to care that my mom, the one buying the tickets was from FL. I'm 24 and never was asked for ID and there was no problem with the kids...
My sister and her friend are thrill junkies (as am I) and since my mom and brother do not care for coasters, I knew I was destined for a weekend of thrill rides. This was confirmed as we started off with three straight rides on the Hulk. Used our room keys for FOTL, which on this particular Friday was just entering thru the exit area. As has been reported before, we got many crazy looks walking up the exit but didn't really care. Hulk is a very smooth ride and the launch the first time was very unexpected and very cool. I did feel a little queasy after three straight rides but that is to be expected with all the loops and twists and turns. As far as whipping you around or rattling you, there is none of that on the Hulk.
We probably would have rode more but wanted to be fair to the non coaster folks so we met up with them and did Spiderman. Very cool ride. Hard to describe it but it is awesome 3-D and very good simulation of height and drops.. Here, the FOTL actually had its own queue and was very nice. Didn't feel intrusive or "backdoorsy" as many of the rides did. We only did Spiderman once because I think more than that in a row would not be good on the stomach (and I have an iron one).
After that we hit Dr. Doom, nothing special, also had its own FOTL queue which was easy to find and not intrusive. Ride could use some tweaking. Not good for a thrill ride but got a nice view of the park.
After Marvel, we all hit the water rides. Dudley Do Right was alright. Here, the FOTL dumps you into the main line with quite a while to go. We waited about 15 minutes with the main line. (yes FOTL spoils you very much) The ride itself was alright..final drop was steeper than I thought but fun. Then hit Popeyes Raft Ride. On this one, FOTL seems very intrusive. First time thru, we went in thru the Express and it just dumped us into the middle of the line. We kinda had to cut into to main line ourselves..not fun considering the people we had to cut in front of were in the same boat as us
. The FOTL could be designed a lot better on this one. Anyways, the ride does get you soaked - seemed like every waterfall landed square on my head. The kids liked this one a lot so we rode again and this time there was an employee where the two lines merged..better, but still not great. After Popeye, we hit Jurassic. FOTL here was good- 2 separate lines.. however, the ride broke down as we were about to get on...they sent 30 empty boats thru and finally we got on. better safe than sorry I guess..ride was okay but to me nothing special. also, make sure your knees are tucked under the bench in front of you as both my mom and i nailed ours on the drop.After that it was off to dueling dragons. Here again, the FOTL was kinda confusing and intrusive. Basically, you go up the exit (weird looks again) and then get into another situation where you in essence cut in front of everyone else. they had someone here helping but the people who had been waiting seemed a little peeved..
Once we got to the ride we chose Fire first...incredible ride...again, very smooth and a lot of cool moments with the dueling aspect. We did Ice quickly after that (a good thing about this one is that it dumps you right near the entry for Express so you can ride over and over very easily). Both rides were so good that we rode each three times.
Then hit the Flying Unicorn with my brother since he hates looping coasters...note: if you over or near 6 feet tall, stay away from this one..leave it to the kids...I am 6' 6" and still feeling the effects of the knee cramping and back pains...
We had done all we wanted to do for the day in IOA and it was still before noon (FOTL rules..) We decided to try to hit everything we wanted at USF so we could have a leisurely second day doing repeats and others that weren't top priority. Park hopping was no problem and we got right in..
All the FOTL queues at USF were much better than at IOA with one or two exceptions. Hanna Barbera was the first...cute little ride for the kids but did nothing for me. FOTL here was good, got in through an out of the way back entrance.
Next was BTTF. This ride had good FOTL procedures. Clearly marked entrances led to a merge with the other line. However once we merged with the other line it was chaos. It seemed like 15 groups came in and out b4 they let ours in. At least the girl on the monitors was pretty cute (even though she is probably pretty old now
) The whole Biff character got old and stupid really quick but the ride itself was great.Next was MIB. This was a great ride with great theming. My little bro liked it a lot. I won't spoil anything but it is very cool and very well done. Kids (esp. boys) all seem to love this one. FOTL was very easy and melded well with the regular line.
Hit Jaws after this..FOTL was very good here.. two separate lines...Ride did nothing for me but make me hot..sat on the left hand side and the flames were VERY hot. Also, the Jaws attacks were rather boring...just not my cup of tea. There were also several odd smells throughout the ride. I am glad we only had to wait 5 minutes for this one.
Next up was Earthquake which was pretty lame by my standards. Actually, the first two parts were boring, the actual Earthquake ride and theming was pretty good.
Here, FOTL was good too, two separate lines. The whole ride was ruined for me by Charlton Heston, a celebrity I cannot stand, so maybe I am biased...
At this point, we are all tired even though it is only 3pm. FOTL lets you do so much and still have time left over. We decided to get a quick bite to eat at the Latin Quarter. They were only serving lunch so they had a very limited menu. Still, what we got was very good. The pulled beef sandwich and the rottiserie chicken were both excellent and our server was good, consistently filling up our chips and salsa.
After dinner we checked in real quick and dumped our stuff in the Hard Rock room. Room was a lot like the Hard Rock in Vegas..as everyone has said..very nice, modern room. (Does anyone know where they get those cool drinking glasses-- I want some and they weren't in the gift shop!!) Hit the pool immediately and stayed for about three hours...great pool with a great slide...could be a little deeper but I guess that is good for the littler ones..
Also played a lot of beach volleyball. We started out two on two but eventually a bunch of people joined in with us..everyone seems to be very polite and cordial at the Hard Rock, even the guests, which is rare... I think the atmosphere just lends itself to friendliness
After all this we were pretty tired so we all hit the room for the night..did sneak out to get a couple of drinks at Velvet but after getting the bill for 2 jack and cokes (around $13) I drove out to a gas station for a 12 pack (less than the two drinks at Velvet). drank most of those during the NBA finals game 2 and slept very well even though I got the floor
Will try to write part 2 soon...didn't realize it would be this long..will tell in that one why the Hulk or Spidey multiple times is not recommended with a hangover...
drew
(haven't written this long w/o cursing in a while
)
