jothp
Going to wash my car in honour of the mouse.
- Joined
- May 21, 2010
- Messages
- 2,212
Day 3 Friday 14th August - Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure part 1
After a broken nights sleep the previous night with the disturbance in the corridor we were hoping for a good night. This didn't happen though - I woke up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom only to tread in a big wet patch walking there. All the lights went on to find that a big area of the tiled entrance way floor was covered in water and it had spread onto the main bedroom area carpet and into the wardrobe. Somehow the girls had remained asleep so I didn't want to call anyone to come and sort it out so I moved the suitcases out of the wet and mopped up the floor as best as I could using the towels we had. It seemed that the leak was coming in under the connecting door from the room next door so we blocked the gap with a couple of dry towels and went back to sleep. Even though we had all this activity in the middle of the night I was still wide awake by 4.30 again and the girls woke not too long after.
We went for breakfast sharp at 7 again and managed to get to the water taxi by 7.25. Today however, luck was not on our side as we had to wait a while for the taxi to come. For some reason we went into the studios first again this morning and took another spin on escape from Gringotts before riding the Hogwarts express to IOA. I loved this ride but DH commented that he thought it looked a little silly that the wheels on the train didn't actually turn as it came into the station. Despite being at the park gates before they opened at about 7.45 it was about 9.00 by the time we made it to Hogsmeade. We decided that by that time Fobidden Journey would be a too long queue so Robyn and Olie took a turn on dragon challenge. Harriet really wanted to go on too - the lady at the entrance did a very thorough job measuring her, but decided she was just a few mm too short. Hattie was a little upset but luckily we had pre warned her that there was a good chance that she wouldn't be tall enough (to be honest I'm surprised that she was as close as she was) so she soon cheered up. We took a few pictures and looked in a couple of shops while waiting for them to come back. As it turns out Robyn didn't really enjoy this one as she said her head was banged around too much and she didn't ask to do it again for the rest of the trip.
Next we walked around the corner and me and the three girls took a couple of spins on the hippogriff before we left Hogsmeade to walked around to Seuss landing. We all did the trolley train ride at which point Robyn declared her disgust at these rides so I sat out of the carousel and one fish etc with her. We did manage to get her to join us for the cat in the hat but she was clearly wanting something a little more thrilling! The funniest part of this area was that Evie rode with Olie on One fish... Somehow she managed to move their fish up and down at just the right time to get sprayed by all the water - and she looks like butter wouldn't melt! We decided it was about time to do something that appealed more to the older girls so we walked over and let them ride together on Doctor Doom's fearfall with express. I waited for them by the exit while Olie let Evie have a go on a few games in the arcade.
They came off quite quickly but it was already 11.50. As we were all already feeling a little worn out and hungry we wandered over to Confisco grill for lunch. We were all really impressed by this lunch and we had a lovely server. Robyn and I had the chicken fajitas which were lovely. Hattie and Evie had kids pizza which looked great too and Olie had a burger. Olie ordered a coffee - he was told at the time there would be a bit of a wait as they would have to fetch it from next door. In the end he hardly had to wait and got two as two people both went for is coffee obviously without telling the other. We skipped dessert here with the plan of getting something later but we never did. The total cost including tax was $75 plus tip. We would certainly plan to go here again if we returned.
After a broken nights sleep the previous night with the disturbance in the corridor we were hoping for a good night. This didn't happen though - I woke up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom only to tread in a big wet patch walking there. All the lights went on to find that a big area of the tiled entrance way floor was covered in water and it had spread onto the main bedroom area carpet and into the wardrobe. Somehow the girls had remained asleep so I didn't want to call anyone to come and sort it out so I moved the suitcases out of the wet and mopped up the floor as best as I could using the towels we had. It seemed that the leak was coming in under the connecting door from the room next door so we blocked the gap with a couple of dry towels and went back to sleep. Even though we had all this activity in the middle of the night I was still wide awake by 4.30 again and the girls woke not too long after.
We went for breakfast sharp at 7 again and managed to get to the water taxi by 7.25. Today however, luck was not on our side as we had to wait a while for the taxi to come. For some reason we went into the studios first again this morning and took another spin on escape from Gringotts before riding the Hogwarts express to IOA. I loved this ride but DH commented that he thought it looked a little silly that the wheels on the train didn't actually turn as it came into the station. Despite being at the park gates before they opened at about 7.45 it was about 9.00 by the time we made it to Hogsmeade. We decided that by that time Fobidden Journey would be a too long queue so Robyn and Olie took a turn on dragon challenge. Harriet really wanted to go on too - the lady at the entrance did a very thorough job measuring her, but decided she was just a few mm too short. Hattie was a little upset but luckily we had pre warned her that there was a good chance that she wouldn't be tall enough (to be honest I'm surprised that she was as close as she was) so she soon cheered up. We took a few pictures and looked in a couple of shops while waiting for them to come back. As it turns out Robyn didn't really enjoy this one as she said her head was banged around too much and she didn't ask to do it again for the rest of the trip.
Next we walked around the corner and me and the three girls took a couple of spins on the hippogriff before we left Hogsmeade to walked around to Seuss landing. We all did the trolley train ride at which point Robyn declared her disgust at these rides so I sat out of the carousel and one fish etc with her. We did manage to get her to join us for the cat in the hat but she was clearly wanting something a little more thrilling! The funniest part of this area was that Evie rode with Olie on One fish... Somehow she managed to move their fish up and down at just the right time to get sprayed by all the water - and she looks like butter wouldn't melt! We decided it was about time to do something that appealed more to the older girls so we walked over and let them ride together on Doctor Doom's fearfall with express. I waited for them by the exit while Olie let Evie have a go on a few games in the arcade.
They came off quite quickly but it was already 11.50. As we were all already feeling a little worn out and hungry we wandered over to Confisco grill for lunch. We were all really impressed by this lunch and we had a lovely server. Robyn and I had the chicken fajitas which were lovely. Hattie and Evie had kids pizza which looked great too and Olie had a burger. Olie ordered a coffee - he was told at the time there would be a bit of a wait as they would have to fetch it from next door. In the end he hardly had to wait and got two as two people both went for is coffee obviously without telling the other. We skipped dessert here with the plan of getting something later but we never did. The total cost including tax was $75 plus tip. We would certainly plan to go here again if we returned.
Looking forward to reading along 
