Just back from an abbreviated 5 night trip to the darkside.Had to come home early due to an unfortunate event( more later)
The Good-Portofino Bay was gorgeous as usual( still painting being done in the outside harbor area).Staff was friendly as always.Room ready at 1130am for check in.Parks ( what we managed to see were fun as I remember).
Harry potter expansion is coming along fast and the new Simpsons area is great
Despicable me was great.Transformers was meh..Like Spiderman much better.Too much going on or something.
The Bad-It was crowded ( not unexpected though and we did well with express pass).wait time for Forbidden Journey at 9am was 90 mins.Despicable me 90 mins and Spiderman 45mins.This was all shortly after general public opening.
We went to early entry at the studios 3 mornings..ALL 3 days Transforners was down and not functioniong till almost 9am or after 9am..The first day was ok -they had anticipated it and had Twister, Mummy, Rocket and Shrek open to help disperse the crowds( there were alot for early entry)
The other 2 days the only thing open was Despicable me..Kind of defeated the purpose of hustling to the park to find Transformers was down again.That
Club level at Portofino was PACKED..we spent alot of time at the resort and for breakfast at 7am and wine /appys at 5pm they would be OUT of food by 5 after the hour and took time to restock.There was NOWHERE to sit alot of the time and kids running amok( we had our 9 yr old with us and I would never allow her to behave like that )plus the kids were left unsupervised at the food areas and would be using bare hands.2 separate times though, a grown adult sneezed over the food or used hands...the club personnel said they have never seen it like that..not sure what the deal was there.
The ugly-On the morning of our 3rd day we rode Disaster .I ended up getting a injured on the ride ( some breaks and torn tendons in fingers and no I was not doing anything other than sitting in my seat appropriately ) .The ride was shutdown briefly and I was sent to the first aid.Transported to a local Urgent Care ( the only good thing was I got to see the whole BACKSTAGE area of Harry potter construction-it is going to be fantastic)Spent 5 HRS of my day in urgent care ( I got there the day they transitioned from paper to computer system so it was a HOT mess)after being told it would be less than an hour and found out that I have to see an orthopedic hand specialist.Since we couldn't do anything else we cut our trip short..I am so bummed since I was so looking forward to our trip.we are also STILL waiting to hear from Universal.Apparently someone was to have made contact with us when it happened, and no one did.The staff at Portofino ALL went above and beyond and did the best they could with a stinky situation..we had fun but missed many things due to not being able to do anything after I got hurt.
The Good-Portofino Bay was gorgeous as usual( still painting being done in the outside harbor area).Staff was friendly as always.Room ready at 1130am for check in.Parks ( what we managed to see were fun as I remember).
Harry potter expansion is coming along fast and the new Simpsons area is great
Despicable me was great.Transformers was meh..Like Spiderman much better.Too much going on or something.
The Bad-It was crowded ( not unexpected though and we did well with express pass).wait time for Forbidden Journey at 9am was 90 mins.Despicable me 90 mins and Spiderman 45mins.This was all shortly after general public opening.
We went to early entry at the studios 3 mornings..ALL 3 days Transforners was down and not functioniong till almost 9am or after 9am..The first day was ok -they had anticipated it and had Twister, Mummy, Rocket and Shrek open to help disperse the crowds( there were alot for early entry)
The other 2 days the only thing open was Despicable me..Kind of defeated the purpose of hustling to the park to find Transformers was down again.That
Club level at Portofino was PACKED..we spent alot of time at the resort and for breakfast at 7am and wine /appys at 5pm they would be OUT of food by 5 after the hour and took time to restock.There was NOWHERE to sit alot of the time and kids running amok( we had our 9 yr old with us and I would never allow her to behave like that )plus the kids were left unsupervised at the food areas and would be using bare hands.2 separate times though, a grown adult sneezed over the food or used hands...the club personnel said they have never seen it like that..not sure what the deal was there.
The ugly-On the morning of our 3rd day we rode Disaster .I ended up getting a injured on the ride ( some breaks and torn tendons in fingers and no I was not doing anything other than sitting in my seat appropriately ) .The ride was shutdown briefly and I was sent to the first aid.Transported to a local Urgent Care ( the only good thing was I got to see the whole BACKSTAGE area of Harry potter construction-it is going to be fantastic)Spent 5 HRS of my day in urgent care ( I got there the day they transitioned from paper to computer system so it was a HOT mess)after being told it would be less than an hour and found out that I have to see an orthopedic hand specialist.Since we couldn't do anything else we cut our trip short..I am so bummed since I was so looking forward to our trip.we are also STILL waiting to hear from Universal.Apparently someone was to have made contact with us when it happened, and no one did.The staff at Portofino ALL went above and beyond and did the best they could with a stinky situation..we had fun but missed many things due to not being able to do anything after I got hurt.
> I can tell you the windows on the buildings were going in on Wednesday and that the track between the 2 parks for the Hogwarts express is mostly completed..They said they are projecting a June 2014 opening, but that could change
