The Un-Christmas Continues! Universal

[dicar123]

Welcome Dark Siders to part 2 of my Un-Christmas Extravaganza trip report!

Let me tell you right up front: Our 14 year old son was hit by a car and killed on December 18, 2006. We took this trip to escape that first anniversary and avoid Christmas. My pretrip, and part one do contain grieving "stuff". This part...not so much really. Here is the link to part one!

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1681184

Our characters:
Here is our itinerary:

December 14: pick up by airport shuttle, early flight to Orlando, rental car, staying at the Country Inn and Suites, Port Canaveral.
December 15-22: Cruise
December 22-27: Return from cruise, rental car, staying at Royal Pacific Resorts (a Universal hotel), Universal Studios for some unknown amount of time, perhaps other stuff we hadn’t decided yet.

Cast of Characters:

Dianna- me, gaining a reputation in my family for excellence in vacation planning. But it’s early days yet and one bad trip could ruin me

Ed- my wonderful husband, happy to leave the planning to someone else, says, “Just tell me when to show up,” and pays the bills without comment.

Dustin- 9 years old, extremely friendly, adventurous eater. Not terribly excited about the trip, but he does live very “in the moment”

Derrick Evan- the ghost of Christmas past. He makes a couple of brief “appearances”-but not in any literal sense, I assure you!

Ready? Here we goooooo!

December 22- Royal Pacific and Universal Studios

When we last left our sorry little group, they had gotten on the Hertz shuttle after the leaving the Disney Magic. Dustin had been quite sick the night before and received a shot of some unknown substance from the night duty nurse onboard the ship. All were tired, and not quite sure how the rest of this adventure would go. Was Dustin sick with some horrible virus which would leave us confined to our hotel?? We did not know and were playing that by ear. Aside from renting a car and proceeding to the Royal Pacific, our day was entirely open.

We packed our luggage into the waiting Hertz shuttle and off we went. Our driver was a friendly guy, letting us know how the weather had been and was expected to be for the remainder of our stay in Florida. He warned us of various speed traps, and was in general quite helpful and pleasant!

We got to Hertz in a few minutes and found that our reserved car was…a Prius. Dustin, upon being informed of the type of car, came out of his sick little stupor for a moment to ask, “Is it powder blue?” No, luckily the car was beige-ish, so no one would be questioning Ed’s manhood while we traveled around town.

What an odd little car the Prius is! It was very comfortable for the three of us, plenty enough trunk space, but boy is it different! There is a touch screen on the dash whereby you can obtain all kinds of information, including a diagram of how the engine is running (either electricity or using gas) at any particular moment.

Dustin was fascinated with this, and Ed was quite interested himself. He wondered if there are many accidents because Prius users are checking out that diagram. It was all well beyond my understanding or interest, and I was relegated to the backseat for the remainder of our trip.

By the way, there were control buttons for the radio on the steering wheel. Why didn't anyone thought of that 10 years ago?

We arrived at the Royal Pacific Resort at around 10:00. The lobby was fairly busy, but we didn’t wait long. Check-in was a breeze, our room was 2430. This is in the smoking section of the hotel and frankly, it reeked.

I don’t know why I asked for a smoking room. I don’t smoke in hotel rooms (although if I were alone, I probably would). The room was roomy and the beds were comfortable. The sink area wasn’t quite clean. The previous occupant had managed to get spots of what looked like foundation make-up on the wall and when I bent over to spit out my toothpaste, I noticed that the backside of the sink (the part right in front of where you are standing, when standing at the sink) wasn’t clean either.

The next time our room was cleaned, the sink had been scrubbed but the wall wasn’t cleaned, so I just did it myself because it annoyed me for some reason (as if there aren’t spots on my walls at home! LOL)

Being tired and having not much of anything planned, we napped. Dustin and I were out instantly, but Ed got bored I guess and decided to do laundry. Then, he decided to address Christmas cards. This was all nearly accomplished by the time I woke up. Oh darn, I missed the opportunity to help! Love that man!

The laundry room, Ed insists I mention, is the coldest place in the universe! You could hang meat in that room! Who in the world has ever heard of a laundry room that wasn’t humid, hot and disgusting? Thank you Royal Pacific, what a nice surprise!

Dustin woke up around 2:30 and seemed to think he felt ok. We were hungry and had some vague plan to exchange our Expedia vouchers for park passes and upgrade Ed’s to an AP, but no plans really to enter the park. Our tickets were 7 day, two park passes, but we didn’t think we would need all the time that we were there (Sat-Weds) to see the parks.

Dustin had a different plan! “When are we going to the park? Huh? Huh? Huh?”

Well, I guess it wouldn’t hurt to go, right? So we wandered off in search of the water taxi. Now, to people who’ve never been to this resort (which was us!), this place seems huge and confusing. I was sure that I’d never find my way back to the room unescorted, but it really wasn’t bad once I’d wandered around a bit. We got to the water taxi, which happened to be boarding as we arrived, and clambered aboard. The drivers are quite funny, when you can understand them on the loud speaker.

We arrived at City Walk and headed over to Universal Studios. We weren’t quite sure which of the various lines we needed to be in. Ed thought that to upgrade he needed to be in some special line on the right hand side. I disagreed, but wasn’t in the mood to argue.

Ed went to one line and Dustin and I went to another. Our line moved rapidly! We got to the front and I explained my needs to the lady. Our vouchers from Expedia were numbered and she asked where the first document was. I explained that it was with my husband in the other line because he wanted an upgrade to AP.

She smiled and said she could have taken care of that. Well! Now I made the mistake of assuming that since Dustin was right next to me, and seeming to be paying attention to what the woman said, that he would fully understand my request to him. I said, “Dustin go and see if your dad is still in that big long line.”

The part I failed to add was, “And if he is, tell him to get his butt over here.” Dustin walked over to where he could see, came back to me, and dutifully reported, “Yes. Dad is still in that big, long line.”

As the lady was nearly finished with us, I just sighed, thanked Dustin and resolved to re-stand in the line. We finished, I alerted Ed (and the dozen or so people he was standing in that very slow line with) that the other line could upgrade his ticket, and we got back into line. It really only took a couple of minutes so it wasn’t a big deal, just silly.

Here is a tip: if you plan to upgrade to an annual pass, it might be handy to remember which annual pass you want. I’d forgotten. One of them had blackout dates which started the next day, so we got the next more expensive one. I’m pretty sure it was the one we wanted all along anyway.

Starving people that we were by this time, our first task was to find food! Preferably plain food that would be unlikely to upset Dustin’s still uneasy tummy. This was accomplished quite quickly, as we stumbled right into the Boulangerie right past the entrance! Score!

We got turkey sandwiches and they were soooooo good. We were very hungry, so perhaps they aren’t as fabulous as we thought, but we oohed and ahhhed. Right after we sat down we found that the Macy’s parade was coming down the street. We were most happy, munching our yummy sandwiches and watching the parade through the window. This is a wonderful place, even if it is the dark side!

Dustin continued to feel well after eating most of his sandwich so we wandered about and tried decide what we might like to do. We ruled out anything at all fast in deference to Dustin’s tummy, and settled on Shrek! Here comes our first experience with Express Pass.

Do not be fooled. The line for Shrek can seem long because you’re waiting for the show to be over. Really, it’s just a few minutes. We crowded into the pre-show and giggled ourselves silly, then went into the auditorium and took our seats. We very much enjoyed this! For some reason, I did not have my feet on the floor, so missed the “spiders”. Dustin commented, “I know it wasn’t real, but it felt real and that was creepy.” Yes, honey that’s kind of the point.

From there we went to the Animal Actors show. This had just started, but we easily found seats. It was cute, but short IMO. Dustin hadn’t been enthusiastic when I suggested it, but he ended up really liking it.

We found ourselves near ET and I was pretty sure it wasn’t fast or anything, so we went on that. I was prepared for the name thing at the end, but Ed and Dustin had no clue what the deal was with those cards. The ride is very cute and they got such a kick out of ET saying their names! Maybe I missed it, but it seemed we were the only ones in the car who got talked to.

After very much enjoying our ET experience, Dustin found that he had a headache. It was dark and people seemed to be meandering toward the front anyway so we decided to go. Ed was sure that Dustin was probably a bit dehydrated still, thus the headache. So, after getting back to the hotel, we got into our cute little Prius and found Wal-Greens to buy some bottled water and snacks, then we went to McDonalds because Dustin begged.

It was a weird little Bistro McDonald’s set up. The food was ok, the kids area (where we sat) was filthy and disgusting. Dustin ate more food and was still feeling fine. Yay!!

Just FYI, Ed and Dustin were most interested in the trashcans at this McDonalds. Apparently, they sense when to open. The menfolk were fascinated and had to play with these awhile, in the filthy and disgusting McDonalds. I waited happily in the, much cleaner, parking lot.

Back to the hotel we go. Ed drops us off with our bags at the entrance so we wouldn’t have to walk all the way from the parking lot. It didn’t seem very nice to just abandon Ed, so Dustin and I waited for him to catch up. Ed arrives and asks what we are waiting for. “We were waiting for you. Because we love you …and I don’t have a key to the room.”

Ed had given Dustin the key before we got out of the car. Dustin neglected to mention that.

We stashed our stuff in the room (no refrigerators, by the way), watched tv and went to sleep.

 

[CruisinEars]

Good start! Glad to hear Dustin was feeling better. Nothing worse than being sick on vacation.

 

[dicar123]

December 23- IOA

We were up early this day, but not quite early enough to get to the park as it opened. As we walked to the water taxi, fully expecting to eat when we got to IOA, we noticed the breakfast buffet at the restaurant at the resort. Well, we’re here and we’re hungry, so let’s eat!

We were seated very quickly as the place was half empty and found our way to the buffet. There was a large variety of foods to choose from, including a made to order omelet station. I don’t care for breakfast much so I got just a few things. Dustin filled his plate but then decided he didn’t think he felt like eating so he had maybe a piece of bacon.

Ed is the only one who really ate. This was fine until the check came. The buffet is apparently $15 apiece. Ed was NOT happy. Lesson learned, and we did not return there. Now, we did know that prices at the resort were going to be high. But $50 for breakfast, when none of us really care about breakfast, is very silly.

To the water taxi we go!

I think it was this day that we watched some guy walking his dog on the beach as we went past. The dog got away and we were most amused watching the guy try to catch his dog. He did finally get the dog and held it up in triumph! We clapped and cheered! Too funny!

Since we had seen US the night before, we chose IOA for this day. Dustin was itching to ride Jurassic Park River Adventure (due mostly to seeing it on the Universal Channel at the hotel, he’s never seen the movie).

Somehow, even though he’d seen the advertisement and he and I watched people coming down the big fall at the end, he failed to notice that WAS the Jurassic Park ride. Imagine his surprise, at the end of the ride, to be going down this great big hill! Oh, Dustin was not pleased.

Now really! The child had stood right next to me watching the ride! Ed, who had wandered off to God knows where, rejoined us and I said (while standing right next to Dustin) “Hey, those people in the front are getting pretty wet. We’d better sit in the back.” Dustin made no peep, he had no comment. If he’d said that looks scary, I’d have explained that was the ride we were planning to get on!

For the next 4 days we heard, over and over, how unfair it was for them to put that big scary drop at the end of a ride he liked so much. Well child, when you wander cluelessly about the universe, paying attention to absolutely nothing going on around you, that’s the kind of stuff you have to deal with.

I must insert here that this child rode Splash Mountain, Big Thunder and Test Track when he was barely 4 with no complaint whatsoever. Now, he didn’t jump up and down with excitement and beg to ride again, but he didn’t cry or complain either. After Big Thunder, his only comment was, “That was fast.”

We continued on, with a very put-out Dustin trotting at our sides. He thought the Discovery Center looked neat so we spent some time there. Personally, I thought it was kind of boring but he and Ed liked it ok. We stuck our heads into Camp Jurassic and found that the wait for the Pteranadon Flyers was ridiculous and with no express pass, so we passed on that and left the area.

We stumbled upon the Flying Unicorn and it looked pretty tame, so we decided to give it a go. Dustin immediately balked. “I’m not riding that. It’s too scary.” At this point, I decided that we needed to have a little chat with Dustin.

Ok kid, look. We will not force you to ride anything that you don’t want to. You will get to ride everything that you do want to ride, we have plenty of time. But dad and I will ride what we want too. You will stand in line and simply walk through to the child swap area and wait for us. Got it?

The child was not pleased, but too bad. Now, I assure you that neither Ed nor I had any intention of riding scary roller coasters all day and leaving Dustin on the sidelines. I suspect that most of the reason Dustin is afraid of roller coasters is because Derrick was afraid of roller coasters.

I wanted Dustin to stand in line with Ed and I while the two of us were excited, and seeing other kids his age and smaller being excited over the ride and I hoped that he might decide to give it a try. Dustin did not ride this first time on the Unicorn, but did try it later in the day and loved it. I’m sure he would never have attempted it had we avoided the ride altogether, so I think we did the right thing (for Dustin).

Ed and I got in the express line for the Unicorn and walked all the way to the front. There was barely any time at all for Dustin to change his mind, and he did not. There may not be a child swap area here, so Dustin would have waited near the exit.

There are quite a few people walking around the area, so Ed and I could live with that. It isn’t my favorite thing in the world, leaving the child unattended for a minute or two in a theme park, but it was our best option for what we were trying to accomplish. We’ve done this exactly one time before, at a local park, leaving both Derrick and Dustin (Derrick was 11 and Dustin was 5) to wait near the exit of the ride. It really bit us in the butt later on this day. I try to walk a fine line between being ridiculously overprotective and acting like a moron.

Very occasionally, we’re just morons.

Ed and I rode the ride, Dustin waited. It was no big deal. We browsed the stores there with the suits of armor and stuff. Dustin really likes all that and tried to talk us into sword. Fat chance!

It wasn’t time yet for the Sinbad show, so we walked over to Poseidon. We got through the first room and into the second room and then were told the ride was broken and they sent us out a backdoor. We followed our noses around and around and back into the park.

It still wasn’t time for the Sinbad show, so Ed and I tortured Dustin further by riding Fire and Ice (the blue dragon). We really, really liked this roller coaster! Usually, because I’m a short person, rides like this aren’t real comfortable for me. My head tends to be knocked from side to side against the padding. It’s not painful, but not comfortable. I had no problem with this ride; it was very smooth and just really fun. Dustin was able to wait in a child swap area and I found that much more comfortable.

We wandered on, still too early for Sinbad or perhaps having missed it, and walked over to Seuss Land. I loved this place! It was just too cute! Dustin never had much patience for Dr. Seuss so he didn’t really recognize much.

But Ed and I had a great time, quoting the Lorax to each other and saying, “They have stars upon thars!” repeatedly. We rode the High Sky Trolley and thoroughly enjoyed it, trying to explain to Dustin the story of the Sneetches as we went.

For some reason, there was a woman in line riding alone so I joined in with her. She never said a word to anyone that I heard, and maybe didn’t speak English; she certainly didn’t protest when I joined her. I tried in vain to spot the Zax. Does anyone know if they are really there?

After that, we rode The Cat in the Hat which we all thought was great. We didn’t particularly want to get wet, so we avoided One Fish, Two Fish, and carousels make me ill, so we were done with Seuss Land. Back we went to see if Poseidon was working and it was! Hmm, this was interesting. Didn’t love it, exactly, though the effects were cool. Worth doing, we think, but probably only once.

It was about this time when Dustin began supposing that maybe, perhaps, possibly, he might be inclined to ride the Unicorn. Hey, dude, your choice. He was still thinking about it when we got in line. With Express Pass he didn’t have a lot of time to talk himself out of it, so he rode it. And he liked it. Yay Dustin!!

We decided that we’d finish up with Spider-Man and the Hulk, then return to the hotel to get “wet clothes” on and come back. Ok! Looking back, it was probably about this time that our brains must have quietly snuck themselves out of our skulls and took off for parts unknown, because Ed and I were about to join the ranks of The Ridiculously Stupid. Just watch!

Spider-Man was the first thing we saw that was really jam packed with people. That whole Toon area was nuts! With Express, we were in line about 6 minutes. And for the first time, I felt a little uncomfortable.

They aren’t really subtle with this whole express thing, are they? You’re just right there, walking in front of tons of people waiting in line. If it were me, really, I think I’d be furious. The wait was an hour. We found express to be worth every single cent! It was really, really fantastic. Oddly enough, we rarely saw anyone using resort room keys. Mostly, they had the express that is bought separately.

We absolutely loved Spider-Man! The effects were too cool! Dustin, when we were “falling”, did slip his glasses down because he was a little afraid and that satisfied him that we weren’t in any danger. So, if you’ve got smaller kids or kids who are a bit nervous, remind them that they can take the glasses off.

Next up, the Hulk! Ed and I had stayed near City Walk the year before, the night before our 4 day cruise. I’d seen the Hulk at that time and swore I’d NEVER ride it. But once Dustin started acting afraid of rides, I was being “cool” and when he said, “I bet you won’t ride the Hulk!” I said, “Of course I will!” (It’s a darn good thing he didn’t ask about the Dr. Doom thing-looking at that totally freaks me out!)

To be honest, it didn’t seem as scary close up, I think or maybe I was in a brave mood. I don’t know, but I was only just a little nervous. Dustin waited in the child swap, calling to us, “When you die, grandma and grandpa will come and get me, right?” Ed and I rode the ride. Oh my gosh! It was really fun, but that first drop gets me. I had my eyes mostly closed. Total Hulk time? 11 minutes from entering the line to being off the ride.

Dustin noticed the swirly Storm Force thing and wanted to ride. Spinny rides make me sick (I threw up on my brother while riding the Teacups at Disney Land when I was a little girl.) so Ed rode with him and I waited. Dustin thought that was great fun! Ed isn’t thrilled with spinny rides, really, but he’s the man and he doesn’t actually throw up so that’s his job!

Having finished Spidey and the Hulk, we set off for dinner. The plan was: food, water taxi to hotel to room, change clothes, water taxi back to IOA. Why? Well, for some unknown reason I was convinced that there was a huge number of water rides that we’d been avoiding all day so that we could do them all at once in some huge water event! So, we planned to change clothes.

We ate at Margaritaville. We all ordered cheeseburgers and Dustin was thrilled to finally be there! We are Buffett fans. The food arrived and Dustin took a bite or two and decided he still didn’t feel so great. Ed got HOT! Ok, kid, this is the second meal I have bought for you that you’ve decided you don’t feel like eating. Eat or don’t-but if you order, you’d darn well better eat!!

We recognized that Dustin was still probably feeling unsure because of the whole tummy thing, and were anxious to get him eating normally again. When Dustin was 3 YO he got a stomach virus and the doctor freaked out because he didn’t eat for a full week. He insisted that if we didn’t start getting food into him, we could ruin his appetite for good. The doctor scared us to death and it’s stuck.

Back at IOA, Dustin wanted to ride the Unicorn again and I pulled out the map. Where the heck are all the rides I thought I was missing out on? Well, there was the River Adventure that Dustin swore never to ride again. I saw the Popeye Bilge Rat thing, and RipSaw Falls. I didn’t even think about One Fish, Two Fish.

We happened to be standing in front of Rip Saw Falls. Dustin took one look at it and said, “I’m not riding that thing!” I would have realized that had I been thinking. The wheels in my head started to turn. We did NOT go through all that changing clothes deal to ride 1, ONE, ride!

To be perfectly honest, I don’t like big falls anymore than Dustin does, but now I had my back up. So I said, “I’m riding RipSaw Falls!” Ed, unfortunately, took this as some wildly enthusiastic, “I’ve been waiting my whole LIFE to ride that ride!” response. We told Dustin that he could just wait for us and we got in line. Now, at most rides, remember, Dustin was with us until we boarded and being roller coasters the rides were pretty quick.

We got inside where the logs were boarding, but hadn’t quite gotten to where we would stand on the numbers when a CM asked us how many were in our party. Ed said two and explained that Dustin would wait. The CM pointed to a hallway and told Dustin to go ahead and walk out that way.

I watched the child walk away and felt distinctly uneasy. We didn’t know yet how long it would be before we actually boarded, and we didn’t know where the heck Dustin was going to be after walking down the hallway. I opened my mouth to call Dustin back, and then feeling foolish, I shut it again.

Immediately after Dustin left, we noticed that the logs didn’t seem to be loading and going as quickly as they had been. Ed mentioned that maybe the ride wasn’t working well. Mostly to reassure myself, I replied, that I was sure we’d get going in a minute. I found out later that Ed was extremely uncomfortable at this point, but thinking I really wanted to ride and not wanting to disappoint me, he didn’t saying anything.

We boarded the ride after maybe 3-4 minutes. I didn’t enjoy it at all, feeling worried over how long we’d already been away from Dustin. I just wanted the darn thing over with! We got to the top of the big drop and the log ahead of us was stuck. Our bump sent them over, but we didn’t go anywhere. I can’t say how long we were stuck. It felt like lifetimes were passing!

The lady in the booth pushed some buttons and called for someone. A repair guy came and went into the booth and pushed buttons for a minute. I was in tears. Ed was beside himself! He could see that the mechanism was working properly, we just hadn’t reached it. So, he was yelling to the people in the booth, “It’s working, we just need a push! Give us a shove!”

Finally, a second repair guy came and shoved us with his foot and we got going. By the time the ride ended, I was in a complete panic! Ed and I took off running down the path to find Dustin. We found him sitting down on the path, in the dark and completely alone.

There was absolutely no one around! He was fine, but told us that he’d gotten worried and retraced his steps up to where the ride was loading. The CM there was very nice to him, joked around a little bit, and told him the ride would be a bit longer and to go wait for us.

Of course, I would have preferred that the CM had kept Dustin there with him, but Dustin is almost as big as I am and it’s hard to tell how old he is. That said, the place where Dustin was waiting was completely unsafe. It was entirely our fault and I’d recommend never having your kid wait alone unless there is a designated child swap area. Lesson learned!

Once confirmed that we were all safe, our spirits rose again and we set off for the Bilge Rats! Gosh, we just love this kind of ride! We had a blast, got totally soaking wet, rode twice and got off freezing! That water was cold!

We went back to the hotel, and since we were wet and the guys were wearing swim trunks, decided to go swimming! The parks had closed at 7:00pm so it was still early. Dustin found some kids to play with and Ed and I got a couple Rum Runners and hung out by the pool. Suddenly Ed looked at me and said with a grin, “It’s December 23!” “Yeah, so?” was my response. “I’m in swim trunks, AND I’m wet, AND I’m outside and I’m not even cold!”

Life is good!

Random Royal Pacific Pics!

 

[dicar123]

December 24-US and other stuff

We didn’t wake up until just after 8:00am (must have been those Rum Runners!) so we decided to sleep in! The express pass was working pretty well for us, so we didn’t think we’d have much problem. We got to US about 10:00.

We wandered over to Jimmy Neutron, saw it was packed and kept moving on to Twister! Wow, that ride is kinda freaky, isn’t it? We’ve never had a tornado near here, but we’ve had a few warnings. I think I’ll be glad if I never see one in person!

On to The Mummy! I was so looking forward to this ride! Now, I knew it was kind of roller coaster-y, but it was hard to decide if it would really be too much for Dustin. He did get brave and ride the Unicorn, after all!

I decided to just keep my mouth shut and see what he thought of it afterward. Ed and I thought this was great! Dustin wasn’t so sure. Finally, he decided that it was ok because the roller coaster parts were in the dark. I quickly pointed out to him that ALL roller coasters happen in the dark. All you have to do is close your eyes! Dustin was unconvinced.

We checked out our picture. I looked terrified, Ed’s eyes were bugging out of his head, only Dustin looked utterly calm. Too funny!

Disaster didn’t seem to be open yet, although it did open a couple of days later for test runs. We never went on it, but I heard it was very, very cool!

We headed over to Jaws. Dustin was reluctant to ride Jaws. Oh, please it’s the cheesiest ride ever and I swear you won’t be scared! We rode and Dustin agreed it was pretty cheesy. We enjoyed it all the same!

It must be a law that everyone take a Jaws picture like this.

Over to MIB! This ride was pretty packed but we got on quickly. I got the huge bonus and just managed to come close to Ed’s score. Dustin found the MIB store and found dozens of things he wanted to buy. Ed talked him down to one, and then tried to talk him out of buying anything right now.

He didn’t want to have to carry stuff around the park. I dimly remembered that the store might deliver to our room, so I sent Ed to ask someone. The CM confirmed that purchases could be sent to our room, so Ed explained to Dustin that he could buy it now, but wouldn’t see it until the next morning. Oddly enough, this was ok with Dustin, so he bought a gun of some sort.

We wandered ourselves over to Woody Woodpecker and Dustin was sure he needed to ride that. We all got on and thought it was a cute little ride.

We found some lunch at Mel’s Diner. The food was really good and Dustin finally ate well. The place was packed so we had quite a wait. Dustin wasted time by browsing the Magic Shop next door.

After lunch, Dustin noticed a bunch of birds sitting in the street. “Mom, can I go run at those birds and scare them?” he asked. “No!” I replied. “He wanted to know why not. “Because you will scare them and they will fly into the air and poop on people.” I explained. Ed rolled his eyes at me and told Dustin he could do it. About 15 minutes later I noticed bird poop on the back of Ed’s shirt. Payback!!

We walked back by The Mummy, but it was down, so we went to Jimmy Neutron. This one was a little bit of a wait, but not too bad. We thoroughly enjoyed it! Then we walked over to T-2. The squeezing of every possible person into the room annoyed me a bit, but we thought it was really neat! Dustin had a million questions about how it worked!

I wandered through the Lucy exhibit while the men-folk watched the parade. We took another look at The Mummy to see if it was working and it was, so we rode again. Once more, Ed’s eyes were bugging out of his head.

Done with US, we headed over to IOA because Dustin was itching to ride the Unicorn again. He rode that darn thing over and over! He had to sit in the front, he had to sit in the back, he wanted to ride alone! It was hysterical!

After waiting all that time for Dustin, Ed and I decided to ride the Dragons. We’d done Ice the first time, so we chose Fire this time around. We loved it again and decided Fire was our favorite. We spent some time trying to convince Dustin to join us, but it went upside down so it was a no-go!

We decided to leave, stopping by City Walk to buy a glow-y ball on a string for Dustin. He’d seen one the very first night we were there and was determined to have one!

Back at the hotel, we found we were hungry and Ed had an errand to run. So, out we went to find some dinner. On Christmas Eve. At about 8:30. I didn’t think much of our chances for success, but Ed? He’s optimistic.

We headed over to the TGI Friday’s we knew was close by. The guy at the podium was not particularly pleased to see us. He said we would be seated in about 15 minutes, but the restaurant was closing at 9:30. So, we’ll be seated around 9:00 and the restaurant would close at 9:30. If the waitress is slow, does that mean you won’t give us our food?

Look, we know its Christmas Eve; we know you’d like to go home early. But you work in a restaurant in a tourist town, either smile at me or close the darn restaurant, but don’t give me a freaking lecture podium guy! A few minutes after we arrived, a woman came in wanting seating for a group of 6. Podium guy gave her the same speech and she yelled at him! You go, girl!

We were seated and I ordered shrimp, the gentlemen ordered shrimp and chicken, and being decent people we really did plan to be speedy about our business. Our food arrived and mine was cold. Ice cold. I’d never in my life sent a plate back to the kitchen, but I did that night. The manager apologized and took it off our bill.

Next up, Ed’s mysterious errand! Now, if you’ve been reading from the beginning, you know that we opened Christmas presents at Thanksgiving and planned to give Dustin just a token gift on Christmas morning. That gift was the DVD of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Unfortunately, Dustin had watched that movie repeatedly while on board the ship and we were scrambling a bit for another present. Well, Ed was. I wasn’t particularly worried about it.

Ed wanted to get Dustin the Simpson’s movie and had been searching for it every place we’d been since leaving the boat. Ed had looked up the closest Wal-Mart and we set off! Ohmigoodness! Wal-Mart was CLOSED! Ooops! Luckily we’d passed a K-Mart at some point and Ed remembered where it was. K-Mart was still open, believe it or not! Ed went in while Dustin and I waited in the car. According to Ed, the store was an absolute wreck but they did have 1 Simpson’s movie left. Ed snapped it up and we were on our way back to the hotel.

 

[tlinus]

awesome trip report so far.....can't wait for more

 

[wwessing]

anxiously waiting. . .

btw - I followed your link and read the first part of your trippie. Quite frankly, despite the sadness of what you have been through, I completely enjoyed reading about YOUR enjoyment. I'm a believer in laughter being a great healer and I nearly wet myself laughing at your description of your server smacking you in the back of the head with the menu

 

[damo]

Wow. I love the details. We had a young friend die suddenly last boxing day and I know how difficult Christmas and any other milestones must be. You a one strong lady and such a good writer! Continue please!

 

[MaryKatesMom]

What a wonderful report!!

You're a very talented writer and I'm looking forward reading more!

 

[CruisinEars]

I'm still with ya too! Enjoying reading about US. I haven't been to the Florida one so I might have to try it on our next next trip. This coming trip is budgeted strictly for Disney.

 

[fairfax]

Glad to see you continuing this report over here! I love Universal just as much as Disney (if not more), so I'm really enjoying this! You are a wonderful writer.

 

[fan of the TTA]

thank you for part 2 of this report.....

 

[Our2Girls&Disney]

I am so sorry to hear about your son. Please keep writing.

 

[Metro West]

I love the report so far...keep it going!


Let's hope Dustin can get over his fear of rides pretty soon. If not, he'll be missing out on A LOT of fun in the future.

 

[Disney owl]

glad i found these looking forward to reading more

 

[lindalinda]

This is a really great report! Cant wait to hear more!

 

[lindalinda]

I just went and read the linked trip report. Everyone....read this report! Its really great. And to the OP, I think you should link it to a grief counseling site or something, its very moving.

 

[keishashadow]

so sad to hear, cannot imagine your pain, hang in there

great report & pics

 

[AlexandNessa]

I have been reading your whole report, and I am really touched by it. Despite the sadness that comes with such a loss, I find your report to be inspiring and uplifting.

BTW, I've never heard of a barking spider either, so tell Dustin he's not alone.

I am so sorry you got Tower 2 of the RPR. That is what I call the "Easter Bib" tower. It's the furthest from everything, has the worst views, and not only is it the smoking tower, but it's also the pet tower. Come back before your next visit, and we'll tell you which room and tower to request.

Can't wait to read about your un-Christmas day.

 

[JawsCPA]

Enjoying your report. I have not yet read all of part I. But I'm going back to read about your cruise.

Love the pics.

Our son was 10-11 when we visited Universal. He is afraid of heights and will not go any coasters that go upside down. Also, he said absolutely NOT to Dr. Doom. That is the beauty of Universal - we still had a blast even though we missed the big "thrill" rides.

 

[JawsCPA]

Dianna - read all of your trip report.

Ed's water camera really did take some great pics of Dustin.

Sounds like you all had a nice time (minus the stomach problems).