Third Time's The Charm! Solo Universal PTR AND TR! COMPLETE!!!

[Shock13]

Hello Everyone! My name is Veronica and I've decided to do a PTR (and TR) for my upcoming USO/IOA trip that will be happening in less than 4 weeks! I don't post often but a big time lurker and I hope I get some followers. I love reading and writing trip reports. I currently have a travel blog but that is usually directed to family only and so I thought I would do one here because the Universal forum peeps are just awesome!

This is me...the one on the left.

Okay, so the picture was taken at Universal Studios but the one in Hollywood. I went in May 2013 and did the VIP tour there which is incredible by the way. I highly recommend it if you ever make it over to the west side.

Some quick things about me...I live in sunny Arizona. It's totally beautiful here. It's hot and sometimes the politics are a bit backwards but I love it here. It's also only a 6 hour drive (or 45 minute flight) to some of my favorite theme parks. I also love theme parks but I'll be honest, Six Flags is not on the list. I grew up going to Disneyland and then onto Universal Studios. I do frequent Knott's Berry (Scary) Farm during Halloween season as well. I didn't visit WDW until I was an adult and of course loved it and then finally to Universal Orlando. I'll explain more about my experience with USO/IOA in a bit.

For work, I am one of these people...

Seriously, my official job title is PBX Operator. This is what I'm sure some people are thinking of when I tell them what I do for a living. I answer phones. I work at a local community college and been doing it for 8 years. I spent (wasted) many years in the hospitality/travel industry and never got a holiday off and then I finally got smart. Now, not only do I get holidays off (and some days off for spring/winter break) but it's so much nicer working for a place that focuses on education rather than making more money for The Man.

No husband or children to speak of (I do have an awesome family though) but I do claim parental rights to this guy...

His name is Charlie, rescue dog extraordinaire. Just to be clear I got him from a rescue shelter. He does not do any kind of rescuing dogs or otherwise. In fact he would probably run the other way if there was an intense situation going on. Although it became quite clear after I adopted him and took him to the dog park that he likes getting into everyone's business. If two dogs are having a disagreement, he runs right over to see what it's all about. But despite some trust issues, he's very loving and all mine.

Next up: Trip details and my past experiences with USO!

 

[Shock13]

Explanation of title of this PTR/TR!
My experience with USO/IOA is quite limited. I have visited the theme parks twice before. My first visit occurred over 14 years ago and I went with my older sister and her 2 year old son. The trip was decided last minute while we visited a friend of hers living in Orlando at the time. I do not have that great of a memory but this is what I do remember...

Rain...
Pushing my nephew around in a Jurassic Park Stroller...
Back to the Future Ride...
Getting sick from the Back to the Future Ride...
Downpour...
Barney...
More rain...

Not very memorable to say the least.
Now fast-forward 12 years...same nephew but with now my mom instead of sister. Two years before, my mom and I visited WDW for the first time and loved the parks and I was anxious to bring my nephew along. We spent 7 full days at WDW and then decided to do a day trip to USO to experience the WWoHP at our very last full day. This was a huge mistake. We had gone commando all week so we were exhausted with sore feet. Also it was incredibly hot. It was April which is usually a good time for Florida but for some reason the temps soared to the 90's. And of course, I will gripe about the humidity because as a native-born Arizonan it's in my DNA to do so. We were miserable.
The day trip also didn't start well as we booked transportation through Mears as we were staying at the Swan. Mears never showed up. The good people at Swan called Mears for us and the company sent over a towncar but still...not happy. We managed to get to IOA before the general public were allowed in and soon we were on our way to ride Forbidden Journey. I admit that we had a great time in this part of the park. FJ blew my mind, it was so incredible and the castle just amazing. We did the usual of eating an early lunch at Three Broomsticks, drinking a butterbeer and nephew bought a wand and t-shirt and lots of chocolate frogs to bring home to friends. But once we left that wonderful area, everything seemed to go downhill. The weather became unbearable, lines were long and we just couldn't seem to get the lockers to work for us.
I purchased the Express Passes for us over at USO (yes we tried to do EVERYTHING in one day) and although this helped some, we still couldn't muster the energy to keep a good attitude. I found myself just wanting to sit in the shade rather than ride MIB (which I did, sit not ride). Of course the Harry Potter part was incredible but I felt the rest of the day could have been so much better with proper planning.

So this will be my 3rd time at Universal and it will be great! Right?

 

[Tink2Day]

Sounds like fun...I'm in.

Even though you are from AZ. I'm joining.

 

[rnorwo1]

I'm in! We went to DL last Mardi Gras, for the first time, and we loved it, also! S much better than WDW!
We didn't think Universal was so great as a side trip from WDW, but a few years ago we did just universal and we fell in love! We are going again over Mardi Gras in Feb, and we are so excited! So, yes, I think this will be the charmed trip for you! Can't wait to hear about it!

 

[Shock13]

Sounds like fun...I'm in.

Even though you are from AZ. I'm joining.

Woo Hoo! My first follower!
And thank you Tink for not holding it against me for being from Arizona!

 

[Shock13]

I'm in! We went to DL last Mardi Gras, for the first time, and we loved it, also! S much better than WDW!
We didn't think Universal was so great as a side trip from WDW, but a few years ago we did just universal and we fell in love! We are going again over Mardi Gras in Feb, and we are so excited! So, yes, I think this will be the charmed trip for you! Can't wait to hear about it!

Isn't DLR great? I do love it more than WDW but I think that's because I grew up going to Disneyland and that I won't get lost like I did at Magic Kingdom.
No WDW for me. This time it's all about Diagon Alley!

Thanks for following!

 

[ArwenMarie]

Following!

Cute dog. I love that joke, he's doesn't rescue dogs even though we call him a rescue dog. I'm going to have to remember that one.

 

[Shock13]

Following!

Cute dog. I love that joke, he's doesn't rescue dogs even though we call him a rescue dog. I'm going to have to remember that one.

Thank you ArwenMarie! I just read your trip report the other day and loved it. I'm also a bit of a ride chicken. I think that is why I like Disney so much because the rides are all relatively tame. The most intense coaster I've been on is the RnRC @ DHS so I'm going to muster up some courage and try Hulk on this upcoming trip.

 

[Shock13]

Trip Decisions
How I decided to finally make the decision to visit USO was no easy task. My sister says I'm a very fickle vacation planner and she is completely right. I change my mind constantly about where and when I want to go and so therefore I try to book only refundable hotel rooms and fly on Southwest as I don't lose any money if I have to change flights. But let me go back to earlier this year...
It was then I decided to try solo traveling. Most of my friends are married and have kids and therefore their time and money is revolved around their family (which is totally understandable) and the few single friends I have are more interested in going to Las Vegas over a long weekend. That's definitely not my scene. I traveled a few times with my mom but she now wants to save her money so she can go visit the grandchildren (none live near us) so I decided to do a solo trip to Disneyland in March.
I spent 4 days at DLR and stayed at the Disneyland Hotel (first time stay) and had a great time. This is the only picture I have with me in it...

I was anxious to do another solo trip. Of course during this time more news and updates were going on about Diagon Alley and I REALLY wanted to go. But the one thing that kept me from making any plans is that I would feel guilty for going without my nephew so I made plans to visit WDW in October to see the Halloween decorations and partake of the Food and Wine Festival at Epcot. But once again my plans were disrupted when my parents decided to visit my sister and her family during the month of October (they are retired so they think they can do whatever they want) and therefore that would leave me with finding someone to watch Charlie for a week. I just wasn't comfortable with that idea so I cancelled WDW.
Then after talking to nephew about Diagon Alley and telling him I wanted to go he told me I should just go without him and thanked me for taking him on past trips to the theme parks! He is the sweetest kid ever and made me feel so much better so I planned a trip to USO in December mostly because of low crowds and nice weather. But of course plans changed again when sister decided to visit us before Christmas and I wanted to take days off to spend time with her and the kids. I couldn't possibly take all that time off so close together so then moved my trip forward to November.
This final decision (hopefully) just came about last week. I haven't even told anyone about it yet. Don't want them to get super jealous that I'm going to see the awesomeness of Diagon Alley.

 

[Shock13]

Trip Details
Dates: November 10th-15th.
Who flies in on a Monday? Me. One of my dear friends is getting married in Anaheim on the 8th and because of the holiday that following week, I figured it would be nice to save an additional 8 hours of my vacation time. Sunday will be spent hanging out with my sister who lives near San Diego.

Hotel: Cabana Bay and Royal Pacific Resort.
I originally planned to stay all 5 nights at CB but to be honest, I love hotels. This is the main reason why I chose a career in the travel industry in the first place (when I was stupid). Resorts, motor inns, creepy old hotels that everyone claims is haunted...they're all awesome. So even though I'm going to be dealing with a switch in the middle of the week, I am excited to experience both resorts.

Airlines: US Airways and Southwest.
Okay so not really sure you want to know all about this too but I'm putting it here anyways. My usual go-to airlines is SW. I have their credit card and everything but for those that frequently use SW can agree that their increased fares and decreased non-stop flight schedules are really irritating. It is virtually impossible to find a decent sale fare from PHX-MCO. Even though I would be flying out of San Diego this time, the fares were still high. So I checked out my back-up USAirways which I only book if there is absolutely no chance I'm cancelling the trip. They had a great fare from SAN-MCO (with a short layover in PHX) for $150. Not bad. I then booked my SW flight from MCO-PHX (nonstop) with unused travel funds. So considering airfare was booked 5 weeks before travel time, it totally worked out.

Tickets:
No big surprise here...I'll be purchasing the AP Power Pass.

Transportation: Taxi or shuttle to get to/from Universal. No rental car for me.

Restaurants:
So far the only restaurants I for certain want to go to are Mythos and Margaritaville. I've never been to either one. I'm more prone to eating at a sit-down place than counter service but I understand that may be difficult to do during lunch time at the parks. Any other recommendations would be great.

Itinerary: (Loosely based)
Monday: Late afternoon arrival around 4:30
Tuesday: USO (Diagon Alley!)
Wednesday: IOA
Thursday: USO (Diagon Alley again!) and switching from CB to RPR
Friday: IOA and USO (More Diagon Alley!)
Saturday: OPEN until about 2:00 when I have to leave to the airport for my evening flight.

Wow, it looks pretty good when I have it all written out like that!

 

[ArwenMarie]

Split stay sounds fun! Which one will you be staying at first?

 

[rnorwo1]

It does sound great! How will you transfer hotels, are they walkable or will you get a cab? I had wanted to spend one night at CB for the pool, but thought it would be too big of a pain.

 

[schumigirl]

Nice report so far

We love both Mythos and Margaritaville.......never had a bad meal in either.

Look forward to reading more

 

[aacvacation]

Subscribed! I haven't been to Universal in a few years when my family used to go every year... Reading your PTR is exciting, I can't wait to go back! I'm confident you are going to have a really great time. Cabana Bay looks fantastic, though I've never been there. Everyone seems to love it though! We stayed at Royal Pacific every year (our 'home resort' as dis likes to call it!) and it's fantastic! The short walk (or boat ride) is like a dream. Enjoy!!!!! I'm so excited for you!

 

[Shock13]

Split stay sounds fun! Which one will you be staying at first?

I will be staying at CB for 3 nights and then the last 2 at RPR. I originally wanted to do 2 CB/3 RPR but there was no availability for Wednesday night at RPR with an AP rate. I'm looking forward to the Mad Men-esque of CB.

It does sound great! How will you transfer hotels, are they walkable or will you get a cab? I had wanted to spend one night at CB for the pool, but thought it would be too big of a pain.

I asked this same question on the forum and was told to just cab it. With the hotels being so close together I'm sure it will be a pretty low fare.

Nice report so far

We love both Mythos and Margaritaville.......never had a bad meal in either.

Look forward to reading more

Schumi! I love your TR's! I'm glad to hear you liked the restaurants. Let me know if there are any others I should try.

Subscribed! I haven't been to Universal in a few years when my family used to go every year... Reading your PTR is exciting, I can't wait to go back! I'm confident you are going to have a really great time. Cabana Bay looks fantastic, though I've never been there. Everyone seems to love it though! We stayed at Royal Pacific every year (our 'home resort' as dis likes to call it!) and it's fantastic! The short walk (or boat ride) is like a dream. Enjoy!!!!! I'm so excited for you!

Thank you for following aac! I've heard nothing but awesome things about all of the Universal resorts so looking forward to staying in 2 of them! I don't know when I'll be back to Universal but since I'll be getting an AP then I'm definitely going to try and make another go of it before it expires and hopefully try out HRH and PB too.

 

[Shock13]

Randomness (Only Slightly Universal Related)
So last night a group of us (family members mostly as we are disgustingly close ) decided to visit a local haunted maze. We usually do Knott's Scary Farm but this year 2 of my cousins recently had babies and of course couldn't travel. Our expectations were pretty low especially since we got a really cheap price through groupon but surprisingly we had a great time! There were 3 mazes, called The Crypt, The Asylum and Chaos. The Crypt as you can imagine was full of the classic scares but the Asylum was really creepy and the scare actors were great. As we were going through the maze they kept asking us if we were there to see the doctor. And of course the doctor is the guy at the end wearing scrubs and brandishing a chainsaw.
We then decided to definitely do HHN at USH next year since none of us have been before. I read a few TR's about HHN at USO and looked online to actually compare the 2 parks since I'm a fan of the movie Halloween and we all love The Walking Dead. Sure enough USH has some of the same mazes! But no Halloween. I know that the mazes may change for next year but if they are popular they'll stick around right? Either way it will be something to look forward to for next year.

Anyone else love Halloween (the holiday) as much as I do? I normally host a party every year (I even did a Harry Potter themed one) but it will be a no-go this year since the parentals will be out and my mom is the one that cooks all the food. This Halloween it will probably be pizza for dinner and curling up with Charlie in front of the TV to watch past episodes of Ghost Hunters.

 

[aacvacation]

Anyone else love Halloween (the holiday) as much as I do? I normally host a party every year (I even did a Harry Potter themed one) but it will be a no-go this year since the parentals will be out and my mom is the one that cooks all the food. This Halloween it will probably be pizza for dinner and curling up with Charlie in front of the TV to watch past episodes of Ghost Hunters.

It's my favorite holiday!! I'm not big on being scared so haunted houses and scary movies aren't really my thing but I love the silly movies, the decorations, the treats, and of course, costumes! Even if it's a cuddly pizza night, it's still better than the rest! I hope you do get to experience the Horror Nights at Universal! Put that pass to good use!

 

[Shock13]

It's my favorite holiday!! I'm not big on being scared so haunted houses and scary movies aren't really my thing but I love the silly movies, the decorations, the treats, and of course, costumes! Even if it's a cuddly pizza night, it's still better than the rest! I hope you do get to experience the Horror Nights at Universal! Put that pass to good use!

I do like getting scared. It's all fun and the friends I go with are the ones that run and cower and it is possible to scream and laugh at the same time! I love a good scary movie but not really big into gore (The Walking Dead excluded) so my favorites are Halloween and The Haunting (the 1969 version not the terrible 1999 remake) and of course a good Alfred Hitchcock flick can set the mood.

 

[Shock13]

Minor Update
So finally told the family that I will be taking an awesome trip to Universal Orlando and they pretty much shrugged their shoulders and said 'okay'. I really wasn't expecting anything different of course since I change my plans so often they can't keep track.
My sister recently introduced the Harry Potter movies to her kids who are 4, 5 and 7. Actually it was only one movie, HP and the Sorcerer's Stone. She isn't the sheltering kind but when the kids were getting freaked while watching Scooby Doo well then she decided to hold off a little while. Now the kids absolutely love Harry Potter. When I told my sister about my upcoming trip she kindly reminded me that Christmas was coming up. I asked her what she thought the kids would like and she immediately blurted out "wands!". I asked her "they do realize the wands don't do anything right?". She assured me they do. That will actually be fun for me since I never got a chance to visit Ollivander's during my last trip. She also mentioned chocolate frogs. I'm sure there will be lots of other stuff to buy. Any other suggestions on merchandise let me know!
Only 18 more days!

 

[lazer]

Minor Update So finally told the family that I will be taking an awesome trip to Universal Orlando and they pretty much shrugged their shoulders and said 'okay'. I really wasn't expecting anything different of course since I change my plans so often they can't keep track. My sister recently introduced the Harry Potter movies to her kids who are 4, 5 and 7. Actually it was only one movie, HP and the Sorcerer's Stone. She isn't the sheltering kind but when the kids were getting freaked while watching Scooby Doo well then she decided to hold off a little while. Now the kids absolutely love Harry Potter. When I told my sister about my upcoming trip she kindly reminded me that Christmas was coming up. I asked her what she thought the kids would like and she immediately blurted out "wands!". I asked her "they do realize the wands don't do anything right?". She assured me they do. That will actually be fun for me since I never got a chance to visit Ollivander's during my last trip. She also mentioned chocolate frogs. I'm sure there will be lots of other stuff to buy. Any other suggestions on merchandise let me know! Only 18 more days!

Be sure to get some insight into which wands you think they'd like. They have so many characters. We also got a chocolate frog and a jar of lemon drops with the honey dukes logo. Oh, and we got some Gringotts money too. Can be used around HP areas, but we're framing it as a souvenir. May not be that exciting to them if they've only seen the first movie though There is a great variety of souvenirs, so have fun shopping!