Canadian Girl 77
Hoping for some pixie dust
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2007
- Messages
- 372
We were supposed to be in Orlando December 11-17, 2016. The weather back home had other plans and we ended up staying a couple of extra days. This is our story...
The players - Me (39), DH (39) and DD (12). We love Disney and Universal.
The Beginning
In October, I received an email offer from Universal Orlando. We had been selected to receive a special pin code which would get us low hotel rates. DH and I talked about it, and decided to tentatively book a December trip. It worked with our schedules, so we figured – let’s do it! And so we did. And then we called it a Birthday/Christmas present to our little family.
Day Zero
We drove to Buffalo on Saturday, December 10 to spend the night at the Quality Inn Buffalo Niagara Airport. On our way we stopped and enjoyed some steak at the Longhorn Steakhouse for late lunch. It was delicious. We did a little shopping before making it to the hotel. DH had a headache so DD and I ran off to Target to give him some space to recoup. We came back a little later with drinks from Sonic and a plan to get McDonald’s for dinner. The hotel and McDonald’s share a parking lot so Hailey and I walked over to pick up a couple of things – specifically hash browns. Gotta love all day breakfast in the U.S.A.
The hotel was pretty awful. The walls were paper thin, the pillows were half sized and the Wi-Fi didn’t work at all in our room. But, they had colour television. I fell asleep well before 10 and DH and DD watched a couple of movies – Office Space and Meet the Millers. Not sure they were really age appropriate but…
Day One – Dec 11 (S)
We were up bright and early and ready to catch the shuttle to the airport.
Alas, it seems that this hotel runs the shuttles on a set schedule (that they hadn’t mentioned at check-in) and we had just missed our shuttle. We’d have to wait 30-minutes for the next one which would put us at risk of being late for our flight. We ended up dragging our luggage to the airport. It was only a 6-minute walk but it was snowing, dark and the cross walk buttons weren’t working. We made it though and pledged to never stay at that hotel again – ever.
Our Southwest flight was uneventful. We were greeted at the airport by our limo driver – complete with Donald Duck impressions. We stopped at a grocery store on our way to the hotel to get provisions (Gatorade and snacks). While we drove to Hard Rock we were amazed to see all the progress to Universal’s new theme park (recently announced and scheduled to open in 2017), Volcano Bay.
We completed check in and got our room assignment right away. As usual our room was lovely. We liked that it was on the second floor. We didn’t have to take the elevator but nobody could peek in our windows.
After a short break to organize ourselves, we headed to the parks. We started at Universal Studios. It’s hard to remember what rides we did on our first day. The front of the line pass makes it so quick and effortless. We also repeated lots of rides over the trip.
We had lunch in Springfield – chicken and waffles. I’m pretty sure we rode Men in Black and the Simpson’s. We also went on Gringott’s (we’ve been on it before but had forgotten most of the actual ride) and took the train to Hogwart’s in Islands of Adventures. A few other rides were completed including Flight of the Hippogriff, Jurassic Park and King Kong. DH and DD also rode Hulk.
We had dinner at Toothsome. We spent to 40-minutes waiting for our table checking out the store. So many treats! We loved the general décor of the restaurant. The food was also great. The only problem was that they were out of milk! That meant no milk for DD and no milkshake for me. I ended up having an alcoholic libation (as did DH) and they hit us pretty hard. Part way through dinner they got milk so DD ended up with her glass of cold milk. I got to try the Key Lime Milkshake. It wasn’t that great. Naturally we wandered around City Walk.
The players - Me (39), DH (39) and DD (12). We love Disney and Universal.
The Beginning
In October, I received an email offer from Universal Orlando. We had been selected to receive a special pin code which would get us low hotel rates. DH and I talked about it, and decided to tentatively book a December trip. It worked with our schedules, so we figured – let’s do it! And so we did. And then we called it a Birthday/Christmas present to our little family.
Day Zero
We drove to Buffalo on Saturday, December 10 to spend the night at the Quality Inn Buffalo Niagara Airport. On our way we stopped and enjoyed some steak at the Longhorn Steakhouse for late lunch. It was delicious. We did a little shopping before making it to the hotel. DH had a headache so DD and I ran off to Target to give him some space to recoup. We came back a little later with drinks from Sonic and a plan to get McDonald’s for dinner. The hotel and McDonald’s share a parking lot so Hailey and I walked over to pick up a couple of things – specifically hash browns. Gotta love all day breakfast in the U.S.A.
The hotel was pretty awful. The walls were paper thin, the pillows were half sized and the Wi-Fi didn’t work at all in our room. But, they had colour television. I fell asleep well before 10 and DH and DD watched a couple of movies – Office Space and Meet the Millers. Not sure they were really age appropriate but…
Day One – Dec 11 (S)
We were up bright and early and ready to catch the shuttle to the airport.
Alas, it seems that this hotel runs the shuttles on a set schedule (that they hadn’t mentioned at check-in) and we had just missed our shuttle. We’d have to wait 30-minutes for the next one which would put us at risk of being late for our flight. We ended up dragging our luggage to the airport. It was only a 6-minute walk but it was snowing, dark and the cross walk buttons weren’t working. We made it though and pledged to never stay at that hotel again – ever.
Our Southwest flight was uneventful. We were greeted at the airport by our limo driver – complete with Donald Duck impressions. We stopped at a grocery store on our way to the hotel to get provisions (Gatorade and snacks). While we drove to Hard Rock we were amazed to see all the progress to Universal’s new theme park (recently announced and scheduled to open in 2017), Volcano Bay.
We completed check in and got our room assignment right away. As usual our room was lovely. We liked that it was on the second floor. We didn’t have to take the elevator but nobody could peek in our windows.
After a short break to organize ourselves, we headed to the parks. We started at Universal Studios. It’s hard to remember what rides we did on our first day. The front of the line pass makes it so quick and effortless. We also repeated lots of rides over the trip.
We had lunch in Springfield – chicken and waffles. I’m pretty sure we rode Men in Black and the Simpson’s. We also went on Gringott’s (we’ve been on it before but had forgotten most of the actual ride) and took the train to Hogwart’s in Islands of Adventures. A few other rides were completed including Flight of the Hippogriff, Jurassic Park and King Kong. DH and DD also rode Hulk.
We had dinner at Toothsome. We spent to 40-minutes waiting for our table checking out the store. So many treats! We loved the general décor of the restaurant. The food was also great. The only problem was that they were out of milk! That meant no milk for DD and no milkshake for me. I ended up having an alcoholic libation (as did DH) and they hit us pretty hard. Part way through dinner they got milk so DD ended up with her glass of cold milk. I got to try the Key Lime Milkshake. It wasn’t that great. Naturally we wandered around City Walk.
