Sonya's Blog - Day 212 - Universal Studios Florida

Sonya’s Blog - Day 212 - January 20th - Universal Studios Florida

Ahh, the big park experience. Driving for miles to a huge parkade, paying $20 for the privilege to park close to the park (there is nowhere else to park that is even reasonable, so they kind of got you there). I checked into taking a shuttle, $20 per person/one way - wow what a great deal! The tickets are hundreds of dollars each, to stand in long lines at bag check, then to get into the park and then for each ride. Now you can pay for the express pass at Universal, another $140 per person/per day to jump to the front of the line. Disney allows you to express pass for free, but only one ride at a time and you are only allowed a maximum per day (we are not going to Disney on this trip, I am just comparing). The reason we are not going to Disney is that the kids had to decided. A ticket for one day costs almost the same amount of money as a ticket for four days, this is the same for both Universal and Disney. The kids chose Universal because of the new Harry Potter section and to see the Hogwarts Express. Little did we know that Universal decided this should be another money grab (but we should have known) and that you had to have a park hopper pass in order to experience this. Good times. The food is outrageously expensive, small in quantity and low in quality - we bring our own lunches, but we are in the minority. Here is the other thing, families have spent so much money to have a “magical” (I get that is a Disney term, but he started all this) experience they are stressed out to have a good time and their kids had better have a G.D. good time as well. As a result, kids are tired by 3, but there parents are dragging them around the park for more “experiences” and there are a lot of meltdowns - and the kids are crying too. Ahh, the magic. Well that is my rant, tell us how you really feel! I am not saying that there are not cool experiences and neat things to see. I am just saying, that overall it is exhausting and a little forced “happiness” at a hell of a price tag. My kids are exactly the right age to get the most out of these parks right now. They can do everything (except for the little kiddie stuff - and if that is all your kids can do it is kind of a waste of money coming). Most kids under 6 seem overwhelmed and over-stimulated and enjoy the puddles on the ground (like a few kids I saw) far more then the next attraction. The first time we came to Disney World Isaac was in Grade 1 and even that was a little young. We literally dragged him around to too many parks (Disney has 4 and Universal has 2) and kept him up too late to see all the shows so that we could justify spending thousands of dollars on the “vacation”. Cuba cost us a third of the price and that was a vacation, Disney World and Universal are like marathons of “fun”.

We are going to the other park today and it is simply called Universal Studios Florida. We were not as efficient this morning, mostly because we didn’t make our lunches the day before. We left a 1/2 hour later and got into the park at 9:30 AM, which was fine. We walked straight over to Diagon Alley. This is the newest section of the park so as it gets later in the day it will get busier and busier. They have done a really good job. You walk down a street that looks like London, past 12 Grimwald Place. The kids both got pictures and Kreacher is peeking out the window in Isaac's picture.

The Knight Bus is there and then some regular looking shops and the end of this section is Kings Cross Station where the Hogwarts Express comes in from the other park. There is a seemingly innocent looking brick wall along the wall of shops. This is where you enter Diagon Alley here, by going behind the brick wall and then a whole new world opens up to you. They have done a really good job and it is quite extensive. They even have a back section that is hidden away and this is Knockturn Alley and you can go in Borgins and Burkes and look at all the dark magical stuff. The kids went in lots of the shops to have a look around. The money exchange was fun, they had a talking Goblin in there and you could exchange Muggle Money for Goblin coins. We may have to do that. We just talked to the Goblin and got some pictures.

Gringotts is really well done and the dragon on top spews out fire every once in awhile. I waited for it, but it was not working properly, so I didn’t get my picture. As soon as I went to get this picture of Natasha and Isaac in Hagrid’s motorcycle the dragon went off - Ugggh!! I missed it. There is a ride in Gringotts called Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts, but it was down at the moment. We walked around for a bit hoping it would open up, but then left to go and explore other parts. I got the Universal App on my phone and told it to alert me when the ride opened up.

We went and did the Men in Black ride next. You walk through the whole facility, like they are testing you out for becoming one of the Men in Black. At the end you get in a car and they take you through the streets of wherever the movie is supposed to be filmed and you get points for shooting the aliens. I have always beat Blake at this game, but got my ass kicked this time. Blake remembered to push the red button at the end and I forgot - that’s how you get all the good points. Grrr!

We decided we should have lunch as we were getting hungry. I ran back and got the lunch while Blake and the kids went on the Simpson’s Ride. It is a simulation ride that I got suckered into riding the last time we were here. I had my eyes closed the whole time and I still felt sick, yuck. I found a nice bench beside the lake for us to have our lunch and Blake and the kids joined me when they were done. We had BLT’s for lunch, except for me I had a BLT salad instead. While we were sitting there one of the park employees, Phillip, started chatting with us, he was on clean-up duty. He had a long conversation with us about what the parks plans are for the future and what is currently being built. There is a large demolition going on right now where the Natural Disasters ride used to be. In that area will be a Jimmy Fallon Running Through New York ride and a Fast and Furious Ride. In Islands of Adventures they are building King Kong Skull Island. The Incredible Hulk roller coaster will also be back online sometime this year, it is currently all apart and being refurbished. We then talked about the new Star Wars movie for a bit and then he guessed our ages and wanted us to guess his (he was a little special needs, super sweet though). I guessed him to be my age, 45 and I was right. He then wanted to know when I was born and it turns out we have the same birthday, including year (he showed me his ID so I didn’t think he was fooling around). What are the chances. He was totally blown away by this. It was pretty funny.

I checked my phone to see if the Gringotts ride had opened up after we were done chatting and it had, I didn’t get my notification though - stinkers. Anyhow, there was only a 15 minute wait so Blake and the kids ran over there while I went and put all our stuff back in our locker. I then walked over to Diagon Alley and proceeded to try and get the picture of the dragon spewing fire again. Well, I was wasting my time because the dragon still wasn’t working. I was so frustrated.

Blake and I decided to head back and take care of Kizmet. There is a 7 PM show tonight around the lake called 100 years of Moviemaking. We saw it last time we were here, but it is pretty good so we wanted to see it again. We also found out that we only have to pay for parking once and then we can get re-entry all day until 2 AM. The kids wanted to stay in the park and goof around. Isaac had bought a wand that allows him to do spells in both parks in the Harry Potter sections, so he wanted to head back to Diagon Alley and perform all of those. Natasha wanted to look in more shops and then they were going to check out some ride. We left Natasha one of the phones and took off.

It took us 22 minutes to get back to the RV, so that was pretty good. We had to take care of Kizmet and give her lots of walks and love. We also wanted to unpack the lunch stuff and re-pack the cooler with supper. I wanted to have a cup of tea and relax a bit in the sunshine - it was much warmer today with a high of 19.

We got everything done (well mostly Blake, I took care of Kizmet and relaxed) and headed back to the park for 5:30. We arrived a little later than we anticipated because they changed the spot where you enter the parking lot and we missed it. We ended up circling around on International Drive, but it took awhile to get back. We went back to the bench that we had lunch at and the kids met us there after they were done on the Transfomers Ride. It was after 6 by this time and the show starts at 7. We all had supper and then just hung out until the show started because we had a great bench with a view of where the show would be taking place.

The show started at 7 exactly and they shoot water up in the air to make it a screen and then flash scenes of all their famous movies over the past 100 years onto it and it is narrated by Morgan Freeman. Every once in a while fireworks go off in the distance. The show goes on for about 1/2 hour and it was really good. We sat on the top of our bench and enjoyed the view. We didn’t have the best location for seeing the fireworks, but that was okay.

The park closes at 7 so we just headed out once the show was over, along with thousands of other people. Luckily we had a much better parking spot on our re-entry and got out of the parkade pretty quickly as hardly anyone was on our level. Avoiding traffic is a main goal of mine. I also like to avoid large crowds, but that is not working out at this park.

We got back to the RV and gave Kizmet a good walk while the kids got ready for bed. We then all crashed for the night as we were all exhausted.

Sonya