This year, over part of the kids’ Thanksgiving break, we headed out to Orlando to visit Universal Orlando Resort. While there are three parks that make up this place currently, we visited only Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. We figured Volcano Bay, being a water park, was best left for another time.
We often go to these beautiful places and are so busy, busy, busy that we never leave ourselves time to relax. Well, this time, we chose to arrive as early as possible on a Sunday so we could enjoy the hotel, the hotel pool, and the surrounding area a bit without the pressure of an amusement park schedule. Monday, Tuesday, and most of Wednesday left plenty of time for that craziness.
Day 1 – Arrival
To find the happy balance between maximizing our time and controlling costs, we wound up taking a 6:00 a.m. flight (direct!) to Orlando. Four tired Woodses managed to get to the airport by 4:25 or so, thinking we were being silly since most people must have left for the holiday week already on Saturday. Boy were we wrong. After waiting in a bit of a line to drop our checked bags off, we struggled to figure out where in the mass of people we needed to wait to line up for security. I may not have this quite right, but I believe that to line up for security at checkpoint one, we were backed up all the way to checkpoint two and actually began our wait in line outdoors. I was on pins and needles.
Before we left the house, Ian and I had both had a little something to eat. Sean and Maya elected to have something at the airport. With the line we were in, we’d be lucky to make our flight, never mind waiting in line again to buy food. I had extra snacks along in case we needed a holdover during our park days, but I had helpfully stowed those in our checked bags. Meanwhile, while standing in this massive line amidst throngs of humans whose demeanors ranged between half-asleep and borderline manic in the face of potential missed flights, Ian announced that he needed to pee.
Then we finally, finally made it through the gauntlet of seemingly infinite switchbacks and security personnel, some of whom hadn’t had their coffee yet, I think. And they held my bags for extra screening. And they sat and they sat with no one bothering to check them. Sean took the kids to find a bathroom and food and I stayed to deal with the situation. Eventually they just re-ran my bags through the regular line again, and I was finally free.
Sean had magically gotten Ian a bathroom visit and he and Maya some food and we skated into our boarding area more or less exactly when our group was boarding. It was amazing. I was so relieved.
The rest of the flight seemed to go without incident. The kids messed with their screens, Sean dozed, I drank some much-needed coffee and read. Upon arrival in Orlando, we collected our luggage and found our shuttle bus to the hotel easily enough.
We rolled up to the Loews Royal Pacific Resort, collected our bags, and went to check in. The place was beautiful! Maya commented that it might be a bit too fancy for us, and she’s probably not wrong, but I never found it to be stuffy or pretentious during our stay. The decor was fun – we crossed a bridge lined with wooden frogs playing various instruments to enter the hotel, and the courtyard featured stone elephants, one of whom fountained water from his trunk – and the staff were all pleasant to work with.
One of the big reasons we chose such a nice hotel (“Universal Premier” is the category, apparently) is that it included Universal’s unlimited express passes for all room occupants. These passes are insanely priced (Sean’s remembering something like $120 per person, per day), and we paid less for our room than we would have for those passes, so that’s what we did. The added bonus is that we also got to enjoy a beautiful properly, nice proximity to the parks, and a generally stress-free stay.
We arrived too early to actually check in, but they took care of all the paperwork and key distribution and whatnot so that we’d just have to go to our room once they texted us to let us know it was available. Also, they had a luggage storage service so we could leave the bags and start enjoying our day right away.
All of us were dragging a little by then, but we needed to have some lunch. Universal’s analog to Disney Springs is called Universal CityWalk. It’s sort of a shopping and dining area adjacent to the actual parks. You don’t need park admission to go to CityWalk, but you do have to pass through a metal detector and allow your bags to be x-rayed.
Our objective was a place called The Toothsome Chocolate Emporium. When Sean first told me about it, I was nonplussed, but he assured me they had savory dishes too. He actually made this reservation earlier in the day, right after our airplane touched down in Orlando. Good thing, too. That place was jumping by the time we got there.
Because he had made the reservation though, it wasn’t long at all before we were ensconced in the dark, steampunk recesses of the restaurant. We uncharacteristically had the kids sit to the outside of our booth in hopes that when the proprietor Penelope and her robot friend Jacques came by our table, the kids would have a chance to interact directly. Alas, we only ever saw them from a distance.
The food here was good. We had a fantastic tray of roasted Brussels sprouts and some avocado bruschetta (Maya’s choice). Ian took advantage of the fact that they serve brunch all day and had a giant chocolate waffle. The rest of us had savory meals and the grownups had very delicious cocktails that we hope to replicate at home. On the way out, we secured some pretty truffles from the shop at the front of the restaurant and wandered our way back out into the daylight.
All of us needed a rest after our early start, so we headed back to the hotel and had a siesta. Well, the parents had a siesta. Their foolish children had more screen time. At least they were still.
After that, Sean, Maya, and Ian suited up to play in the giant hotel pool area for a while. I went down and hung out on a lounge chair and poked around at some of the things we might do and see over the next few days and tried to get my bearings a little. The weather was perfect, so I was very comfortable on my chair, and the pool water was warm, so the kids – even Ian – enjoyed playing.
After playtime at the pool puttered out, we wandered back in, pausing to have a swimsuited photo with one of the hotel’s lovely Christmas trees. We went back into CityWalk to do a little browsing and to find some dinner. Our target for dinner had been a place called the Cowfish Sushi Burger Bar, but it was pretty much fully booked, so Sean set a reservation for Cowfish for the following night instead.
We tried out the water taxi on the way back to the hotel – less time-efficient but more fun, and at least this evening, we weren’t in any hurry. Back at the hotel, we had a perfectly respectable dinner at one of the hotel restaurants – Jake’s American Bar. Maya’s chicken and waffles came with what I thought was a really lovely pile of cooked greens, so when our server came by, I commented on them. Maya shrugged and that she preferred cucumbers. Lo and behold a couple minutes later, that woman came back with a treat for each of the kids and some surprise cucumbers for Maya. She sat there and happily ate every one, pronouncing them much better than the ones we get at home.
Day 2 – Islands of Adventure
Sean didn’t have to plan nearly as tightly for our Universal days as he traditionally has done for our Disney days. Thanks to staying at a Universal hotel, we were able to enter Islands of Adventure at 8:00 in the morning instead of 9. Thanks to a long, lingering shower by a certain daughter of ours, we didn’t get in line till around 7:30, and that line was immense.
Our plan was to start our day by queuing up for Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure. This is the only attraction we cared about going to for which we could not use our express passes. Sean had read (and we observed) that this ride starts out with a long wait and stays that way … unless it happens to be delayed for one reason or another, and then it gets even worse.
Sure enough, it seemed that everyone else had that same idea, and so our wait time ballooned to something like 110 minutes by the time we arrived. My notes say that it was ultimately more like an 80 minute wait, and I think everyone in our group would agree, it was totally and completely worth it.
I had the benefit of having done no research and having very few expectations. There are two to a “row” in the ride train, one person on a motorbike and one person in its sidecar. The kids both had first-ride jitters and decided to sit in the sidecars. Hooray for the grown-ups! On its surface, it’s just a roller coaster, but it was deeply themed and had such a fun variety of elements. The ride has several fun launches, including one particularly intense one fueled by “dragon fire.” I hate to ruin the surprise, but there’s a startling drop element partway through. At one point you head to some dead-end track and wind up riding the coaster backward for a while. Plus there are magical creatures galore. Heck, even the ride queue was fun with all its deep theming. It is saying something that over our three-day visit, we rode this coaster three times at the kids’ repeated request, and the line was nearly as long each time.
Sean had purchased some kind of vacation package that allowed us a breakfast at each of the parks at the signature Wizarding World restaurant. That means we had already paid for our breakfast at the Three Broomsticks that morning. They served breakfast until 9:30, and even with our long wait at what I kept calling the Hagrid’s Motorbike ride, we were still in our line by around 9. This was after we had wandered around for several minutes uncertain of exactly where it was in all the throngs of people. Finally Maya calmly pointed out that it was that restaurant right there … the one with the (wait for it) three broomsticks. We were astonished to find that it had its own rather lengthy queue and we were sweating that we’d miss our already-paid-for meal, but when it came down to time, they made sure that anyone who had a voucher got in to fetch their food.
The decor inside Three Broomsticks is rich and immersive, much like the surrounding Hogsmeade Village. The food was likewise solid. And let me tell you, when you order coffee with breakfast, that sucker is huge and already in a to-go cup. It’s like they know what’s required.
After breakfast, Maya and Dad decided to partake of some Butterbeers. Ian was on the fence about whether to have one, but after trying some of Dad’s decided that he definitely would like to have one later. I passed. For one, I was still working on my much-needed coffee and for another, those butterbeers were very sweet to my tastebuds. A sip or two was pleasant enough, but I knew I wouldn’t make it through the whole thing.
Since we were in the area, we lined up for the Flight of the Hippogriff. This was a relatively little roller coaster. The wait was short and it was pleasant enough, but nothing super thrilling. Seeing the Hippogriff was kinda fun.
We next went to the other big deal ride in the Hogsmeade Village part of the park: Harry Potter and the Hidden Journey (or if you’re me, you insist on calling it “the Hogwarts Castle ride”). This ride is amazing to experience. Your ride vehicle is basically attached to an arm that zips you through various screens and animatronics. And, when you’re experiencing the screens, there are portions of the ride during which they’re actually moving with you. It’s insane and difficult to explain, but this youtube video does an excellent job. As I understand it, this ride has experienced its fair share of breakdowns over its lifetime, but given the ride complexity, it’s not hard to see how it might be a hair fault-prone.
As is typical of our vacations, we had told the kids that we would purchase one souvenir for them. Anything they wanted beyond that, they’d need to use their own money to buy. After some shopping the day previous and some careful examination of the shops in Islands of Adventure. they settled on the most adorable little backpacks. In Harry Potter lore, a niffler is a creature whose favorite thing in the world is to collect shiny treasure in their pouches. Maya and Ian’s backpacks look like fuzzy black nifflers holding coin purses. We even pointed out that if we purchased these, we wouldn’t be buying any fun interactive wands, and the kids both still wanted their backpacks. And to their credit, they happily carried them around the rest of the day.
After a goodly dose of Harry Potter immersion, we made our way to the Jurassic Park portion of Islands of Adventure. The theme music from the movies greets you as you enter the terrifying tropical wonderland. We hardly paused though on our way to what promised to be the most thrilling ride of the our Universal trip, Velocicoaster.
The story is that you’re about to ride a state-of-the-art, “perfectly safe” vehicle through a paddock full of velociraptors. The ride creators do an excellent job of building tension as you wander through the ride queue. At one point you pass animatronic raptors who are entrapped in muzzles and look for all the world like they’re working their way through the mechanics of escape, occasionally rattling their muzzles, pupils expanding and contracting as they take in their surroundings.
Ian was clearly getting pretty fidgety. And as the characters from the Jurassic World movies are warning us of the dangers of what we’re about to do, that it’s a bad idea, that we should definitely be made to sign a waiver, Ian’s little body wouldn’t hold still. That nervous energy needed to get out!
Maya and I were lucky enough to get the front row, and let me tell you, that coaster was absolutely intense. The twists and turns felt unique. The initial launch takes your breath away once (0-70mph in 2.4 seconds), and the giant 80-degree, 140-foot drop over the top hat halfway through takes it away again. They tell you there are no brakes through this entire ride, not till the very end. Velocicoaster has some of the most beautiful and smooth inversions. There’s one point where you’re hanging upside down somewhere in the vicinity of 2 seconds (Sean counted), which is an eternity in roller coaster time. I’m not entirely sure Maya liked riding up front, but I loved it.
Somewhere after this joyous thrill, we had to experience the come-down. Maya at some point realized her almighty screen time would likely not be happening since we’d be spending long hours at the parks each day. This isn’t a new scenario, so it honestly caught me completely off guard that it was going to be an issue for her. Without going into detail, let me just say it was kind of a sore spot on an otherwise outstanding day.
We eventually made it over to Skull Island: The Reign of Kong (aka, the King Kong ride). The ride queue was kinda spooky, but otherwise short. The simulator ride was interesting enough – we saw Kong vs dinosaurs and fell off a cliff.
Sean and the kids rode the Dudley Do-right’s Ripsaw Falls. It’s a log flume type ride, and I hung out and guarded everyone’s bags and things while they all went and got soaking wet. As I waited for them, a fellow wandered out with a grocery bag tied around each foot. I asked him whether that was an effective antidote to walking around with squishy shoes all day, and he assured me that they worked very well. Noted.
In fairly rapid succession, we rode The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman (simulator ride), The Incredible Hulk Coaster, and The Incredible Hulk Coaster a second time, but this time without Mom. I remember really enjoying the Hulk Coaster when we were in Florida for our honeymoon some 23 years ago. These days though, with my messed up spine, I try to be more careful about what I ride. In this one, I felt pretty heavy positive G-forces, and so I opted to sit out a second run, just for self-preservation. It is a pretty fun coaster though.
After a quick baked pretzel snack, we headed back to ride Harry Potter and the Hidden Journey again. Here’s where I’ll point out a marked difference between Disney and Universal. Pretty much anything I rode at Disney, I could just take my backpack along, no big deal. Universal is more particular. At nearly all the rides, you were required to first take a moment and stow your things in a not-particularly large locker. They were free of charge and opened with your park ticket, so it wasn’t too much of a hassle. However, had I carried my normal big backpack that could hold jackets, waters, and snacks for four people, it wouldn’t have fit. They’re so particular about Velocicoaster, they make you pass through a metal detector, so for that one Sean even had to leave his phone and keys in the locker. Only once during our three days at the park did we have an incident where our key didn’t re-open a locker we had secured. Poor Ian was in a panic because it was his locker and it held his beloved new niffler backpack. The park attendant eventually helped us out, but it was a tense few minutes.
We did a little shopping in Hogsmeade, visiting Honeyduke’s candy store and swinging by for some butter beers as well. Sean and Maya this time went for frozen butter beers (which they both decided they didn’t enjoy quite as much), and Ian had an original. We were getting ready to line up for Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure again, so we’d have some time to finish our drinks. As per usual, the ride line was long, and we were maybe three quarters of the way through it before Ian simply couldn’t contain himself. We had to exit to go use the bathroom. One of the ride attendants gave us vague instructions and a slip of paper that maybe would allow us to return to the ride once Ian was relieved. Thankfully, it did work, though it wasn’t at all clear what we were meant to have done. (It sounded like one of us should have stayed and waited for the others to return, but I don’t think we were given that information up front.) This time the kids got to ride the motorbikes and the grownups loaded into the sidecars. I can tell you, the ride was just as thrilling as the first time we rode.
Sean managed to steer us into the right spot to watch the holiday light show projecting onto the Hogwarts Castle. The lights and music were beautiful and I was happy to soak it in, even though I normally have a fairly strict “no Christmas celebrating till after Thanksgiving” policy.
We had a little time to kill before our dinner reservation, so we hopped in line and rode Skull Island: The Reign of Kong again. We hadn’t ridden any of the rides in the Dr Seuss part of the park yet, so on our way out, we took a moment to ride The Cat in the Hat. It’s a “family friendly” ride, which the kids aren’t normally too enthused about, but it is testament to the power of Seuss’s books that they both remembered the story so fondly that I don’t think either of them really minded that it wasn’t especially thrilling.
We made our way out of Island of Adventure and over to CityWalk to get to our late reservation at The Cowfish Sushi Burger Bar. The kids are deep into their sushi love at this point, so it was pretty much a sure thing. We had some more lovely cocktails and some perfectly fine sushi. I didn’t even fuss too much when Sean wanted to try a burgushi roll. Yeah, it’s what it sounds like – some kind of bastardization of hamburger inflected sushi, but it tasted good enough and the kids seemed delighted with their meal.
We were four tired folks when we walked back to our hotel that evening, 25% of whom were still actively negotiating for screen time. Sigh.
Day 3 – Universal Studios
The park didn’t open until 9 this morning, so we could operate at a slightly slower pace. I think we meandered in around 8:45 and made our way to Diagon Alley to have our pre-paid breakfast at the Leaky Cauldron. Sean drove us nuts by repeating the line from the movie, “The Leaky Cauldron; that’s in London.” over and over again. (“D’you hear that, Ern? The Leaky Cauldron, that’s in London.”)
We took a moment to take in the Diagon Alley scenery before the crowds really filled in. Again, the experience was deeply immersive. Shops whose names we recognized from the books jumped out at every turn, their whimsical storefronts inviting us to explore. Anchoring the scene is Gringotts wizarding bank and looming large over the crowd is the dragon who sits atop the bank, presumably having recently escaped. Much to Maya’s chagrin (and maybe eventual acceptance), that dragon would, from time to time, breathe real fire. As a fan of the series, it was incredibly cool to be there.
We did eventually make it over to the Leaky Cauldron, waited for a bit, and were treated to another delightful breakfast (and another large cup of coffee).
After breakfast, we made our way over to check out the Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts ride. We started by entering the brilliantly detailed Gringotts lobby and got to see the clever goblin animatronics busy at their work. We rode an elevator down into the depths and eventually boarded our vehicle. This is a roller coaster and a dark ride / simulation ride wrapped up into one. I thought it was fun, though maybe not quite as fun as Harry Potter and the Hidden Journey had been. Maya tells us she preferred this one.
After a bit of window shopping during which Ian finally broke down and bought one of the huge chocolate frogs he’d been eyeing, we made our way over to our appointment at Shutterbuttons to have some magical family photos taken. This is another thing that was included in whatever vacation package Sean purchased, and while I don’t think I’d have gone out of my way to partake of it otherwise, the results were pretty fun. The only bummer is that our reservation was somehow “lost” (along with many other people’s, it seemed) and so we had to wait around for about a half hour before our photo session could commence. This, as you might have guessed, was maybe not the best scenario for our fidgety kids. Still, we have a few fun prints and some special, magical moving photos as well.
After this, we used our express passes to their fullest and binged on rides for a little while. First there was The Simpsons ride, a simulator ride tucked into a gloriously eye-popping Simpsons-themed part of the park. Then we lined up for Men in Black Alien Attack, one of those interactive rides were we got to shoot up our alien attackers. Next we tried out the Fast & Furious Supercharged ride – another simulator that the kids pronounced “cool.”
And finally, at Maya and Ian’s repeated request, we tried out this park’s only real thrill ride: the Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit roller coaster. The coaster was fun enough. The kids seemed to like that you could choose your music at the beginning. Maya and I again got to ride right up front, a situation I’m not sure she’s entirely okay with. Honestly, the most alarming part of the ride is that you climb straight up for the first hill, and I felt like I was going to slide out of my seat.
We planned to have lunch at the Minion Cafe, but since we weren’t super hungry yet, we decided to sneak in one more ride beforehand: Despicable Me Minion Mayhem. The idea is that we’re turned into minions for the ride and get to experience a simulated world as a minion. Things naturally go haywire and hilarity ensues. Cute enough, but I was maybe wearing out on simulators by then.
Lunch at Illumination’s Minion Cafe was outstanding. The kids each ordered ramen, which they only picked up, but that we adults found to be delightful. Our soup and sandwiches were excellent and the minion tots were as delicious as they were adorable. The kids really hadn’t eaten enough, so we did what any responsible vacationing family would do – we filled the gap with dessert. We walked over to the Bake My Day bakery and bought Maya and Ian some minion cookies.
After Bake My Day, we rode the Transformers simulator ride. After that, Dad and Ian wanted to ride Revenge of the Mummy, but Maya has a pretty serious aversion to fire, so I sat out with her. While they were getting chased by a mummy, Maya and I decided to try the Race Through New York Starring Jimmy Fallon ride. Yeah, it was yet another simulator, but at least we weren’t just sitting and waiting. And Maya especially seemed to enjoy it.
After a quick stop by Shutterbuttons to pick up our photos, we rode the Escape from Gringotts ride again. Since it was getting darker now, we decided to wander through Diagon Alley again. Everyone but me had *more* butter beer. I had beer beer. We sat down and enjoyed our beverages and watched as folks who had sprung for special interactive wands wandered around and tried to get various “spells” to work. One particularly fun one involved making an umbrella thunder and lightning and proceed to rain on whoever was standing under it.
I had been gunning for a photo with a Transformer for most of the day. We finally made our way over and had our photo taken with Bumblebee!
Then, at Ian’s request, we rode the ET Adventure Ride. And we finished out our evening by riding the Rockit roller coaster in the dark.
Dinner was kinda tricky because no one was all that hungry, but we’d be ravenous by morning if we didn’t eat something. We first stopped by Voodoo Doughnuts so we’d set for our vacation doughnut fix in the morning. Then we wound up first stopping by some sandwich shop for Maya and then picking up a wood-fired pizza on the way back to the hotel for the rest of us.
Because we’d be leaving town the next day, Sean and I did a fair amount of strategic packing while the kids wound down for the night. We’d need to arrange things so that we could go to the park with our small packs, but then come change our clothes (it was a lot cooler in Austin than Orlando at the time) and repack our carry-ons for air travel.
Day 4 – ALL OF IT – Islands of Adventure, Universal Studios, Heading Home
After getting ready for the day and having some delightful doughnuts, we checked out of our room, dropped our luggage with guest services, and headed into the parks for our last vacation day. We started at Islands of Adventure and made a b-line directly for Velocicoaster. While we could line up early for the ride, we could not use our express passes until the park opened at 9. Either way, we didn’t have to wait long and the ride was nearly as much fun in the middle of the ride train as it had been at the very front.
We then hit Hagrid’s Motorbikes for the third time, this time waiting maybe 70 minutes all told. Then we watched the Grinchmas Wholiday Spectacular, which was colorful and silly and fun. Plus we got to sit down!
As it was starting to mist and sprinkle outside, we ducked into Three Broomsticks for lunch. Then we rode Harry Potter and the Hidden Journey again before lining up to ride the Hogwarts Express train from Islands of Adventure to Universal Studios. We had purchased the park-to-park tickets for flexibility, and that is what’s required if you want to take the train between parks. On the chance that your family is really excited about trains: this isn’t one. It’s more of a cable-car. The windows are actually screens, which is a lot of fun. You get to see interesting scenery fly past you and you hear some witches and wizards outside your compartment door.
Back at Universal Studios, we went straight to ride Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts again. After that, we tried out Illumination’s Villain-Con Minion Blast. Here, we were issued a gun and stepped onto a colored dot on a moving sidewalk that led us through a lineup of villains that we were meant to shoot. It was fine. I came, I saw, I randomly pulled the trigger in my impossible to aim gun, I left.
The kids were itching for one more ride on the Rockit roller coaster before we left the park, but the light rain hadn’t really let up, and so the ride was shut down. At Ian’s insistence, he and I went and rode Revenge of the Mummy together (and yeah, I can confirm, Maya would have hated that ride). We were just getting off, when Sean texted and told me they were running the Rockit empty in preparation for opening it again. We rushed back and he and the kids lined up, and they managed to just squeeze in their ride before we had to get back to the hotel to rearrange our bags and catch our bus back to the airport.
All of that went very smoothly. We changed clothes and juggled our suitcases a bit so we didn’t have any TSA no-nos in our backpacks. The bus was right where it was supposed to be, right when it was supposed to be. Security at Tampa was a bit lackadaisical and in absolutely no rush at all, but it was ok. We ate before running the gauntlet and still had plenty of time before our flight left.
We got into Austin very, very late, but bags were acquired and parking shuttle was caught with a minimum of fuss. And the next day was Thanksgiving, so we could take it as easy as we needed to.
