Orlando, Florida // 10-13 June
Universal Studios was on our priority list for Florida as it has the Harry Potter World. (We were saving Disney to experience DisneyLand in California.) To experience Harry Potter World we needed to visit Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. We decided to sell a kidney and get the park-hopper passes so we could ride the Hogwarts Express between the two parks. One in, all in. It was well worth it. Moving between the parks was super handy, the Harry Potter parts of the parks were by far the busiest areas so we could pick and choose our timing to avoid the crowds a little. We waited about 35-40mins for most rides except for the most popular which was Hagrid’s Motorbike Adventure. The shortest wait we saw for that one was an hour. We got to do lots of our favourites a couple of times which was great, slotting them in when the ride times when down.
The first day we headed to Universal Studios at park opening (9am) and headed straight to the Harry Potter area and jumped on the Hogwarts Express. Islands of Adventure had more rides and was set in Hogsmeade with Hogwarts Castle. There was snow on the rooftops which was funny in the scorching Florida summer. Universal Studios had a completely immersive Diagon Alley with Gringotts Bank, Weasley’s Wizards Wheezes and Knockturn Alley. It was fantastic to wander around, in and out of the shops, and watch so many people using their interactive wands to set off the special effects. Kings Cross Station where you board the Hogwarts Express was also impressive. We were exhausted by around 6pm but had a good lay of the land. We swung by the Minions ride on the way out and headed back to our hotel for a quick dinner, cool off in the pool and plan our park attack for the next day.
We treated ourselves to a sleep-in before starting day two. We planned to start later and stay until closing at 9pm. We started the day off strong at Waffle House, which was amazing seeing the staff work ten-to-the-dozen in the open kitchen. We checked out more of the rides and experiences in the other parts of the parks. The Bourne Stunt Spectacular was a standout. It was an indoor version of your usual stunt show but still on a huge scale. There was a massive screen as the backdrop and the stage in front was fully interactive, with cars and small buildings moving across the stage. The background screen image moved with the action on stage and was super impressive. You couldn’t tell what was real people on the stage and what was on the screen. We went back and saw it again on our third day it was that good! There were lots of family-friendly ‘experience’ rides like Jimmy Fallon’s Journey through New York, Men in Black, Transformers, Fast n Furious, ET Adventure. The kids favourite turned out to be Pop-eye’s Bilge-rat Barge (raging rapids) ride. We knew we’d get wet so we headed there in the late afternoon (it was still super warm). The reports were true, everyone on the ride got completely soaked, so much that you couldn’t help but laugh. It was hilarious. We wrung out our clothes after and went to dry out in the sun. There was a spot were you could spray water on people on the ride, we spent a fair bit of time there. The funny part about that was the water out of these squirters was cold, so people looked up to see where it was from. As we had started the day late we had a late lunch at the Three Broomsticks (in the Harry Potter area) hoping it would be not so busy. It was worth the wait, but a typical theme park queueing experience. We waited outside, thinking once we were inside we’d be lead to a table, but no, there was another queue inside the restaurant. At least the second queue was in the shade and aircon. It was awesome to see the park lit up at night. I think we headed home by about 8pm and it was around 10pm by the time we got out of the park, back to the car park, then back to our hotel. Big day!
Day three was about revisiting our favourites and spending time in the Harry Potter parts of the parks. It was a pretty relaxed day. We arrived at the parks around midday and didn’t plan to stay too late but we ended up staying until closing. We started out with lunch at the huge Hard Rock Cafe just outside the parks, and for dessert we couldn’t resist The Toothsome Chocolate Emporium next door. Their shakes and desserts were super extravagant and impossible to finish but we gave it a good try. We did some of our favourite rides again, spent time in Diagon Alley enjoying some more Butterbeers, and caught a few last rides we’d missed. We came better prepared for the Pop-eye ride with spare shoes and towels in the car. The kids had gotten their souvenirs the day before so we had it all covered. After leaving the parks we wandered through the Universal City Walk and grabbed some late dinner. We all had very tired feet, averaging about 20,000 steps each day. What an experience! Lots of fun and the Harry Potter World was so impressive!
