Photo TR:You can take the girl out of Disney, BUT………

Well, maybe you can’t even do that completely……

Hi all. I am Jennifer.

This is a trip that was planned fairly last minute (we booked it 15 days prior to leaving) and something totally different for my family.

We are a Disney family. When I say we, I mean my DD Claire, who is 7 and I. My DH, Skip, likes Disney as well, but will never admit to being a Disney lover. He’s more of a resistor, but we break him down when we can. Lucky for me, Claire can bat her eyes enough to sometimes convince her Daddy to do what she wants.

This is our lovely family.

The guy smiling behind us is NOT part of our family, but it was nice of him to make the picture look better with his smile!

I also have 2 older children; Michael who is 23 and Paige, who is almost 20. They don’t travel with us anymore. They are too cool to hang out with us, I guess. And honestly, they are so different from each other, that there would be a lot of stress involved. Paige is easy going for the most part, but she can do her share of whining, and of course being away from friends and her boyfriend might be torture. Michael has his grumpy moments and I think by the end of the trip, there could be some major arguments.

But don’t feel bad for them. They do stuff with their friends all the time…and they HAVE been to Disney several times each, with me and other family members, as well as other fabulous vacations in their childhood.

My Disney obsession took over in 2007 when I went back for the first time after an 8 year break. This was Claire’s first trip. We have been down a few more times since then, vowing to fit Universal Studios into the mix in the near future, especially since I am a fan of Harry Potter.

I have been to Universal Studios 3 times in the past, but never to Islands of Adventure. My last trip was in 1999, and IoA was being built at that time. I haven’t had a chance to get back since then.

Last year, we debated our options, and planned a new trip for us. We took a Disney cruise! Skip ended up having to cancel about 2 weeks before the cruise due to issues at home with our farm, and my Mom took his place. We also planned 3 more days after the cruise and we debated going to Islands of Adventure. With the Wizarding World of Harry Potter still very new, we decided to wait once again to visit and planned 2 days at Disney and 1 day at Sea World.

I also added to my obsession last year and became a Travel Agent just a few short weeks before our cruise. My specialty is Disney, but I do other travel as well. (And to think…. there IS such a thing as other travel. LOL,. Who would’ve ever thunk it?)

I did my Disney training online and learned all I could about the ways of the travel industry. It was very exciting to be living my dream. In May there was a notification that there was to be an Agent Education Program right on site at WDW in August, which means onsite training and touring. I signed up and was excepted and had yet another trip to Florida! This time without family! It was a great experience. I am happy to have had the opportunity to do this program.

Fast forward to this year. I was having the Disney Blues. I have another Disney Cruise planned for next Nov with many members of my family, but because of the time of year, Skip is not joining us. It has been since 2009 since we have actually gone on a family vacation with him. I did some nagging and finally he decided we should go to the “other Disney Park” in Orlando.

Now he is terrible with names and what belongs to who or what. He still calls WDW Disneyland and it drives me batty. I knew what he meant…Universal Studios.

We checked out flights (which were all high because of the last minute planning) and a few different weeks that would work for us. The best time would be when Claire had off school for Spring break. The flight times weren’t ideal, but Skip wanted a cheap and quick trip.

We got it set and booked on Sunday, March11th. I was super excited. Not only was this going to be a fun trip, but a great learning experience for me as well. I had quoted Universal a few times for clients, but this was my first official Universal booking. I went right to work researching as much as I could and reading other TR’s to get more familiar.

Skip wanted it to be as cheap as possible, and I didn’t mind, as I am saving up as much as I can for our Disney cruise and a week at WDW in November. I found the Quality Inn on Canada Ave to be one of the cheapest, with 1 day free and it included a Continental breakfast. It also included early entry to IoA and a breakfast at the Three Broomsticks.

We also flirted with the idea of staying onsite. It was going to be $1000 more basically, and no “free” breakfast and Skip couldn’t get past that. I tried to explain about the express pass benefits with staying onsite, even if we just booked one night there, but he declined. We decided to get the 3 days park to park tickets as well.

The flight times were NOT ideal, but we wanted to fly out of Toledo into Sanford, so we had to take what we could. We got a 6:50 PM out of Toledo on Allegiant Air on Monday, Mar. 26th, and would return March 30th, with the flight leaving at 3:40. This flight cost more than any other flight we have ever taken, but it was last minute and shopping around and looking at flights out of Detroit, we found the prices were all the same.

A few days later we discussed this some more, and he suddenly asked why we weren’t just going to Disney instead? Hunh? He said he didn’t want to do Disney…but why argue about that now. Did I mention that Skip doesn’t do well with change….and he is very last minute with everything…..

He decided we must go to the Magic Kingdom at least 1 day during this trip. He figured the money we would put towards express pass would just go to this instead. The plan was to go to Universal for half a day on Thursday and then over to MK for the rest of the day.

We decided to buy our tickets at the gate just in case we changed our minds.

So everything was now set and we just had to wait for our day to come!

I took over 1600 pictures on this short trip, so there will be plenty for me to share and tell you about.

We really enjoyed Universal a lot, but I have to let you in on a secret…..my heart still belongs to Disney!

The 2 weeks we had to plan this trip just flew by. The weather turned extremely nice at home, with 80 plus degree days. I did yard work and also started walking outside to get ready for all the park walking. I even dragged Claire with me on some of them to get her little legs ready as well.

I also had several clients to take care of in that time and I tried my best to wrap up any loose ends before leaving and sent out emails letting clients know I would be gone during the week and with any reminders or info that I thought they needed.

I also had to pull out summer clothing and get that packed. Claire has grown like a weed once again, but we found several things that still fit.

Soon after the trip was booked, Jeanne, one of my fellow Travel agents messaged me and told me I could borrow a skirt and top of one of her DD’s that was Harry Potter themed. GREAT! Sadly, this outfit got lost in the mail and as of yet has not turned up on either end. I sure do hope it eventually makes its way to one of us.

But Jeanne knows me so well. She also gave me some ideas and names of people who make dresses. Before I knew it, I had two outfits ordered for Claire to wear to the parks. This is right up Claire’s alley. At Disney, she typically wears a princess dress for part of the day and then some Disney themed outfit.

I also took it step further and ordered bows to match the outfits.

I also made a pillowcase for signatures. This was a cute idea in theory, but when we got there, we ended up only getting 3 signatures. Claire was a little shy with the Universal characters for some reason.

I also emailed Bubbasmom (Barb) and she gave me some wonderful tips that I used to make a tip sheet for us and also to use for future clients.

On Sat. the 24th, We went shopping with my Mom, and she bought me an early Easter/Mothers Day gift. A kindle fire. I am really loving this thing. I debated on leaving the laptop at home, since I now had the kindle, but I did end up bringing it…and never even taking it out of the bag. I had thought I might need it to dump pictures on, but I didn’t. I think it will stay home from now on. It’s heavy and a pain in the butt to bring. I plan on buying a few more CF cards before our next trip, so I should be OK with not having it along, and I can get on the internet just fine with the Kindle. I’m not super savvy with it, but I can still work it enough to make do.

By Sunday, March 25th, most everything was packed and ready to go. I only had a few more items to throw in the suitcase before we left.

Here are the bags. Claire thought we should take a picture.

Everyone went to bed at a normal time. And we had most of the day Monday to wait out as well. Claire was already too excited. But I told her she needed to be patient as we weren’t even leaving till late afternoon the next day. I figured that she would sleep in (she loves to sleep in and stay up late), and then we could run to the bank and get the last minute stuff done to keep her mind off of things…..yeah right!

Looking forward to the rest of this adventure.

Looking forward to the rest of this adventure.

Thanks for joining in

March 26, 2012. Monday

The day had arrived. I slept pretty decent and got up at the crack of dawn…..but I normally get up early anyways.

I started out with a little computer time and sending out those last minute client emails.

I then started packing all the last minute stuff. At 8 AM I see a bouncy little girl emerge from her room shouting that she was too “esscited” to sleep. Claire never gets up this early on her own. Each school morning is a ritual of basically dragging her out of bed and dressing her while she flops around. Today she was in high gear and wanted to get dressed and just leave.

Soon the chanting began. “Is it time to go yet?” over and over….then on to “let’s leave now, let’s leave now”. It got old real fast.

We did make it to the bank, I got a shower and she got a bath and hair wash. She took extra time to be sure she was nice and clean for Florida.

Around 3:30 or so, we dressed in our traveling clothes, and Skip came in to shower. We gave a once over and at 4:15 my Mother arrived to take us to the airport. It was kind of funny, because earlier in the day my Mom had called and talked about which car to take to the airport. She hates my car…because it isn’t new, and she worried my car wouldn’t make it. I was like what? We are only going to Toledo airport…that’s only like 12 minutes away.

She had thought we were going up to Detroit. I bet she was relieved to have a much shorter drive.

Since Mom came early, and we got her car loaded within minutes, we actually left for the airport a head of schedule.

We unloaded, said our goodbyes and got in the check in line.

Not long after we arrived I heard Skip talking to someone. It was my friend Jenny. She, her son and her boyfriend were also going to Florida on the same flight. I had totally forgotten that she was going. She had told me a few months back and had inquired about Disney tickets back then. They were staying with friends in the area and doing some local stuff.

We checked in easily and said goodbye to our bags and turned around to see Skip’s sister Dee Dee. She works for Hertz at the airport and she was helping a client who had a wheel chair.

We said hellos and good byes to her and made our way to security. A few days prior to leaving, Claire had asked if she had to take her shoes off again and why. I told her probably, but we did find out kids 12 and under no longer have to do this, and I told her the why….because they check for bombs….then I told her NEVER to say the word bomb at the airport or they will strip search you. LOL! So she kept saying bomb, bomb, bomb over and over at home to get it out of her system. I prayed she wouldn’t say it now, and all was good and we cruised right through.

Skip was worried because this was his first time traveling since his hip replacement and he showed his card out and they didn’t seem to care. He went through the body scanner without a hitch. (We were told they are not metal detectors and won’t go off). Claire and I went through the old detectors though.

We gathered our things and up to our gate to wait. Toledo only has a couple of gates, so you basically can wait anywhere and still see your gate.

I pulled out the new kindle and realized that Toledo now has free wifi and played around with that.

Of course we had to take a few pictures.

I took a few of another plane outside.

We decided we should get something to eat. The choices are just awful at Toledo airport. Basically cardboard pizza or subway. Claire chose the pizza, which was a little better this time around.

Skip and I share a subway tuna.

Claire and I made a bathroom stop. I love the bathroom here, it is so pretty, but I feel weird taking pictures in there. I did snap this one of Claire washing her hands. The sinks are very unusual. Toledo is the glass city, so I guess that is the theming of this bathroom.

We finally spotted my friend Jenny and gang. I think they might’ve gone to the bar downstairs while waiting. We talked a bit and found out they were flying the same flight home as well.

Before we knew it the Allegiant plane arrived and I snapped a few quick pictures of it coming to the gate.

I told Skip to go to the bathroom and he said he didn’t have to. He does this every time and then as soon as they start boarding he runs to the bathroom. Sure enough, he did it this time too. That drives me nuts. Claire asked what were we going to do and I said he had 30 seconds and if he wasn’t out, we were boarding without him!

No worries, he made it!

We got settled into our seats and waited to take off.

My phone wouldn’t shut off for some reason. It kept cycling in shut down mode. I haven’t turn the phone off in several months, so I’m not sure what was up with it. I finally just opened the back and pulled the battery out.

The flight was good and smooth. Claire liked watching the sunset out the window. Being on the end, I couldn’t see much of anything. Of course we had to make a bathroom run on the plane. These things are not made for 2 people, no matter how small the second person is. And let’s just say YUCK!

I handed Skip the tip sheets I had made for him to read while on the plane. One tip is that Richters burgers gets bad reviews and you should avoid going there. Skip thought it was awful that I wrote that. He said he was going to eat there and prove me wrong. He never did, but it was a little joke all through the trip.

We landed about 15 minutes early and out bags came rolling out fast as well. Skip went to get the car and he seemed to take forever. We had a good rate through Hertz from his sister, but I found out he fell for the “you need insurance” line. UGH! I tell him over and over not to get it. They were out of cars too, but they borrowed one from someone else.

While Claire and I waited, we saw Jenny and gang once again and said our good byes and have funs.

Skip led the way out to the row he remembered the car to be in and that’s it. He couldn’t remember the make, model or color. He kept hitting the panic button on the fob and nothing lit up or sounded an alarm. I was a little annoyed that he couldn’t remember what we were getting.

Finally he said he thought it was an Altima and it was silver and we had been standing next to one the whole time. I tried opening the trunk, but it wouldn’t work. I opened the door and started it, so that worked. We finally realized you needed to press a button on the trunk to get it to open. This car caused problems like this throughout the trip. You needed step by step directions to get the thing open.

And we’re off! Of course that sounds easy, but Skip didn’t like the directions I was giving him, so he would argue a bit, but finally he realized I was right.

As we rode along, Skip loves to read road and town signs and turn them into dirty words. Yep, we have nothing but class! Soon we ran out of good names and Skip decided it was time to sing different lyrics to the songs on the radio. I have to admit, it was pretty darn funny.

We made a stop at a carry out for a pop and went back on our way.

Claire was worried about food. She said she missed supper and we were supposed to eat at the airport. I told her we did, but she had thought we would ALSO eat at Sanford. I told her we had snacks packed and she could have something as soon as we got to the hotel.

We did get a little lost. Not bad, but the road we were to turn on did not have a sign so we cruised right by it. Finally we got our bearings and found it and checked in quickly.

We stayed at the Quality Inn. This has just changed hands. It was formally a Fairfield Inn. They are in the process of renovating it.

Our room was decent, a nice size, and good for what we needed it for.

This was the view out the window.

I unpacked a bit and found one thing I wasn’t too happy about. The drawers had that shut up/no air smell. They were in need of a stick up thingy. My other complaint of the room was that the heavy drapes did not close any further. So we had lights from those tower things all night long and some noise from that area as well. Why on earth they wouldn’t make it so the curtains could shut all the way was beyond me? There were just shears covering that area.

The towers though were a lifesaver. I think it was some sort of bungee shoot thing. When driving back to the hotel each day, we would just look for the towers to know we were heading in the right direction.

Sounds like you are on your way!

I really like your TR's they are so great to read! Can't wait to see Universal

Jennifer, I honestly can't remember if I've posted in any of your threads before, but I just wanted to say Thank You for sharing your Disney adventures. I always enjoy how amazingly comprehensive your trips report are. I'll be looking forward to following this one as it develops.

Sounds like you are on your way!

Yep! It takes me awhile to get it posted...but I have a lot of fun writing it.

I really like your TR's they are so great to read! Can't wait to see Universal

Thank you so much!!

Jennifer, I honestly can't remember if I've posted in any of your threads before, but I just wanted to say Thank You for sharing your Disney adventures. I always enjoy how amazingly comprehesive your trips report are. I'll be looking forward to following this one as it develops.

Thank you for reading along. I do try to remember as much detail as I can and share it with others. I like reading TR's with detail, it really helps whe nI am researching a destination.

Claire and I decided to take a quick tour of the hotel. The pool closed at 11 and I had given her an option to take a quick swim and she said she didn’t want to. I should’ve made her put her swimsuit on though…just in case she changed her mind…because she DID!

As soon as Claire saw the pool she wanted to swim. By this time it was very close to 11 and there was just no way to get changed fast enough and make it back down. I did promise her some swim time for tomorrow though.

Views from the pool area.

We moved on the breakfast area. It was dark so I only took a few shots and kept moving.

Going back towards the front desk (which I don’t think I ever took a picture of).

And it was time to head back to the room.

Claire liked to be the official door opener.

We got ready for bed and watched a little TV. I connected to the hotel’s free wifi on my kindle and facebooked a bit and then we all called it a night. The room has 2 double beds, so I slept in 1 and Skip in the other and we gave Claire the choice to sleep with either of us. She chose Skip! Score for me!!!!

Claire is awful to sleep with. She is a totally bed hog and she likes to snuggle up to you. No matter how much you move her over, she shimmies right back like an eel.

I know it took me a while to fall asleep. The light was bugging me and we could hear cheering off in the distance too. The last time I looked at the clock it was 12:15, and I think it probably took another 15 minutes to fall asleep after that.

I also had a lot of the pre-vacation dreams that night. Like we woke up late, lost our tickets, or everyone decided just to go home and not do anything. I always have weird dreams like that when I travel. So needless to say, that night’s sleep was not sound, but the bed was comfy at least.

Our first day was already over!

March 27, 2012. Tuesday

I had the alarm set for 6:25, but I woke at 6:15 and started to get myself ready. Skip was up right behind me and he got dressed and headed downstairs for coffee. Claire got up fairly well this morning. I knew this would probably be the only day, and it was just because of excitement.

Look who joined us this trip!

Sadly, we kept forgetting we had him and only took a handful of pictures with him in it.

We headed down to get a quick breakfast.

The choices weren’t great, but it was free. Claire went with a mini powdered donut and only because I insisted she eat something. She’s not much of a breakfast person.

I went with the biscuits and gravy. They also had hard boiled eggs (which I thought was weird), and make your own waffles, toast and bagels, a couple of cereal choices, fruit, like apples and oranges, and a couple of juices and milk.

Skip came in (he was outside smoking) and told us he had talked to some people outside that said the park crowds weren’t too bad and many of the basic rides were walk on. I didn’t quite believe that, but was happy to hear that it might not be too bad after all.

We finished up breakfast and then made our way to the car.

We had another fight with it this morning. We couldn’t get it to unlock. We kept hitting the button and then a combination of buttons and finally it opened. I was about to have a panic attack. We NEEDED to get to Universal early today.

We got in and I gave Skip the directions. They were right up to a degree. Our directions stated we would need to make a Uturn to get to the parking garage. That was not the case and we almost passed the entrance because we were on the wrong side of the road.

As we drove, I took a few pictures.

This pirate ship was right around the corner and we found out it was a pirate dinner show.

After we made a big swerve across a couple of lanes, we were at Universal. It was VERY close to our hotel. Technically we could’ve walked if we were adventurous, but it wasn’t worth the time or energy to do that. I would say it was a good mile away.

We paid for parking, which is $15 for standard parking, and weaved along towards the garage.

We got a very close spot, right next to the elevators and just a short walk to the escalators.

It was about 7:30 now. I was happy that we actually got moving this fast.

The walk to the parks is not a short one, so be prepared.

There is a bag check, but it is really fast.

They have moving walkways which help make the trip go faster as well. BUT, be sure you keep walking…this is NOT a ride. In the morning we had no troubles, but in the afternoons when we left, people would get on and stand 3 wide and not move an inch. This annoys the heck out of me….it is called a “moving walkway” for a reason. You are supposed to move and walk!

Of course the whole time I am snapping pictures along the way. Some turned out decent, some really bad.

I kind of got photo bombed here too. Not intentionally, but come on…get out of my way!

There’s a better picture.

For those who don’t know, this is City Walk. There are lots of shops and restaurants here and you have to walk through it to get to either park.

I was proud because the family was moving pretty fast and keeping up with me. I really had slowed myself down too, but we kept up a good speed.

I never did make it into this store. I had wanted to check it out, but time didn’t allow it and Skip was anti shopping.

The park is in my sights now!!

We had to go to the will call kiosk and pick up our tickets.

This was a very easy process and it had no line. You just swipe your credit card that you paid with and punch in your confirmation number and out pops your tickets. We also got tickets for city walk, basically a waste for us. It’s for the night clubs at night, and we got our Three broomstick breakfast tickets as well.

This guy wanted to have some fun today too.

They had not opened the gates for early entry yet. I had heard they do this sometimes as early as 30 minutes prior and let you in so far, but not today. Look at the crowds waiting.

It was 7:45 now and we just had to wait.

Skip was in charge of a bag this trip. Since we didn’t bring a stroller along this time, I said he had to carry a few things to keep the load off of me somewhat.

Skip does NOT know how to wear a backsack evidently. We laughed and joked on the ways he would carry it.

A little before 8 we were let in. We were behind a lady in a scooter. She went up and scanned her ticket and then backed up at full speed. We had to pull Claire out of the way or she would’ve been toast. The lady seemed like she wasn’t familiar with the scooter at all, but she also never looked behind her when she backed up. The lady behind us about had a heart attack. She said it was good we were on our toes, because that lady was crazy! LOL!

Claire didn’t have to do a finger scan, but I did. And it didn’t like me. The TM asked if I had used the ticket yet, and I told her no, this was our first day. Eventually she had me scan my thumb instead. Skip said he told her I used to be a bank robber so I took my fingerprints off. LOL!

We only got to go a few steps in and there was another rope blocking us, but we were there less than a minute and they dropped that and we took off with the herds of people…most heading in one direction….Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

Of course I took lots of pictures on our journey.

I oohed and ahhed my way through. I just loved all the details and thought of my forum photographer friends who would enjoy snapping away here as well.

I pretty much knew where to go and it was easy NOT to get lost since the whole crowd was heading the same direction.

I must say, with walking, gawking and taking pictures, I didn’t get the best shots. I got a lot that were either under or over exposed, because I wasn’t paying attention to my settings at all.

I also had to remind myself that I would get back to these areas later and would be able to get more shots.

After our fast walk through Seuss Landing we entered the Lost Continent.

I just love this shot.

Ok, I like this one too.

This was a fun place to photograph, sadly we didn’t spend a lot of time here.

And the moment we all have been waiting for…Entering Hogsmeade!

And look at the crowds!

It was near impossible to get a picture of the Hogwarts Express with all the people there…plus walking fast didn’t help.

I just kept shooting as I walked.

And then I spotted Ollivanders! The tip I had been given is if the line didn’t stretch past 2 buildings, it was a less than ½ hour. There was hardly even anyone there….WRONG!

I am guessing this is newer, but there is now a queue stretching back in between the shops near the Dueling Dragons exit. We got in the line and at first it didn’t seem too bad…but it was!

Skip wanted to know what ride this was. I told him it was just a little show I wanted to see (and hoped Claire would be picked for) and the lines were long for it all day, so this was the best time to see it. He wasn’t necessarily happy, but he went along with it.

While waiting, I took pictures of everything I could see in line.

I have a thing for castles (who doesn’t right?), so I kept taking pictures of it over and over.

And Perry has to get in on the action.

Doesn’t Skip look so excited to be waiting in line?

Claire had to play with Perry a little bit more.

The Chimneys were all crooked on the top of the buildings. Skip just didn’t get why they would do such a thing.

While waiting, I got the feeling that they hadn’t even opened the doors yet. I knew they could only hold a small amount of people for each show, but we literally never moved a step for at least 20 minutes. Eventually we started moving though.

As we got to the door they asked us how many and I said 3 and they let us in and we were the last for that group. Darn it, I figured we would be in the back and not able to see well, but actually we walked in and just stood there ……front and center. (We had waited about 40 minutes for the show)

We saw Ollivander look around for kids and I hoped…but it wasn’t meant to be. (Actually there were more adults than kids in there too.) He looked at 2 kids who looked to be about 10-12 years old. He asked if they got along well as they had a great chemistry. The Mom totally misunderstood and it was kind of funny. She pointed to her DH and said us? And he said no, those two, and then she pointed to herself and one child, and said me and him? LOL! Ollivander was patient and finally she figured out that it was the kids she was talking about. And some of us laughed and said No they don’t get along, they are brother and sister.

They went up and he selected wands for them. As they waved the wands, boxes would move and lights would flash. Claire loved this.

It was very dark in there and you had to use a flash if you had any hopes of getting any pictures….and you were allowed to as long as it wasn’t a LED flash, which we were told were what iPhones had.

The show is very short and cute, but this is not something we’ll have to do again. Skip’s thoughts…what a big rip off…all they want to do is sell you a wand. LOL

As we walked out, Ollivander talked to Claire and asked her age, and I replied 8…wait no 7. Why did I say 8? LOL Anyways he talked to her for a minute and suggested a few different types of wands for her when she was old enough to go to Hogwarts. I think he suggested Birch or Elder, which I was surprised, because I thought people didn’t want Elder….if you have read the stories, you know why.

They had us split in 2 directions to leave the shop and we emerged out to where they sold wands. Again, Skip was disgusted that they were pushing wands so hard. Luckily, Claire didn’t fall for it and insist on buying a wand. I wasn’t opposed to her getting one, but they are pricey and I knew it would be a novelty that would wear off in 45 minutes.

We next made our way over to the bathrooms.

Moaning Myrtle is in both bathrooms….moaning of course. Claire was amazed by this as well. She wanted to know why a ghost would live in the bathroom and asked a lot of questions about her over the course of the next few days.

Next on our agenda was Forbidden Journey, so we worked our way over there.

Wow, the attention to detail is amazing.

Great pictures.

Wow, the attention to detail is amazing.

 

Great pictures.

Thanks!

The line was only listed to be about 20 minutes for Forbidden Journey. That wasn’t bad at all. I think it was about 8:50 when we got in line and it truly was close to 20 minutes when we rode.

We put the bags in a locker. This was my first locker experience at Universal and it was pretty easy and harmless. I did keep put my point and shoot camera so I could take some pictures of the queue area. They aren’t the best pictures, but better than nothing.

We had no line what so ever till we came into the Greenhouse area.

It is VERY dark in the halls. You have to use a flash for any hope of a halfway decent picture.

Oh, there’s the line….

Even though there is a line, you pretty much keep moving the whole time. The ride is continuously loading, like Haunted Mansion, so the wait isn’t so bad when you are constantly moving.

A quick one with Mommy and Claire….looked how thrilled she is about it.

I have to add……what a dumb idea to make the line go through a greenhouse. Greenhouses are HOT! And even though they had fans blowing in there, it was already warm at 9 AM. I can’t imagine what it’s like in Aug with 105 degree weather.

Skip noticed the guy in front of us was taking pictures of everything and wanted to know why I wasn’t getting as many. LOL! Well my point and shoot takes a few seconds to regenerate after each flash picture…..I would’ve taken more if I could.

This queue is really cool and if you get a chance do go through it, even if you don’t want to ride the ride.

There is a separate queue that they will allow you to go through if you ask (and it’s not too busy) that is just a walk through queue. I had thought about going back through there and taking more pictures, but I never did. It also does not go through every room.

This balcony has the “Fab 3” come out and say something, but they were just leaving as we walked in the room and never came back out before we left it.

We kept moving and I kept snapping as much as I could.

You can’t see this well, but this is the portrait of the Fat Lady.

At one point in the line you are stopped and they wait a few minutes then let you through. They switch you over to a different queue, which I thought was weird. And the single rider line switches too and a 3rd queue is there for child swap people.

Soon enough we were boarding our vehicle and taking off immediately.

I have heard all sorts of things about this ride, but the number one thing was it’s a must do…and it is. It is super cool. I had heard it was a bit scary and intense, so we had Claire watch youtube videos of it so she knew what it would be like…and she almost backed out that day, but we wouldn’t let her.

There is a part where the dragon blows smoke right in your face, and it was directly into Claire’s face…and I thought …..”Oh Lord, don’t make her scared”. But Skip reached his hand out and said “hey dude” to the Dragon and she thought that was really funny.

The vehicle is designed so that you really can’t see much of the person next to you, but you can reach over and hold hands….which is what I did for Claire…and she held a firm grip the whole time, but I could hear her laughing as well.

You do go up and down and tilt back pretty far, but never upside down. It’s really hard to explain, but it was really cool. It goes from prop type scenes to movie screens as well. I heard many people are afraid of the Spiders area, and that was nothing to be fearful of. The spiders look extremely fake, even Claire said that. The scariest part is when the Dementors keep popping up at you. Claire said afterwards that she didn’t like that part and closed her eyes through it.

All in all we really liked the ride, but I would not wait over an hour for it. But my limit is usually 50 minutes tops anyways. I do wish/hope Disney gets some sort of ride like this in the future.

We exited and made our way to the lockers, which is a total madhouse of a project. And to get your stuff out of the locker you have to go the computer kiosk again and scan your finger. You are dumped into Filches and that place is just too small for the amount of people coming through.

We hopped over to the line for Flight of the Hippogriff. This line was about 10- 20 minutes or so as well.

You can see a peak of Buckbeak through the trees.

That was another fun little ride. Similar to Barnstormer, but has more kick to it. Actually it was pretty darn fast.

We made our way back to Hogsmeade and used the bathrooms once again. Again, Claire was just curious about Myrtle and why she kept talking the whole time we were in there.

We decided it was time to try some butterbeer. I was told to go into the HogsHead to get it. The lines are shorter and you can use your AAA card and get 10% off. We went in via the Three Broomsticks and asked a TM where it was exactly and she directed us to our right.

I asked Claire if she wanted to share and she said no way. I asked again…in case she didn’t like it, but she was convinced she wanted her own. Looking back, I should’ve just went with my gut and got 1 to share, we could always come back for more. Skip decided he wanted one too, even though he had no clue what we were ordering. We ordered 3 frozen

The verdict………not so great. Skip immediately said yuck. I don’t think it was yuck, but it wasn’t fantastic. Claire said it was the best thing ever….then about 5 minutes later she said she really didn’t like it anymore and didn’t want it. It was just ok to me. Having one was good enough for me and nothing I would rush back to get again.

Great pics from Universal which I will likely visit next spring...

On the Moaning Myrtle bathroom my question would not be the moaning but why the bathroom isnt looking like the one in the movies....

And I'm alyways surprised on what goes for "breakfast" in the States. After 3-4 weeks I'm dying for a good assortment of wurst - the kind you slice or spread, cheese and Nutella chocolate-cream...

Great pics from Universal which I will likely visit next spring...

 

On the Moaning Myrtle bathroom my question would not be the moaning but why the bathroom isnt looking like the one in the movies....

 

And I'm alyways surprised on what goes for "breakfast" in the States. After 3-4 weeks I'm dying for a good assortment of wurst - the kind you slice or spread, cheese and Nutella chocolate-cream...

You'll have a great trip!

I wondered the same thing. The bathroom is not themed at all.

I have no idea what wurst is. LOL! I do know what nutella is, but I don't eat that either. I guess we eat weird things. Probably not the most healthy of choices either.

We headed out in search of a smoking area. Just a heads up for those who do smoke, there is not any smoking areas in WWoHP. There is one right outside the gates in the Lost Continent though.

I tried to take a few more pictures as we headed that way, which was tricky to do with a cup of butterbeer in my hand.

Into the Lost Continent and directly to your right is a little cove for the smokers.

Claire sat and drank her Butterbeer, this is when she told us she didn’t care for it anymore.

We found out then that Skip has spilled the foam from his butterbeer all over the backsack. How he did this, I have no clue, but it was really foamy and gross. I had a few napkins and tried to clean it up the best I could and it appeared it hadn’t gotten on anything IN the backsack.

We just sat and relaxed a bit…well they sat, I kept taking pictures and sipping on my butterbeer.

Skip and I split Claire’s butterbeer into our glasses and went off towards Seuss Landing before Claire exploded. This was all she could talk about.

As you can see, I still kept taking pictures in route to Seussland.

This area is really neat looking.

You can see Claire off to the side of the picture. Yep, she was on a mission and wasn’t going to wait around for my picture taking.

A look across the lake.

And now we enter the world of Dr. Seuss.

This place is so colorful! I loved looking everywhere here.

We stopped for a ride on the The High in the Sky Seuss Trolley Train Ride! This has 2 tracks, and one of the tips I had been given was to ride both tracks because each were a little different. Only one track was running at this time, so we got in line. I took a picture of the wait time, but it didn’t come out. Perhaps they were changing the time when I did it. I think the wait was about 10 minutes. This area was much calmer and quieter than the WWoHP was.

This ride featured the Sneetches.

Almost there!

Love your trip report!! It is very detailed and the pictures are great!

Love your trip report!! It is very detailed and the pictures are great!

Thanks so much!

Time to board the Trolley Train. Skip and Claire rode together.

I thought I would be riding by myself, but I had a guy jump in behind me. I’m not sure why, as the line wasn’t long and his family didn’t appear to be in any cars near us. It was fine, but I thought it just seemed weird. And then I had trouble getting shots while we rode because he was in my way for some of the better things…..plus moving and not having the correct settings on the camera didn’t help as well.

If it was a family member with my, I would’ve elbowed them out of the way, but I couldn’t do that with a stranger. Darn!

The trolley goes through the Circus McGrukus Café and I took a REALLY bad picture as we went through.

I guess for some reason I felt the need to take a picture of this cactus.

I really liked this view.

Another great view.

The ride is very basic; not thrills, but Claire loved it. You can see some really cute things too, but, like I said, I didn’t get pictures of most of it.

Onward we went.

And we came across the Lorax themed area…which of course is a big hit right now with the movie just being out.

I’m not sure exactly what this area was about. We didn’t walk through it, but I did see it had a path and at one time I saw a TM standing outside the door of the Once-ler’s house and it looked like she was going to go inside. I don’t know if us regular folks can do that or not.

Our next destination was One Fish Two Fish.

Claire had also watched youtube videos of this ride. It’s very much like Dumbo…..with a twist. There is a song that plays while you ride and tells you when to go up and down. If you don’t follow it, you have the chance at getting wet. YEP! They have fish along the sides that like to squirt you. This is exactly what Claire wanted. I, on the other hand wanted to stay dry.

The line wasn’t too long. We just had to wait a couple of cycles before it was our turn.

Soon it was our turn to board. The girl was trying to get the 3 of us to ride together and I kept telling her no. She said the seats were big and we would be fine, again, I told her no. She kept at it, and I just flat out said no over and over. I’m glad I stuck to that decision. There was NO WAY the 3 of us would’ve fit in one car.

Claire chose to ride with Skip…Yay! I could avoid getting wet!

Skip told me after, that it was tight with just the 2 of them in the car, he couldn’t see how I would’ve made it in with them.

Soon we were taking off and I tried to follow the song and take pictures at the same time.

I quickly found that following the songs directions was NOT working for me. I couldn’t go up or down fast enough…and got shot in the ear with water. UGH! I hate that feeling.

After playing around, I realized that staying up worked best for me. There were less sprays at the top and if you watched carefully you could dip under them just enough. I pretty much avoided most of the water squirts once I figured that out.

Here’s a couple more I took while riding.

We saw that The Cat in the Hat was out for autographs, but Claire had to go potty, so we dashed over there first and used the restroom. When we came back he was still out, along with a few other characters, one being the Grinch. We got in the short line for the Cat and met him. Claire calls him Dr. Seuss all the time. I try to tell her that Dr. Seuss is the guy who wrote the story, but she keeps forgetting. LOL

We pulled out our cute pillowcase for signatures and she went up and met with him.

As you can see, Claire and Skip got a little wetter than I did. Claire was aiming for the water. LOL

It was then announced that the characters were going in and would be out for a show shortly. That was OK by Claire, because the Grinch looked scary to her anyways. This became a theme with every character there.

Skip and Claire sat down for the show, and I walked away, but for the life of me I have no clue why or where.

I took these pictures though.

I must’ve just strolled the area, I guess. I came back shortly and took a few pictures of the show that had already started.

After the show was over the characters came down for autographs. Claire said no, but I insisted she meet up with the Things since she was wearing a “thing” outfit and bow.

She reluctantly gave in and had a blast with them. I’ll warn you now. I took over 20 pictures of her with them. I cut it down a bit on what I am posting, but you know me, I like to post pictures.

Her outfit and hair bow was a big hit with them.

They both signed her pillowcase, but I wasn’t thinking and hadn’t moved the embroidery hoop after the Cat had signed, so all 3 signatures are smooshed in 1 small area.

That was fun, but she wouldn’t go visit with anyone else. The lines were not bad at all for the characters, a lot less than most Disney lines, but she didn’t want to wait and she wasn’t as familiar with most of these guys either.

We headed off towards the Cat in the Hat ride. The line was posted as being 10 minutes, not bad at all. I took a couple of pics while in the cue.

When we got towards the front they asked for a party of 3…That’s us! So we got to cut up and get right on. The TM’s fussed over Claire’s outfit too. She loves it when they do that.

You are not supposed to be taking pictures on this ride….but I did…till I got caught. I guess they have cameras watching you because a little ways in we heard an announcement. I couldn’t understand what it said, but Skip did and told me to put that camera away before we get kicked out. OOPS! It was just as well, because I took some really bad pictures anyways.

I must say, this is an awesome dark ride. I really liked the story inside and I think it’s better than many of the Disney dark rides. One thing to know…this ride spins every so often. And not just a small spin, a pretty wicked one. It was fun, but after one ride for me, I was done. Claire on the other hand was not. She wanted to go right back on, so Skip took her on and I told them I’d be in the area waiting. I checked out the gift shop and took a few pictures.

I really loved these Thing tank tops. I debated and decided if I was to get one; it would be when we left so I didn’t have to carry it around all day.

After a roam around the gift shop I ventured outside.

I roamed a bit and took a few pictures.

And I had read about this spot. A spot where you could get a good shot of the Discovery center at Jurassic park across the River. So I took a picture, of course!

And this one too.

Then a couple started talking to me for a bit. We were talking cameras. They had recently bought an SLR and were asking questions. After a bit of talking, I found they had just gotten married on Sat. (this is now Tuesday) and they were on their honeymoon. Everyone say AWWWWW!

I realized I better get back and see if my crew was waiting for me. I took a few more pictures on the way.

No sign of them yet. I went and looked at the wait time and it had change to 30 minutes. I wasn’t sure how long they had been gone, but I figured I wouldn’t have to wait much longer.

More pictures.

I decided to just sit in front of the gift shop and wait….and wait…and wait. Still no sign, but there was a churro stand right there, so I decided it was time for a snack and purchased one. The carts don’t take the AAA card…I asked though, just to be sure.

It was good, but it wasn’t fresh. But it did its job. I ate about half and then tucked it in my bag to save for Claire. And then I waited some more. I had to go potty, and I debated on leaving. I knew as soon as I did, they would come out, but finally I gave in and left my post and headed towards the bathroom.

I kid you not, as soon as I was in there I got the beep from Skip. (We have Nextel phones and use the two way talk feature, like a walkie talkie.)

I told him I was on my way and headed off towards Cat in the Hat. But they weren’t there! I beeped him back and asked where he was. He said he found a smoking section and was sitting there. His directions were terrible. He said he was under the trolley tracks behind a place with balls on top. Seriously? The tracks run all over, and as for a building with balls on top…no such thing. He elaborated by telling me he was sitting near tables with umbrellas…..no help at all. Finally I broke down and asked a TM where the nearest smoking section was and she pointed the way. It was actually very close to the bathrooms and not anywhere near Cat in the Hat. We had to of passed each other at some point.

Oh well, they were found (and not behind a building with balls on it either) and I pulled out the churro and gave it to Claire. It was a big hit with her.

I took a couple of pictures of the area.

And we pulled out Perry and took a picture of him too.

We now were going to make our way over to Jurassic Park. As we walked we noticed that the Poseidon’s Fury Show line wasn’t too long. It said 30 minutes, but hardly anyone was standing outside, so it couldn’t be too long of a wait, right? We followed a few people towards the line entrance and they asked what this was. The TM told them it was a walk through special effects show. That sounded OK and we decided to give it a shot, but evidently not fast enough, because the guy behind us asked me if we were going in. I said “ I think so” and kept moving. It kind of irked me , as we couldn’t move any faster than the people in front of us, but evidently this guy was special and needed to get in line a bit faster.

We stood in line outside and waited till they let us in. I took a couple of pictures while waiting.

It soon became apparent that this line was going anywhere fast. And being outside was HOT! We got in line at 11:40 and the sun was doing its magic! The line was getting very long behind us too. And then the express people…I think I cursed them a few times this trip. They just kept pouring in, which meant we would be waiting longer. Go away express pass people!!!

You can tell Claire was getting a bit impatient.

Speaking of impatient….”Mr. Impatient” behind us was going nuts. He kept checking his watch and wiggling around. It was just he and his son, and I am not sure if they had to meet up with others or not, but he surely did not want to wait….Now he would be a perfect candidate for Express pass.

Finally we were let into the building, only to find that this is another line as well. At least it was cool in there. And dark! I took this picture and then put my camera away.

This line barely moved at all. Finally we got to move up a bit and the railing split away from the wall a bit. Mr. Impatient took this as there were now 2 lines and dashed past me to go in the other line. It clearly wasn’t another line as the railing only was about a foot away from the wall and got narrower as it went on….and Mr. Impatient quickly found that out. Plus he was the only guy going that way. So he came back and clawed his way back through to get back in the same spot he was in before. Luckily the people behind him were nice enough to let him back in.

At about 12:15 a TM was walking up and down the express pass line and Mr. Impatient asked her how long it would be. She was foreign and very hard to understand, but from what I could gather they were running behind and it would be about 30 minutes from this point, also depending on how many express pass people came into line between now and then. She did tell us that the line would get much longer after the Sinbad show let out, which would be shortly. Oh Man! I was becoming Mrs. Impatient then. Mr. Impatient talked to his son and they got out of line. I guess they had more important things to do.

We stuck it out though. We could see the next door and we had already wasted 30 minutes here, why not another 30. Luckily the wait wasn’t quite that long and soon we made it to through the next door.

We let out a sigh of relief as they were counting people going through and we made it. We are famous for being stopped right before we can enter.

We had to wait a little longer in this next room, but it wasn’t too bad and where we standing at, we could actually sit on a ledge and take a load off our feet.

Finally it was our turn. The show is neat, not great, and not worth a long wait, but if you can do it with a short wait, I recommend it. You go from room to room with different scenes of special effects and a story about Poseidon. We have a guide that takes you through each scene and interacts with the show.

The last room there is a fight with Poseidon and his rival. Whose name totally escapes me? But I had to laugh, because he looked like a Power Ranger. I didn’t know there were Power Rangers back in the time of the Gods, but maybe I’m wrong? LOL! As we exited Skip told Claire that Poseidon was Ariel’s father. I quickly said no, King Triton is. So we figure he must be her grandfather then. No clue if any of this being true, but Claire accepted it and said if she saw Ariel she would ask.

It had been 1 hour and 10 minutes from the time we got in line till we walked out of the show. Like I said, it was neat, but I would never wait that long for it.

I shot one picture as we headed out.

We were still on a mission to get to Jurassic Park. That means you have to go through the WWoHP to get there. And once again, I was clicking away with my camera.

I tried to get some pictures of the windows….not a very easy task with the glare.

Nope, not so good, let’s get closer and see if that works.

No, not at all, but it’s a nice picture of the reflection of the buildings behind me.

And because you can never have enough castle pictures, I took a few more of those as well….except it was crowded and I got Mr. Baseball Caps head in it.

Let’s try this again.

Somewhere along the way we lost Skip. It was very crowded and really hard to stay together. I kept looking back for his green shirt, but I couldn’t see him.

A side not on his green shirt… Skip doesn’t have a lot of nice clothes. He’s a dairy farmer and he wears cruddy clothes everyday pretty much. And then when he does dress up, he tends to wear the same few things over and over. I actually will rotate clothes on his closet rack so he can’t find some things that he wears over and over so we can have some variety. But he still seems to find them. LOL!

Last year when we were planning our cruise, and at that point, Skip was planning to come with us; I had been out shopping and scored 3 T-shirts for $1 each on clearance at JC Pennys. I got him a green, a yellow, and a turquoise blue one. I then put them into hiding. T-shirts suffer a not so nice fate at our house. He will put a nice one on for tractor pulling and by the end of the night it has grease and crud all over it. I didn’t want these shirts to suffer the same fate. When he pulled this shirt out that morning to wear, he was clueless. “Hey, where did these t-shirts come from?” LOL! “Oh, I got them last year on clearance and have had them packed away for our next vacation”. LOL!

So back to our Trip Report…..We lost Skip, but we kept going. I beeped him and I think he said he stopped off in the bathroom. So we told him to make his way out of Hogsmeade and we would be waiting there.

I decided to take a picture of Claire while we waited. It’s a hard thing to do because EVERYONE there had the same thought and it was crowded.

I even took a picture of another couple while we waited.

And then I took some more pictures.

We spotted this boat. It appears that someone must’ve been cleaning the river, though we never spotted the human doing so.

We walked across the bridge because it was just too busy waiting there and spotted the arch!

And the Jurassic Park music was playing….just to get you in the right mood.

No Claire, don’t go in there, there are dinosaurs that will eat you as a snack! Evidently she didn’t care!

We waited a little longer and soon we spotted a speck of green coming our way.

Daddy’s here!

On to Jurassic Park! Well…..kind of sort of…..

When you enter Jurassic park, you can see Hogwarts from a different angle….and you can never have enough castle shots, right?