Our Trip to Universal: The Other Most Magical Place on Earth
I have been plotting a way to get Universal Studios for years. I had been with my family back in the mid-90s but so much has changed since then and they certainly didn’t have the Harry Potter theme back then. And, after having visited Disney World with the kids, I knew that my experience at Universal would be more complete without the kids in tow. I had tried to convince my sister-in-law, as she is a big fan of Harry Potter, to do a girls’ trip with me, but we just couldn’t make it work. Since Chris and I were planning on going on a somewhat short (4-nights) adults only Virgin Voyages cruise out of Miami, we decided to extend our trip by driving down and stopping mid-trip in Orlando. We were able to spend time with family while in Orlando and finally made that trip to Hogwarts.
We got into Orlando on a Monday afternoon so that we would have time to meet up with our family. After checking into our hotel, which was not one of the fancy Universal resorts, we learned that it was best to get an Uber to City Walk, where we would be spending the evening, since the parking for City Walk is the same for the parks and costs $30 regardless of where you are going when arriving before 6pm. As a comparison, if you are going to Disney Spring, which is an entirely different area from the parks, then parking is free. We found that City Walk had a good variety of restaurants, shopping and activities that you could take part in. We did some shopping at their Universal store and then found some great craft beers and cocktails at the Big Fire bar. Then, we had dinner at Cowfish, Sushi and Burgers, which was a fun mix of affordable cuisine, as far as sit down restaurants is concerned. We also wandered over to the Toothsome Chocolate Emporium where we got a fancy milkshake and a delicious ice cream sundae. We rounded out our evening with a picture in front of the Universal globe. A fun time was had by all.
After reading up on some tips and tricks on how to best tackle the most desirable rides, we were alerted that we needed to arrive to the park at least 30 minutes to an hour before they opened up, which was at 9am. There were plenty of people who were staying at the fancy resorts and were therefore given not only the Express pass but also Early Access to the parks. Since many rides didn’t open until 9 (including Hagrid’s Motorbike Ride), all this seemed to mean though was that for some rides, they were waiting in the front of the line for an hour. While we waited for the park to open, we did some more shopping and found a cool Harry Potter Christmas ornament and a nice sweatshirt that kept us warm during the somewhat chilly and windy morning. We headed straight to the Hagrid’s ride and both agreed that the hype was real for that one. I am especially glad that I didn’t watch any YouTube videos of the ride, as there were some fun surprises.
We left Hog’s Meade, which really was so magical, and then headed over to the Jurassic park area, which was a delightful blast from the past. We rode the Velocicoaster, which was a roller coaster in the truest sense of the word. We found that the Velocicoaster was fast and fun like roller coasters should be. And, after the ride, we headed out into the gift shop and museum, which was modeled after the museum in the movies. We got some fun photos of us inside the museum and then headed out and back over to the world of Harry Potter.
After trying a frozen Butter Beer, which was very sweet but tasty, we tried to ride The Flight of the Hippogriffs but the line was too long and not moving due to it having to start and stop a number of times thanks to the wind. So, we got in the line at Hogwarts for the Forbidden Journey. Even though this was about a 30 minute wait, every minute of it was worth it because we got to be inside Hogwarts for the entirety of it. We saw the sorting hat, the Phoenix guarding Dumbledore’s office, listened to paintings talk to each other and more. This turned out to be our favorite ride and we even rode it again at the end of the day. After the ride, we were ready to find lunch and found our way to the Three Broomsticks, which provided us with an excellent meal and view of Hogwarts.
After lunch, we got in line to ride the Hogwarts Express over to Diagon Alley and the other park. In what was one of our longer waits of the day, we wound around until it was our turn to get on board. It was fun to see ”the view” outside our window and we heard Harry and his gang walking by in the corridor, which was cool. Once in Diagon Alley, we were able to walk through all of the fun stores from the movies, such as the candy store and joke shop. And, we made sure not to miss Knockturn Alley where we saw the darker side of the Harry Potter series. In Bourgan and Burkes, we considered purchasing Lucious Malfoy’s cane and other items belonging to the Dark Arts. We rode Escape from Gringotts, which in our opinion, was fun but not quite as exciting and magical as the Forbidden Journey ride.
In both Hog’s Meade and Diagon Alley, there were really long lines outside of Ollivander’s Wand Shop. While you could purchase a cheaper, non-interactive version of a wand at various carts throughout the park, many families chose to wait in these long lines so that they could spend around $60 purchasing the interactive wands and experiencing the fun of choosing the right wand or having the right wand chosen for you. The interactive wands could then be used to cast spells at various markers throughout the park. We can’t speak to the value of this purchase or the experience as we opted to 3D print our own wands at home and bring them with us. This satisfied us perfectly fine and we don’t feel like we missed out.
It seems to me that after the Wizarding World Area, which is a can’t miss experience even for those who are not super huge fans of the book/movie series, that the rest of the parks should be visited according to one’s own interests. We passed by the Men In Black experience and spend quite a bit of time in the Simpson themed area. We had Duff beer and waited in a 45 minute line so that we could ride the Krustyland ride. Because the Simpsons was such a big part of our childhood, we really enjoyed this. We skipped the E.T. Ride and the Transformers themed activities but that was because we wanted to ride the Rip Ride Rockit and go on the Tonight show themed ride. The Rip Ride Rockit was a long ride but a really fun, classic roller coaster type thrill ride. While the actual ride, Race Through New York Starring Jimmy Fallon, was kind of lame in our opinion, seeing all of the memorabilia from the show and feeling like you are actually there at a taping was pretty fun. Chris thought it was funny how the design for the building was practically identical to 30 Rock, which is where he works sometimes.
After that, we decided to skip the lengthy wait to ride the Hogwarts Express back to Islands of Adventure and just walked, which was much faster. Back in the other park, we rode a bunch of the Avengers themed rides, which were fun and worth the wait (25 minutes or less). Before leaving the park, we decided to ride the Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey ride again. We loved it just as much the second time.
The bottom line is that we had a really nice time at the Universal theme parks and contribute that partly to the fact that we were there without our kids. This gave us the freedom to ride all of the rides that we wanted to ride and do what we wanted to do. While the whole experience was somewhat costly, we really enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone who loves amusement parks, especially those who are also fans of Harry Potter. I mean, who doesn’t need a little more magic in their lives?
