6:30 a.m.
I planned yesterday to hit up the Orlando Eye first on my way up before check-in but the forecast predicted potential rain and my GI was having "fluidity" issues so I decided to let my two doses of Kaopectate do its thing, delayed my start and instead went straight to the hotel from Sebring (with first a quick stop at a MetroWest Walmart and a hole-in-the-wall Chinese place for provisions.)
The drive up was uneventful and included an actually surprising clog-free flow right through the ChampionsGate and Disney I-4 corridor! Still though, just five minutes on Kirkman made me wonder how I survived all those years living in this city. Give me the redneck but less severe traffic of Highlands County any day, thank you very much.
Still in my "good boy" phase, my provisions included only a four-pack of PBR 16'ers and I only had one with a couple Bennies to help me sleep around midnight after watching a great "kick off Pride Month movie" on Showtime featuring a most-delicious Timmie Chalamet -- "Call Me By Your Name."
That's right, it's still just 6:30 am as I post this. Got a solid five hours in a very comfy bed here at the Clarion Inn and Suites Near Universal Orlando. This is a snap of a room just like mine I found online. Too lazy to click one of my own, plus, I intend to take a few pics at the park through the long day today and I have but little space before Google tries to sell me cloud space. (BTW, the main photo of the post above is also a ripoff)
The only downside is no in-room microwave so no hot meals. I have Chicken in a Biskit crackers and either Easy Cheese or onion dip for breakfast. I plan on sampling a few of the reportedly fine delicacies at the park throughout the day so I'll be quite fine.
Oh, speaking of food, how did I do on my Epic Diet I started a month ago? Did I lose the goal weight of 20 pounds? Bitch please! I gained at least a pound. So proly no coasters for me these next few days. My only hope is Monsters Unchained and Ministry of Magic are okay for me today. Those are the two I was most anxious to ride anyway.
Well I'm gonna kick back and chill 'till around 9:30 - 10 or so. I saw the rope drop festivities on the vloggers' vids so I don't mind foregoing that in favor of playing the long game and being able to muster out a long, hot day until close. I do mean to stay 'till then. This park is gorgeous at night and I don't want to miss it.
6:00 p.m.
Well I'm back at the hotel already.
First off, let me just say, it's not because the day was a total bust. I'm actually proud of what I got accomplished considering the circumstances.
I did get to the park as planned around 9:30 am but it turns out either I read the app wrong or they changed the park hours overnight, not sure, but instead of the hours being 9:00 am to 10:00 pm, the park is actually open today from 10:00 am to 9:00 pm! So I arrived early enough for rope drop. Still a big ass queue of cars to get in and I was directed to park way out yonder in the section called "Monsters." Remember that photo I showed of opening day where the parking lot was barely occupied by noon? We were well past that already by 9:30 am. And once in the park it became painfully obvious -- Universal isn't capping attendance numbers anymore. The park was jammed! Wait times were immediately intense. Ministry of Magic shot up to 150 minutes and never really let up for the rest of the time I was there. Luckily, Monsters Unchained was only 35 minutes early on when I got in the queue and I was able to ride her with not too horrible a wait. Then it broke down for a couple hours afterwards and the wait times were something like over 50 minutes in the afternoon. All other rides were equally ridiculous.
Here's a rundown of what I was able to do:
As I walked in through the Chronos gate, the TMs were announcing that two worlds were queueing up to get ready for rope drop: Nintendo World and Dark Universe. I was thirsty AF from still being dehydrated due to yesterday's bout of bowel problems so I chose not to just stand around like a simp and grabbed a Diet Coke at a Celestial Park kiosk ($5.31), sat on a bench and sipped until Dark Universe opened officially. I didn't see or hear any fanfare like the videos I showed in my previous posts of opening day and media previews.
Once in Dark Universe, I chugged the rest of my soda and made my way to Monsters Unchained. The queue was great and a nicely themed ride overall but I gotta be critical on two fronts. 1. The plot was confusing and a bit convoluted to follow, kinda like any comic book action movie these days. 2. The mechanics were okay but if you ask me, the very similar Forbidden Journey at IOA is worlds better! Let's just say, I had no desire to ride it again. Oh, I did fit fine in it.
Went over to the Burning Blade Tavern windmill. Very nice fire effect. Feels nice and hot on a hot day, just what you want, LOL! Grabbed a tasty IPA ($15.40 w/tip)
Next, on to Harry Potter and the Ministry of Magic for the 12:00 pm showing of Cirque Arcanus. Very nice show. Nice world, well themed.
Ran to Isle of Berk to catch the 12:45 show of the Untrainable Dragon but got there too late, walked around Celestial Park a bit, some live music playing, then got over to the 1:30 pm show. Vikings, loud music, flying dragons -- what's not to love? Another awesome themed land by the way. The coaster here looked really fun. Again, wait times way too crazy all day.
Wanted to eat at Pizza Moon but it was a 20 minute line just to be seated, then you would have to use the QR code on the table to place your order and who knows how long before your food would come out? The crowds were just outrageous! I ended up heading back to Darkmoor and had a bit of a back and forth with the bartender about the ridiculousness of this mobile ordering system, especially when it comes to stuff like the garlic pretzel I ordered there.
So get this -- I could order my beer from the bartender in the bar, and if I looked over twenty feet away, there was the kitchen with the orders going out to the "servers." I wasn't able to order the food from the bartender -- that had to be done through the app. I asked him what would happen if I didn't have a phone. He said I'd have to order at the pick up window. So I get my beer and walk outside, around the building and show up at the window (remember, this is twenty feet away from where I was when I was just inside) and ask for a garlic "stake" (the pretzel is shaped like a vampire-killing "stake," get it?). The "server" asks if I did a mobile order. I say no. He says I have to order it on the app. I said, well if I just ask you for it, like right now, wouldn't that be faster? He admits yes but you can tell he's trained to try to get people to use the fucking app and he's resisting but he finally gives in and reaches around and grabs the food and I pay with my credit card like a fucking normal person ($12.77). What fucking bullshit! They weren't necessarily rude about it, it's just that either they really are duped into believing it's a better system or they're scared of breaking the rules. Universal probably tells them mobile ordering is more efficient and helps save the planet by reducing printing menus and receipts and yada fucking yada but of course I know it's really to enable them to harvest even more information for their database.
The snack was really filling and quite tasty coming with a soufflé of garlic butter dipping sauce. My only complaint is it was slightly cold. Probably because I didn't order it through the app. I'm sure app orders come nice and hot. :)
Once I ate, I suddenly started decompensating and my hopes to stay 'till closing started fading away. I was sweaty as a pig, starting to burn despite the overcast (yes, as a Floridian I know the sun can still burn through cloud cover) and I was worried that if I pushed it too hard, I'd be all the more hurting tomorrow and maybe not able to enjoy my Day Two of this multi-park trip. So at 3:30, I figured 6 hours was good enough.
Quickly poked my head into Nintendo World -- and rapidly skedaddled out again once hit with that throngs of sensory-overload colors, sounds and, of course, kids, kids, and more kids!
One ride, two shows, some live music. Saw Igor and The Invisible Man walking about Darkmoor. Had one snack, one soda and two beers for a total of $80.88 including $32 for parking and, of course, not including admission.
Tuesday, June 3, 2025
5:30 pm
Yes I know, again no "full day" but I gotta say, I think those may be behind me. My body just won't have it.
But fear not, again I feel I got a lot done for the time I spent in the park. Today's selection: Universal Studios Florida (The Original Park).
No pictures since, well, I've taken my share over the years haven't I? And it's still pretty much the same as it's been for decades. Though there have been a few changes since my last visit and I got to experience at least one of them today.
Here's my so-called rundown of my day:
I weighed the options of either walking (since the hotel is actually within walking distance if I want to work up a bit of a sweat), driving and thus paying another $32 parking or taking ride share. I decided on the latter since it was the least physically stupid considering I'm not really in any shape to walk and the most cost-effective as it would be about 2/3 the cost even with a nice tip for the driver. I've always used Uber in the past but I decided to give Lyft a shot. Pretty much the same except I still haven't figured out how to rate the driver after I tip them. Oh well, hope it doesn't hurt their stats. I like how they have a "wait a little longer" feature to save a little money (yet the driver, at least today and for this location, showed up almost immediately anyway).
Drop off was at the top of the north garage and even though I could see by the time I made it through security and stepped off the people mover belt into City Walk proper that the park was going to be jammed (and it was) it was a very different experience that yesterday.
Studios (and IOA in my experience) have always handled huge crowds pretty effectively. Now, that's not to say that the most popular rides aren't going to get plagued with hefty wait times -- they sure will, but those rides will fluctuate regularly throughout the day. And other rides can benefit from the uneven crowd allocation. I think it all has to simply do with the fact that there are just many more rides and attractions than Epic has right now. More things for people to go to means better crowd control. Epic will struggle with this for quite a while until, and if, they get more shit in there. (Speaking of Epic, I was checking the app throughout the day and they were having the same issues today, maybe even worse since it looked like Ministry of Magic was down most of the day...ugh!)
Like yesterday, I arrived at the park wicked thirsty so I got a water and an Americano at the Today Show Café. Boy I miss the Café Boulangerie which used to be in this spot. It took these guys about 15 minutes to make my coffee. I got a little snippy with the server that brought it over to me and said "Oh you must have had to get it from Colombia." I felt bad right away and made a mental note to myself to not be such a fucking asshole. Sometimes this works and (mostly) it did today. :)
Speaking of "Wicked," after my drinks, that's where I went. They have a large gift shop dedicated solely to Wicked merch. You can buy Wicked themed shit like the usual keychains and t-shirts and such but they also had, for display only, costumes, jewelry and other items from the movie. How cool!
Of course I didn't buy any crap, I just browsed and then made my way over to a "ride" I'd never done before since it was installed just after my last pass expired: The Villain-Con Minion Blast. A quick 15 minute wait time. Neat little standup conveyer belt thing where you shoot a gun to gain points (like Men in Black). Kinda crowded close together so for a tall guy like me I had the problem of trying to constantly avoid smacking the short lady in front of me in the head with my gun as I was shooting.
Having had no breakfast except a small cup of crackers, I walked by a kiosk offering pizza by the slice and figured it do the trick so I got one of pepperoni with a cup of Diet Coke fountain service and sat in the little park in front of Jimmy Fallon watching the birds boldly make their moves to see if I'd leave them a bit of the crust. I didn't. The slice was a huge New York style (of course since it was the New York area) flavorful yet a bit greasy. Not at all bad though. It indeed hit the spot.
On to Mummy! Single riders. Immediate walk on placement. Fit no problem. Always a good ride although, as always, way too freakin' short.
Haagen-Dazs? Sure, why not. Small coffee chip, sugar cone please. Immediate melting going on in the Florida sunshine...better eat it quick.
Transformers. Again, single riders, immediate seating. Sweet! No crazy wait times here!
Fast and Furious. Will it be a trifecta of single rider walkons? Yup!
Diagon Alley. Can you believe I almost forgot this was here? I remembered it only as I was walking towards it. Oh my beloved, how could I forget you? I walked through the brick wall just in front of a family whose mom I could hear behind me exclaiming her surprise at the vision of it all in front of her. I love the first-timer reaction. It truly is a wonder and it's great to relive it again!
Grabbed another water (Gilly Water) and, of course, a Butterbeer. Tastes better than I remember. Not as super sweet. Good. It was kinda gross before.
Hello say the storm clouds of summer in Central Florida. Luckily the greenhouse-like canopy over much of Diagon Alley, which I luckily was sitting under, shielded me from much of its deluge. But the rain was a bit relentless and persisted off and on for the better part of the next hour as I lazily moved about the park. The parade I was hoping to catch was canceled. And, ultimately, I was getting a little pooped.
Pretty much around the same time as yesterday, I made my way out of the park, to the ride share waiting area, called a Lyft and went home to my hotel. Oh, but I did snap up a magnet at the central parking garage hub gift shop kiosk on the way.
Today's out of pocket:
Lyft rides there and back: $20.01
Today Café bottled water and Americano: $10.46
Pizza and Diet Coke: $17.87
Ice cream cone: $7.44
Gilly water bottle and Butterbeer: $15.57
Souvenir magnet: $10.65
Today's total (again, not including admission): $ 82.00
Wednesday, June 4, 2025
2:00 pm
What? Two O'clock? Don't feel bad, I don't. I think in many respects it was the perfect cap of my vacation.
I fell asleep early last night failing to finish watching Raiders of the Lost Ark for the umpteenth time on Showtime around 8:30 pm. I knew it was too early and it would mess my sleep pattern up. I slept well (this bed is VERY comfortable) and for a good amount of time with minimal tossing and turning and maybe only two pee trips to wake up around 4:30 am. Well, 8 hours so...but was it a majority REM? Maybe not. I didn't feel "degaussed" if you know what I mean. What's more, my muscles were still achy from their relative workout from all this walking and shit. My body is just not used to it. Also, understandably, I was hungry. I had a few more crackers and dip and that held me over for a couple hours but by 6:30 I geared up and made my way back to Walmart to buy some proper provisions -- lunch meat, bread, mayo and even the ol' standby canned ravioli and spaghetti and meatballs, to be eaten cold out of the can. Oh, and I also got washer fluid for Hulk and a Beetlejuice t-shirt to wear today.
Did I not mention I'd been wearing Universal IP themed t-shirts for these visits? Yep. Each black with the following decals: Monday I wore Jurassic World, yesterday's was Halloween II and today Beetlejuice.
Summoned my Lyft around 10:30 am and felt the burn trying to walk through City Walk to IOA. Took it slow and steady. Good thing; got to appreciate a high school band at the lakeside bandstand playing Universal IP theme music (ie. John Williams compositions) like Jurassic Park and Harry Potter. Good job for a small town bunch of teenagers from Indiana. Great memory for them I'm sure.
Checked out the City Walk Epic Universe Preview store. Nice good-sized miniature model of the park with lots of details.
Oh the nostalgia waves as I walked through the familiar gates of IOA and entered the Port of Entry. I immediately made my way to Backwater Bar, sidled up to the bar, ordered a frozen Confisco Margarita (I usually get rocks but figured I be different today -- good choice; frozen was soothing and surprisingly just as strong), sat my ass at my usual seat at the outdoor "reviewing bar" on the patio (you know the spot) and chilled. For an hour. Then got another. And chilled some more.
I sat and remembered. And shed a little tear. But I also marveled at the present and how beautiful everything was. I was loving my moment. I was content and I knew that I need go no further.
By 1:30 the clouds were threatening anyway, I had my fill with just two drinks, I had no stamina and was seeing peripheral auras. But no waterfall eyes emojis for me, dear hearts. I'm good.
Today's costs, not including admission as usual:
Lyft's: $11.92 (I think they gave me some first timer's discount or something)
Backwater Bar Memory Lane Juice: $42.61 w/tips
Today's tally: $54.53
Vacation Grand Total (including hotel and park tickets): $1057.38