Completed 4/24 - I Don't Think We Got Enough Treats or Candy... - Sept 2021 Disneyland/Universal Trip Report

[Araminta18]

Birthday Brunch!
Saturday September 18 2021 (part 1)​

The day dawned bright and early, but we weren't ropedropping so we slept in! It was my actual birthday, and we had a day planned full of yummy eating to celebrate, especially since we had no park tickets for today.

We left the room after packing up a little bit, around 10 am. I wanted to do some leisurely shopping in Downtown Disney and explore, and you know - buy all the souvenirs! - before our brunch reservation at 11ish. It was a little sad to walk through the Esplanade and not head into a park, but I couldn't be too sad, since there was a day of great eating ahead.

We wandered through the shops, buying more than we should (and exchanging some items for better sizes). I don't remember what all we got at this point, but I promise a haul at the end of this trip report! As we got to the far end, we found that they were doing a promotion for the Wonder Years reboot and we got ice cream!

Not chintzy ice cream either -- I was impressed! It was a bit close to our brunch reservation time but it's not like we could pass up free ice cream.

We meandered through a few more shops (including the Lego Store where I tried to convince Trevor he needed the giant Millenium Falcon - thank heavens he was wiser than I and said no!

Then it was time for brunch at Storyteller's Cafe! I was really excited for this one - I'd heard all sorts of good things and the character outfits looked super cute. We checked in and were waiting outside to be called in when who should walk by but my favorite princess!

She didn't stop, but she did tell me that she liked my ears, so that was nice. Happy Birthday to me!

We got seated pretty soon after that, in the little alcove to the left of the entrance area. Then it was time for food! Well actually, the waiter got us our drinks and then right as I was about to go to the buffet, the characters came out!

Since it was COVID they didn't really come and meet at every table, more like they went up and down the main walkways. I got lucky and managed to snag a few photos as they did. We also took several video clips - I spliced them together here: Characters at Storyteller's Cafe

Trevor thought he was being funny taking photos of me taking pictures with the characters. Photo-ception?

Mickey and Minnie came out with Chip and Dale but Chip and Dale didn't walk by our table this time (again, I assume COVID). But that was ok - time for food! I will say the brunch menu was a little bit confusing -- our waiter was super nice but we weren't quite sure how the buffet + a la carte options worked. So first off we just hit the buffet. It all looked so good! I was a little bit sad that the cereal milk wasn't there (we'd seen it in a couple vlogs/reviews and I was morbidly curious to try it), but otherwise it all looked delicious.

Round one for me: eggs, berry french toast, mickey waffle, croissant, bacon -- breakfast of champions!

Round one for Trevor: eggs benedict, bagel with salmon, bacon, mickey waffle....

Round two! Fruit and pastry for me.

All the food was really good. Too much good stuff and not enough stomach space! We made a pretty good dent and then ordered some dishes off the a la carte menu. The waiter was great -- we only ordered two things and then he brought us a couple extra dishes that he thought we might like. So nice.

So, we ordered the beignet bites:

These were good -- they had some kind of berry jelly in them which wasn't my favorite, but they were good.

We also ordered the Avocado Toast on Ciabatta (with Burrata, Tangerine Oil, and Micro Citrus Greens).

This was also delicious! I know avocado toast is a millenial cliche but I don't care 'cause it's delicious. Fight me. It was nice and fresh.

Then waiter-supplied bonus dishes - Shawarma Chicken Skewer with Pita Bread, Roasted Tomato, Red Onion, and Tzatziki Spread

This was interesting -- Trevor liked it more than I did, but it was still good. Just seemed a bit out of place at a brunch.

Last one - Truffle french fries!

I always think truffle will be better than it is, and I don't usually like thick cut french fries but these were cooked perfectly. Crispy and hot and just perfect.

Yea...too much food. But so good! I wish I had more stomach space - would have hit that buffet again for sure! While we were waiting for the food to settle (let's be real...hoping to see if we'd have more room for food ) Chip and Dale came around!

Tried to get Trevor in the shots this time. I was only able to get a pic with Chip though.

This was the best picture I was able to get of us with Dale. I'll take it!

Did manage to get Mickey with both me and Trevor this time!

So yea -- a great birthday brunch! Delicious food, fun characters...highly recommend. And I loved the entryway:

I really liked the decor of the whole restaurant actually. The paintings were nice and it just felt warm and welcoming and rustic. I'd love to go back for brunch again sometime!

After brunch, we strolled on through the Grand Californian lobby -- I know we just ate but I wanted to get some of their Halloween treats to take back to the room. And there was no line, so it worked out! But first, look at this Oogie Boogie display. Bonkers. So cool!

We (let's be real, me - Trevor doesn't have nearly the sweet tooth and was still too full to even look at treats) was only gonna get the Mickey-shaped Whoopie Pie but then I saw this:

Look at all those cookie shot glasses! Couldn't not get that!!!

I got it with chocolate milk - it was delicious! The glass was thicker than I thought it would be -- both Trevor and I really liked it.

And the whoopie pie! We didn't eat it right then, just took a picture.

Doesn't really look like Mickey but meh, what can you do.

After our dessert, we went back to shopping -- we decided to do the pumpkin scavenger hunt, which was fun. It was super easy, which I guess is to be expected, but it was fun to look around and find them all. We also bought a bunch more treats (macarons and cakes from Kayla's Cakes... ), cause I apparently never learn my lesson.

Eventually though we flagged and headed back to the hotel to drop our purchases and take a nap. Shopping and eating really takes it out of you! Back at the hotel we arrived at the exact wrong time when housekeeping was in our room, so we had to wait for a little bit. We actually ended up wandering around and looking around at the view, and found this...slightly disturbing Minnie and Donald. We did like this hotel for the location and the rooms were clean and comfortable but man...that theming is rooooooough.

Ok, this is a good stopping point, so gonna stop here...any guesses on our plans for dinner?

 

[Araminta18]

Corndog bummer - but hey, those pictures turned out great! I love those silhouettes, and I am a big fan of the carousel as well so I loved seeing those pictures too. What's with pirates being a wet ride now? I've seen several other people mention that too, and it would definitely annoy me to get soaked on pirates.

Can't wait to see how you closed out your last day!

Not sure what's up with Pirates! Made me grateful it was our very last ride cause wet butt is not my favorite feeling in the world lol

 

[Araminta18]

Eating away the afternoon
Saturday, September 18, 2021 (part 2)​

After our nap, it was time for our dinner pre-game! We were heading back to Trader Sam's for fun drinks and atmosphere before our fancy dinner. Our dinner reservation was at 7:30 (any guesses? ) so I figured Trader Sam's at 4:30 would be a fun pre-dinner activity.

Since we had a reservation, we were seated inside again - yay! We were still at the bar, but on the opposite side this time, so that was nice - got to see different decorations on the other side of the bar.

I found my favorite piece of theming - the "Paradise Falls" jar!

They don't have a ton of non-alcoholic drinks, so we got repeats:

So here's the problem with not taking notes! I have our receipts - I know we got a Polynesian Punch, a Schweitzer Falls, and a Skipper Sipper but I'm not sure which is which! They were all good though. Just not all that different lol

We were just gonna get drinks, enjoying the ambiance and hopefully the special drink effects, but we were getting hungry so we ordered some Panko-crusted Long Beans (served with Togarashi Aïoli) to tide us over 'cause these were so good last time.

Delicious! Highly recommend getting these if you go to Trader Sam's.

I think we'd definitely go here again, but next time I'll try and get an actual evening reservation, under the hopes that more people will order the fancy drinks with effects so we can see them! There were only two orders with effects this time. Still fun though. And we did film them, of course: Krakatoa Punch and Uh Oa.

Selfie with the CMs photobombing, which was not planned!

As we were leaving, we took some more pics of the decorations -

The House Rules cracked me up!

A map of the Temple of Mara!

We left around 6 and headed back out to Downtown Disney to kill time before our dinner reservation. It had gotten much more crowded than it was earlier in the day! Good thing we'd gotten most of our shopping done already. But I did see something else I'd been wanting to try, even if it perhaps wasn't the best idea right before dinner: Salt and Straw ice cream!

I'd heard so much of their weird flavors I couldn't wait to try it. And cool enough they were doing samples! So i got to sample the pear and blue cheese and honey lavender...strange, but good! We decided to get one cup and split it so we'd still have our appetites for dinner, and Trevor isn't as adventurous with ice cream as I am, so we got Chocolate Gooey Brownie and Salted Malted Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough.

Delicious! Though I think if I were to go back I'd get one of the weird flavors. I kind of wish they'd do an ice cream flight like Ample Hills used to do at Disney World.

We ended up sitting outside in Downtown Disney and people watching while we ate our ice cream. It was nice, though we eventually migrated indoors to the Grand Californian lobby to listen to the music there in the lobby...we were impatient for our dinner! We did look around a bit in the gift shop there and I ended up caving and buying some of the H2O softening foot rub.

Finally! It was time for our dinner reservation. Where were we going?

Napa Rose!

 

[Araminta18]

Napa Rose Chef's Counter Birthday Dinner!
Friday, September 18 2021 (part 3)​

Had to start a new post for dinner at Napa Rose! We had reserved the Chef's Counter, but I didn't book soon enough to get a seat at the main counter, so we were at the dessert counter. I was slightly disappointed by this initially, but by now, I was just excited. They led us over to the counter closest to the main room.

The dessert counter has 4 seats, so you can see the two empty seats there to Trevor's right.

Selfie! I also loved the little vase of roses there. Just a nice touch.

We started with some drinks - we asked for some mocktails and again, I should have taken notes 'cause I don't remember anything about what these are! The receipt says Pomegranate Splash for both but I thought we got different things...maybe not!

I remember these being good, but I should have written this sooner...it's been a while! As you can tell we definitely like our mocktails.

After we got our drinks one of the chefs came by and talked with us asking about any allergies, food preferences, etc. We basically said we were open to whatever, though I did say that seafood wasn't my favorite. But part of the fun of these fancy restaurants is trying things I normally wouldn't, so... yea.

Then the courses started!

Trevor and I both got Golden Osetra Caviar, Red Beet Borscht, and Buckwheat Blinis.

It came with the fancy mother of pearl spoon to eat the caviar with. And I don't lilke beets but this was all really good, surprisingly - all the flavors together were just really nice. I kind of wanted a bigger portion! Definitely an auspicious start.

Next course, we got different dishes. I got Tomato Pissaladiere, Sauted Leeks and Arugula.

It's fancy flatbread, but it was really good. And I don't like tomatoes. The bread was a bit more chewy/dense than I was expecting, but delicious.

Trevor's dish was more interesting. He got Lobster Toast, Santa Barbara Sea Urchin.

The sea urchin on the plate threw Trevor for a loop! He eventually just asked if he was supposed to it and if so, how, but the sea urchin meat was already on the toast and so the shell was just there for decoration. He liked this a lot - I took a bite but it was too fishy/seafoody for me.

The courses came out just slow enough to ramp up that anticipation...though of course we eat fast too. We really enjoyed watching the chefs work on the dessert, though the big silver thing did block our view a bit more than I would have liked cause they had to raise the lid to work on things.

They were all super nice and friendly and talked to us about what they were doing though. Great fun. The Chef de Cuisine Gloria Tae came over at one point to say hi and was also very friendly. I kind of see what people mean now about not having as great a view at the dessert counter but we still really enjoyed what we were able to see.

Anyways, back to the food! Right about here was when I started recording when the server brought the food so I could remember what the dish was! I wasn't sure if we'd be getting a menu at the end (spoiler: we did), so this was just in case.
My next course was Diver Scallop, haricot verts and golden chantrelle mushrooms with Brentwood yellow corn. The printed menu mentions pomegranates but I don't think there were any.

I think this was the only miss of the night for me. The scallop was too fishy and I just...not my favorite. It was just too fishy for me, but probably great for people who like seafood.

Trevor got Arctic Char, with blackberrries and cauliflower mushrooms. The printed menu says it's Arctic Char with roasted honeynut squash, and sage brown butter, but again, I don't think so.

I think he liked that more than I liked my scallop!

Next up I got apple pancake and duck confit.

This doesn't look like much but it was really really good. The pairing of the apple and the duck - delicious.

Trevor got Bone Marrow Custard (the printed menu mentions braised beef veal cheeks but the server didn't mention that when she dropped off the food).

He did not like the texture of this, but he liked the taste. First time having bone marrow!

I got another drink at this point - don't remember what it was but considering it's red, it was probably something with berries.

Next up we got a palate cleanser: pomegranate tangerine sorbet (the printed menu says orange)

So good! I definitely wanted more than just a bite.

But next up was our main course!

I got Grilled Filet Minion, parsnip puree, brussel sprouts, parsnips, and apples, with a hazelnut relish.

Trevor got Sauteed Creekstone Farms Petit Filet Mignon, Braised beef ragout, and cheddar whipped potatoes.

Both of these were really good, though I apologize for the complete lack of specifics here...I definitely enjoyed myself I just don't remember much of the details! Just that it was good.

Next was the cheese course! We both got Baked Mt Tam triple cream brie, braised lentils and fennel-red pepper marmalade and brioche crouton.

This was an interesting combo - hot cheese with lentils. I thought it was good, if a bit odd. Trevor loves brie but he did not like it at all (something with the texture) so I ate his too.

Next (I know, not the last course yet!) we got the Profiterole roll with lavender honey and white chocolate.

This was a fun little bite - lavender isn't my favorite flavor in food but it worked.

Finally, they asked us what we wanted for dessert after seeing everything. I think I should have asked for the raspberry thing or the chocolate thing, but I think I asked them what they liked best or would recommend, and so I got Summer Peach Custard Pie, Blackberries, and Peach sorbet. It was delicious, but you know, buyer's remorse and all that. And I'm a fan of chocolate and berries

They were nice and put happy birthday on my plate!

Trevor got Tropical Kidavoa Chocolate Mousse, passionfruit inside with mango sherbet and bruleed pineapple.

Trevor doesn't really like pineapple in meals or grilled, so I got to eat that, but he liked the rest of it.

And that was the end of the courses! 9 courses total, for those of you keeping track at home. Overall, it was delicious food and great service, with a great show watching them make all the desserts and getting to ask some questions and things. Trevor and I are super awkward so we felt a little weird asking questions/interrupting, but they were so friendly it helped. We got our signed souvenir menus at the end to take home, though as you may have noticed they were 100% what we got. Basically, highly recommend the chef's counter here -- definitely going to go back!

We kind of rolled out of the restaurant at 10:40, and slowly meandered back to the hotel through Downtown Disney and the esplanade. We kind of didn't want to leave! So we lingered a bit longer at the esplanade, enjoying the music and sound effects and taking pictures of some of the Halloween banners there.

And one last Oogie Boogie picture...

The nice thing about going back to the hotel for the last time after a big meal is that we were kind of tired and ready to lay down and veg, so it helped us not be tooooo sad to be leaving. Except we (I) still were. Despite some of the food misses (looking at you corn dog), we had a great time and enough time to ride all the rides despite the crowds (except Tarzan's Treehouse and that unexpected closure sadness ), and got so lucky with Web Slingers and Rise! And we weren't going home yet, just heading over to Universal, so that helped too. But yea...still sad to leave, but a wonderful way to end my birthday.

Last Disneyland picture!

Fun with Metrics:
Steps walked: 14,404 steps (5.9 miles)

 

[FeistyDisneyMom]

Napa Rose! Great way to cap off the Disney food experience, and on a higher note than the corndogs I especially enjoyed your description of Storytellers. We have never been, and it is on my list of special items for our trip in June!

Great pictures of the esplanade, and perfect selfie of thank you for visiting. Between the souvenirs and the treats, how did you get all the stuff packed up?

 

[Araminta18]

Napa Rose! Great way to cap off the Disney food experience, and on a higher note than the corndogs I especially enjoyed your description of Storytellers. We have never been, and it is on my list of special items for our trip in June!

Great pictures of the esplanade, and perfect selfie of thank you for visiting. Between the souvenirs and the treats, how did you get all the stuff packed up?

LOL yes! Napa Rose was definitely a better ending note than the corn dog. Ooh I hope you have a wonderful meal at Storytellers - we really enjoyed it.

Honestly? We flew Southwest and brought empty suitcases so we could fill them with treats and such and each check two suitcases on the way back!

 

[FeistyDisneyMom]

Empty suitcases is so smart! You are an excellent planner - I love the way you explain your preparations but also go with the flow during your park days. Really great reading your trip reports - I plan on stalking your WDW reports when I am ready to plan a vacation there

 

[Araminta18]

Empty suitcases is so smart! You are an excellent planner - I love the way you explain your preparations but also go with the flow during your park days. Really great reading your trip reports - I plan on stalking your WDW reports when I am ready to plan a vacation there

Aw, thank you! That's so kind. And that's exactly why I plan -- if I plan, we have options and can do what we want in the moment, including ditching the plan and just hanging out. But if I don't plan, it cuts down on our options -- we can't just feel like a walkup dinner at Napa Rose or brunch at Lamplight Lounge (generally ). Anyways. Getting off my soapbox now before I really get going!

I hope you get to go to WDW soon!

 

[Araminta18]

Universal Here We Come!
Sunday, September 19 2021 (part 1)​

We woke up Sunday morning sad to be leaving Disneyland but excited to head over to Universal Studios! We'd never been to Universal in Florida, and Trevor's a big Harry Potter fan so when planning this trip, we decided to add a few days and do Universal - see Harry Potter land, all that jazz. So when we woke up Sunday morning, Trevor especially was excited.

We wanted to head over early rather than later, but when planning I was conflicted about how to get from Disneyland over to Universal. We'd ended up making a rental car reservation through Costco (cause refundable basically no matter what) for like $70, and then figured we'd check uber/lyft prices that morning and see what they were like. I'd been reading stories of crazy high uber/lyft prices so I wanted to have the rental car option just in case. But when we finished packing up and were ready to leave at about 9 am, the uber prices weren't bad, so we decided to go with that instead of the rental car.

We got picked up at 9:18 am. I figured Sunday morning traffic couldn't be that bad but you never know, so it was nice to have essentially no traffic. We got dropped off at the Sheraton Universal (one of the two "onsite" Universal hotels) at 9:57 am, for a total cost of $60 including tip. Not too shabby! Especially considering I left a slightly larger tip 'cause we had a bunch of bags and one of them was super heavy with all our Halloween candy.

It actually worked out great. We walked in, dropped off our luggage, checked in (though our room was of course not ready yet), and then right as we were going to walk up the hill to Universal, the hotel shuttle pulled up! So on we hopped.

We pulled up to CityWalk 4 minutes later and were heading towards the front of Universal! It was actually kind of nice to get a feel for Citywalk with no crowds (since it was too early for any of the shops to be open).

By the time we arrived at the gate, it was about 10 min after the park had opened, and most of the early crowd lines at the gate and security had cleared out - I think it took about 5 minutes for us to get through?

Then we saw the arch/entranceway! Pretty nifty.

We walked through and they had a photographer right by the statue/fountain right inside the archway, and Universal's version of photopass was something I was interested in, so we stopped and got some pictures.

Not the most flattering photos, but what can you do. Also I literally just realized that they didn't even get the statue in the background...oh well!

Anyways. We were in the park, it had just opened, and I had a strategy -- head to the lower lot before the crowds make their way down there! And the lines were still posting short waits down there so off we went!

We passed some of the Halloween Horror Nights decorations--

creeeeeeeeepy. We hadn't bought tickets to HHN cause neither of us like gore or really scary stuff all that much (Trevor likes it a bit more than I do but still not a ton), though we were still keeping an open mind in case we decided we needed to buy tickets to have extra access to the rides or something. But decorations like that put me firmly in the no column!

We got over to the escalators to the lower lot and started to head down, but ran into trouble a bit. Trevor has a fear of heights that really manifests with high escalators. He was nervous about those escalators to the lower lot just based off pictures, but figured he'd give it a try. We made it about halfway down and then Trevor decided that was a no and so we did the stairs for the rest of the way down.

I did like the T-Rex bone shadow on the building as we came down.

We got in line for Jurassic World at 10:30 am. I don't remember what the posted wait was, but the actual wait was definitely shorter! There was a little bit of a wait, so we enjoyed looking around and taking pictures.

We were on the ride 7 minutes later. Not too shabby!

Second row in the middle - not a bad spot for our first ride! We didn't even get that wet. We really liked the ride though - lots of fun animatronics and that last drop...scary!

When we got off the ride we purchased our photo package there at the counter - I like Disney's system for photos better. It's a lot easier/less friction. Though I guess to be fair this was cheaper. We also spent some time looking around at the fun merch in the gift shop, though we decided not to purchase anything right then 'cause we didn't want to carry it around all day.

Next up, Transformers! Short posted lines for the win. We got in line at 10:54 am and were getting on the ride at 11:06am. Not long at all but it felt longer -- that is a very long/windy queue! I did like the one room where the robot lady is telling you what the mission is and she's all sad about how you're basically gonna die. Trevor took a video of part of it: Transformers Queue More video from the Transformers Queue

The ride was fun, but nothing super exciting - basically a motion simulator. Trevor liked it though.

We came out of the ride and found some Transformers out meeting and greeting!

We decided not to get in line to meet them though -- had more rides to do!

Over to the Mummy we went. It was posted 35 minutes (at 11:15 am), but I was hoping it would be shorter. We waited 10 minutes in the outside section and then we headed inside the building (yay AC!) We had fun looking at all the theming there, though as a big Brendan Fraser fan I was hoping for more of him and Rachel Weisz. We did like the Book of the Dead effect:

One of the other people in line triggered the effect first and so I filmed the last part of it: Revenge of the Mummy Book of the Dead effect But the line didn't move so I tried to get it to activate. Trevor filmed it: Tiffany trying to read the Book of the Dead yes, it did scare me a little!

There was another effect where you stuck your hand in a hole -- I wasn't brave enough for that one but Trevor tried: Mummy Queue interactive Trevor is not nearly as jumpy as me! I wasn't willing to try it. It also kind of reminded me of that scene in the movie "Roman Holiday" where they convince Audrey Hepburn to stick her hand in the statue's mouth and then they scare her

We finally made it to the pre-show room: Pre-Show

Pre-ride selfie!

Trevor was a bit nervous as this was a coaster, but we figured with this big a ride vehicle it couldn't be too intense. It was definitely scary though! I still liked it, though the effects were a bit cheesy.

We got off the ride at about 11:55 and we were hungry! Time for lunch. I'd done my research on where to eat, but I will say Disneyland definitely has better food options! But MrCheezyPop is one of the youtuber vloggers we like and he ate at Jurassic Cafe and the food looked pretty good, so we figured that should go on our list. So it being lunchtime, and us being right there, Jurassic Cafe it was! I did not realize that it didn't open until 12, so it was a pleasant surprise when the long line outside that I joined all of a sudden moved very quickly into the restaurant. But then it slowed down a lot. Dunno why, but it was just super slow. Also, the menu had changed from what I'd seen online and what they had wasn't super exciting, but oh well - food!

Trevor got the "Isla's Sliders" for $7.99 -- I would like to point out that the menu says "sliders" but apparently it just comes with one. I got the Tropical Roasted Chicken Salad - Iceberg lettuce, shredded cabbage, avocado, house-made citrus vinaigrette, garnished with pomegranate seeds and queso fresco. There was no pomegranate seeds on mine, and it was mostly just iceberg lettuce. Blergh. Oh well. We also got one of the refillable cups which Trevor was super excited about because he loves the Coke Freestyle machines, so at least lunch wasn't wholly a wash.

We also (well, me) couldn't resist a fun treat: a captain crunch rice-krispie-type treat!

This was good! I liked it. Lots of fun.

Overall, lunch wasn't the best. It was fine, but nothing memorable. And especially since it took us 26 minutes from the time we got in line to the time we got our food. If I'd realized beforehand that the menu had changed, we probably would have skipped it.

As we left after lunch, we saw Bumblebee (I think it was Bumblebee?) out meeting and greeting, so this time we did hop in line and meet him.

Also had to take a picture of Trevor with whatever this thing is (ah, custom buggy from Transformers, per the plaque).

We then saw that the raptor was going to be out meeting and greeting, so we decided to hang around for the next meet and greet - it was in about half an hour. So we sat down and watched the people on the ride and just kind of hung out. We did get to be first in line, which was neat. The raptor encounter is such a fun thing - highly recommend. The handlers are super funny - it's great.

I love Trevor's sideeye in this picture - definitely trying to keep an eye on that raptor! Like we know it's not real but it kind of feels real?

Raptor selfie!

And of course I filmed our whole encounter: Raptor Encounter!

At that point it was about 1:30, and the lines were starting to get long, so we decided might as well bite the bullet and go on the Tram Tour before it closed, and just put up with the line. We rode the shuttle up from the lower lot to the upper lot (cause Trevor was like "no way" to the stairs/escalator) and then headed over to the Tram Tour. Trevor did film the shuttle ride, just for kicks I guess? Shuttle ride from lower lot to upper lot

You get a great view from that walk to the tram tour!

Also, we got super lucky with the line -- we'd just gotten in line and they were calling out for a group of two and we were in the right spot and so we essentially got to walk right on! Yay! We were in the very back, but we had a great time.

Jimmy Stewart Avenue!

I loved all the trivia and fun information, like seeing Hitchcock's bungalow!

You can kind of see his line profile portrait to the right of the door.

Where they filmed The Good Place!

The Bates Motel was kind of blocked off for Halloween Horror Nights, which was a bit of a bummer, though to be fair I've never seen Psycho so not that big a deal.

Norman Bates almost got Trevor!

Trevor filmed the tour: Tram Tour

And there's my picture limit! What did we do after the Tram Tour? It was 2:30, and the park was closing at 5:30 (or 6? can't quite remember). What to do!

 

[erinch]

I basically binge read your whole report in one sitting and stayed up till 1 am when I had an early meeting the next morning! Tiffany for the win! Keep it coming! Thank you! I grew up in SCal, but left in the late 70s. When we went to Disneylamd, you still got E tickets, and Pirates and Haunted Mansion could not have been imagined. Automatronics!

 

[Araminta18]

I basically binge read your whole report in one sitting and stayed up till 1 am when I had an early meeting the next morning! Tiffany for the win! Keep it coming! Thank you! I grew up in SCal, but left in the late 70s. When we went to Disneylamd, you still got E tickets, and Pirates and Haunted Mansion could not have been imagined. Automatronics!

Oh gosh, that's so nice! I hope you weren't too sleepy for your meeting! lol Oh wow, eTickets and no Pirates or Haunted Mansion? crazy!

 

[Araminta18]

Best Show Ever (and a Disappointing Treat)
Sunday, September 19, 2021 (part 2)​

We left off with the Tram Tour - we really did like it, though being in the very back of the tram made it seem a bit like everything was on a bit of a delay since the guide would talk about something we wouldn't be able to see for another 15 seconds or so. And the part after the Jaws section was under construction mostly so not really anything to see there. Still fun.

As we headed into the upper lot from the Tram Tour, we decided to go by way of Harry Potter land! Our first glimpse of it, and it was kind of crazy crowded. We did enjoy the theming and taking pictures though, even if the lines for anything (including butterbeer at the carts) were too long for our taste. They had one of the Hogwarts Express conductors out so we stopped for a picture.

We left the crowds though and headed for Despicable Me! I think it was posted at 30 min or so; we waited 20. Which again, wasn't too bad. I did like all the fun details and funny posters/theming in the queue -- Minions are hilarious. Trevor filmed a little bit of the queue: Despicable Me Queue

The ride itself was kind of meh - we were off to the side so the simulation was a little askew. We did like the dance party at the end though - you can kind of see the projection behind us where we're dancing with the minions!

I also loved the gift shop theming -- I want to go to this amusement park!

I bought some banana taffy - I love fake banana flavor.

As we walked out, we saw one of the minions out meeting and greeting! There was basically no line, which was nice.

It was about 3:30 at this point, and perfect timing for us to head over to the WaterWorld show! We have no interest in WaterWorld the movie, but we'd heard such good things about the show, we figured we'd try and fit it in, and it worked out perfectly.

We had to wait a bit in the crush before they opened up the arena, but once they did, we got a great seat in the center section. They had a couple guys come out who basically were there to entertain the crowd. They were hilarious. Trevor filmed most of it - including how they kept soaking people (or a specific person in the splash zone) - we were all dying laughing: WaterWorld Pre Show

The show was good - great stunts and fantastic effects. I think I still liked the pre show better though. Trevor did film the show though so you can decide for yourself, but there's something to being there live that video can't capture: WaterWorld Show

The show got out at 4:30, and the park closed at 6 pm, and the crowds were definitely picking up, but we decided to head over and explore the Harry Potter section a bit more. It was still crowded but we had fun browsing in all the shops. I'm not a huge Harry Potter fan but I was definitely enabling Trevor and telling him he should buy things. Though we did look in the Hogwarts Express shop and I really liked the line of things with the Hogwarts Express ticket on them. I ended up getting a wallet with the ticket on it, and Trevor got a Hogwarts Express jacket. But aside from what we bought - the theming! So fantastic!

We also got some treats and such to take back to friends in HoneyDuke's - and I couldn't resist the non-melting ice cream (frosting ).

I'm a sucker for frosting.

At that point it was about 5, so we figured with the park closing at six, maybe the line for Harry Potter and Forbidden Journey was inflated? So we decided to hop in line. Well, after I tried the test seat -- I lost a bunch of weight in 2018/2019 but the pandemic was the pandemic and I'd gained a lot of it back and was a bit nervous about fitting on the ride, esp cause I thought I'd remembered this one being particularly unfriendly to larger folks. But the test seat gave me the ok! Yay! The first hurdle down -- test seats aren't always as reliable as you'd think they ought to be, so I was still a bit nervous about the actual ride, but fitting on the test seat was a good sign.

There was a little bit of a line starting at the entrance to the castle (so we walked all the way through the greenhouse), but it actually worked out 'cause we were enjoying all the theming and the line moved at just the right pace to let us linger but not get bored. We took a TON of pictures and video - and yes, I'm going to post them all. My trip report, you can't stop me.

All the pictures are of Trevor 'cause he's the Harry Potter fan.

I really loved the loading area -- the floating candles were amazing.

Queue videos:
Moving Portraits part 1
Moving Portraits part 2
Portrait Gallery
Dumbledore's Office
Defense against the Dark Arts Classroom
Fat Lady Portrait
Final Part of the Queue
The Sorting Hat

The wait was 30 minutes -- not bad at all! And I did indeed fit on the ride - yay!! It was a lot of fun, though I don't get motion sick at all on rides but with this ride I could see how people get motion sick. Basically, if any ride was gonna make me sick, it would be this one. Super interesting and fun though. I did like the real effects though (better than the screens).

We got off the ride at 5:45.

The castle!

With only 15 min til closing, we didn't really have time to do anything else, and one of the frozen butterbeer carts had a shorter line than we'd seen so far (like 4 or 5 people), so we decided to grab some. You have to try butterbeer, right?

This was my attempt at an Instagram shop - took the pic in front of the Three Broomsticks instead of the random cart with all the people around.

Unfortunately, this was a bust. Neither Trevor nor I liked it very much. Oh well. We had to try it!

At that point, we decided to meander out of the park. You could definitely tell it was Halloween Horror Nights, cause while Harry Potter world had indeed started to empty out, the rest of the park walkways (at least there in the upper lot) were bonkers crowded. Crowd video

As we meandered out, we ducked into some of the shops - I liked how they had movie memorabilia on display in the shops, particularly The Mummy memorabilia (#brendanfraserforever)

At one point while I was looking in the shop, Trevor was hanging around outside, as they were doing flame tests on one of the HHN things. He filmed it but he was too late - they didn't test them again: Flame Test (Hopefully ) It's kind of a long video but you can see the crowds and such - kind of a nice "Universal ambiance" video.

Aaand there's the picture limit!

 

[Araminta18]

We've Had First Dinner Yes, But What About Second Dinner?
Sunday, September 19 2021 (part 3)
​

The park had closed at 6, so we headed out and back through CityWalk to catch the shuttle back to the hotel (we were tired and our feet hurt. ) We couldn't wait to see our room!

We got back, picked up our bags and got our room key and headed up to our room! We were in room 2022. Room pics!

The last picture is from the bathroom, looking into the hall - the door to the left is the room door and the room is to the right.

We had a view of the city, not the theme park. Which was gorgeous. And the room was nice and spacious -- I really liked it. See that white bag with the red handles? That's all our Halloween candy and treats, including the whoopie pie we bought at the Grand Californian the day before. We broke the bag open to put some of the treats that needed refrigeration in the fridge, and the whoopie pie was calling my name.

Trevor and I ended up eating it while sitting on the floor in the hallway/bathroom floor. I don't remember why we were sitting on the floor - I think maybe I was putting stuff in the fridge which is in the hallway and low to the ground so I was just sitting down, and then decided to go for the whoopie pie and just didn't get up - but oddly enough it's a pleasant memory of the day: sitting on the floor eating the whoopie pie with Trevor and laughing. Even though the pie wasn't actually that good! Kind of bland. Oh well. Still a fun memory.

Our plan was to put the stuff in the room and then go get dinner at City Walk. So we headed back down to City Walk pretty quickly but before dinner -- VooDoo donuts! I'd seen these mentioned on Tim Tracker vlogs so often, so we had to get some!

There was a bit of a wait, and I was just drooling over the menu while we waited. The decor inside was pretty neat too (also who doesn't love a giant donut outside? )

A coffin full of donuts!!

But by the time we got to the front, two of the donuts we wanted were sold out - the bubble gum donut and the giant graveyard Halloween donut. Sadly, the people right before us at the register got the last giant graveyard donut. We ended up getting 3 donuts, for breakfast the next day.

Then, crepes! Trevor loves crepes (I like them too, but not as much as Trevor), and so when we found that CityWalk had a crepe place, that obviously had to go on our list. There was a little bit of a line, and they were kind of slow making the food, but after about 20 min we got our crepes!

Trevor got this strawberry chocolate crepe on the left, while I got the Florentine (cheddar, feta, spinach, and onion) crepe. They were both really good! Hearty and filling. The only problem was the wait time lol.

We looked around the shops in Universal for a while - Trevor bought some socks at the sock store, but after about half an hour or so we were getting kind of hungry again, and we'd wanted to try the giant pretzel at the NBC Sports Grille, so we figured hey, why not get it now! They didn't have any wait when we arrived, so that was nice - got seated immediately. Trevor ordered the giant pretzel, while I ordered the guacamole (it just sounded really good for whatever reason). Trevor also got some kind of mocktail - I foolishly didn't write down anything about it. Maybe some kind of lemonade?

The guacamole bowl included charred corn cotija guacamole dip, tomatoes, chips, pork rinds.

This was all really good - Trevor is a huge giant pretzel fan, and as you can see in the picture he was definitely excited for this one. And I liked the guacamole too. We didn't end up finishing either (Trevor took what was left of the pretzel back to the room as leftovers but I can't remember if he ever actually ate it), but they took the edge off. It was nice.

And the nice thing is that the NBC Sports Grill is right by the shuttle pickup/drop off, so we didn't have far to walk to get on the shuttle back to the hotel. We were back in the room by 9:45 pm, tired but happy. It was a great first day at Universal - we got so much done! And we had a full day still in store!

Fun with metrics:
Steps walked: 16,831 steps (7.3 miles)
Ride Count: 7 (Jurassic World, Transformers, Revenge of the Mummy, Tram Tour, Despicable Me, WaterWorld show, Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey)

 

[erinch]

Continuing great report!

 

[FeistyDisneyMom]

I haven't been to Universal in over 20 years and I am loving your report! Tentatively planning a trip for DLR & Universal at Halloween time for 2024 because you've shown how fun it is!

 

[Araminta18]

Continuing great report!

I haven't been to Universal in over 20 years and I am loving your report! Tentatively planning a trip for DLR & Universal at Halloween time for 2024 because you've shown how fun it is!

You both are so kind - I'm blushing! Also do it, FeistyDisneyMom -- Halloween in the parks is great fun!

 

[Araminta18]

Universal Rope Drop!
Monday, September 20, 2021 (part 1)​

The nice thing about Universal in the off-season on a weekday is that the park didn't open until 10 am. So we definitely slept in! The first picture I have is time-stamped at 8:46 am, and it's of donuts. Not a bad first picture.

We got the "O Captain My Captain" captain crunch donut (Raised ring with vanilla frosting and Cap’n Crunch), the Dirt donut (Raised ring with vanilla frosting and chocolate cream-filled cookies), and Diablos Rex (Devil’s food cake with chocolate frosting, red sprinkles, a vanilla frosting pentagram, and chocolate chips in the middle). Breakfast! These are big donuts, but they're delicious.

Room view during the day:

The first picture is just straight out the window, and then the second one is looking to the right, and you can see the Minion eye peeking over the wall of the theme park.

We wanted to be there early for rope drop (planning to rope drop Harry Potter world!) so we left the room at 9:15. And the shuttle between the hotel and the park only started running at 10 am, so we decided to walk up the hill there to the park.

It's not a bad walk, and you go by some fun photo ops (the welcome to Universal bridge, for example). It is very much up a hill, but still not bad. Took us maybe 10 min or so to get to the security checkpoint, and then we were here at the gates at 9:32. Definitely not the first people in line, but not too far back either. They definitely aren't set up for the volume/logistics like Disneyland is, but I was ok with a smaller crowd.

They let us in a bit early, at 9:45 am, so that was nice. We got another picture in front of the globe, but this one included the statue!

Then we headed over to Harry Potter world!

Sliiiiiiiightly less crowded today.

We were heading right back to the Flight of the Hippogriff coaster, cause that line was long yesterday and was not moving quickly! But we took some people-less photos on our way back there.

There was no wait for the coaster which was nice. The theming in that queue is pretty neat though, so we were slow going through.

(also Trevor's shirt, despite being a DisneyWorld shirt, is totally on brand in our minds for Universal - Great Movie Ride! And Universal is all about classic movies!)

We got our pick of seats on the coaster so we went for the front row:

The ride in the front was fine - nothing super exciting. The ride picture got totally blown out.

But when we pulled back into the station there was no one coming so we asked if we could just re-ride without having to go back through the line, and they said yes! So we decided to ride in the back row this time.

Better ride picture this time. But we liked the coaster a lot more in the back row. It's such a small kiddie coaster that if you ride in the front you're like halfway down the drops before the speed starts or anything like that. Definitely wait for the back row if you're gonna ride this coaser.

After the coaster, it was 10 am, and we decided to head over to Forbidden Journey and ride that, cause there as no wait!

Lots of fun! We ended up riding it twice in a row, though there were people continuously coming and we didn't have the guts to ask if we could just stay on, so we went back through the line again.

We got off the second ride at about 10:30, and we'd wanted to do Ollivander's, so we headed over there. There was a bit of a line, but not too bad. I think we waited for a few minutes, and then they let a whole group in, and we were like 2 or 3 groups from the front at that point, so we waited for one group to go before we should go. Not bad - I think it was about 10 minutes?

I did like the "waiting" room - all those pretty wand boxes! I was kind of hoping Trevor would get picked since there weren't any kids in the room with us, but then right before they closed the door there was a mom and her little boy who walked in and they were doing the whole "it's our first trip and he's such a big fan and is so excited" so I knew they'd get picked. Which is probably for the best - we weren't gonna buy a wand (I did ask Trevor several times if he wanted to ) and the boy did enjoy it. We filmed it: Olivander's show

We looked around in the gift shop and then took some more pictures with the Hogwarts Express.

At that point it was about 11 am, and we were kind of hungry. Trevor had wanted to eat at the Three Broomsticks, so we figured now was a good time! We thought about doing dinner there last night but there was a huge line. There was basically no line right now, so we went for it!

We had a much better experience there then we did at Jurassic Cafe the day before. There was literally no line, and we got our food after just like 3 minutes or so. There was a bit of a mixup with the charges -- the cashier charged us for something we didn't want, in addition to the food we did. When we brought it to her attention (hey, it looks like we were charged for this but we didn't want it) she was just like "so?" Like she didn't understand why we were telling her? It was kind of funny, in an absurd way. So we said that we'd like a refund, and she said she'd have to get her manager, but didn't move - just stood there (and again, no one else was in line or coming in at all, so it wasn't like she needed to serve the people behind us, 'cause there was no one behind us). So we said "ok, please do" and then she moved and got her boss. But it was kind of hilarious - like she didn't understand why we'd want a refund for food we didn't order and didn't want. LOL

I got the Roasted Chicken salad with raspberry vinaigrette.

Trevor got the bangers and mash (Grilled English sausage, creamy mashed potatoes, roast tomatoes, sautéed onions and cabbage, minted peas and gravy)

And then we got pear cider to share. This was all really good! The salad was good (esp with the raspberry vinaigrette), and Trevor liked the bangers and mash. And the pear cider was much better than the Butterbeer (don't @ me ). Definitely a good lunch. And the theming is super neat - I really liked the decor and the theming. Very cool.

After lunch (about 11:30am), we didn't really have any plans -- we'd ridden pretty much everything we'd wanted to (except for "Secret Life of Pets" which was closed so far -- it hadn't opened yet for the day. We were definitely checking! But so far it was still closed). We'd kind of wanted to ride/see the Kung Fu Panda show, so we decided to meander over that way.

As we meandered, we ran into King Julian! (from Madagascar)

That was fun. But also LOOK AT HOW THERE IS BASICALLY NO ONE THERE. Crazy. Much less crowded than yesterday!

Then we saw Scooby and the Gang walking by too!

And then Helloy Kitty Bride of Frankenstein was out meeting and greeting too so I got a picture with her (Trevor was uninterested in a selfie with her. )

And then, in conclusion to this random characterpalooza part of our day, we met Frankenstein!

Trevor went to the bathroom at the start of this so he missed most of the characters, but he got Frankenstein! Which to be fair, was the coolest.

And there's the picture limit! What's next? Will we make it to Kung Fu Panda or will more characters show up?

 

[Araminta18]

Best Character Meet Ever!
Monday, September 20, 2021 (part 2)​

We left off with Trevor making friends with Frankenstein...(I was going to try to make a joke about Trevor being the monster but I'm not clever enough after a day of work to come up with something!).

So we were heading to Kung Fu Panda! But as we headed that way, guess what we saw? (if you guessed more characters, you'd be right )

Shrek and the glitter troll were out meeting. Shrek had a short line, but there was absolutely no one in line for the troll. We're not huge fans of either character, but short lines, why not.

They were kind of funny interacting with each other -- well, mostly the troll trying to interact with Shrek and the people meeting him, since no one was in his line. (Fun fact, you can see the refillable Coke freestyle cup that we bought hanging off my crossbody bag there in the second picture. If you're curious. )

After that, we finally D) made it over to Kung Fu Panda. OOOH first though I almost forgot. So we bought the photo package the day before at the Jurassic World photo counter -- we ended up buying the annual passholder package, 'cause we'd bought silver annual passes for us 'cause it was cheaper than 2 one day tickets. Then as I was browsing in the app while we were in line for something yesterday, I found a section on the app that said annual passholders (of all tiers) can save 25% on the annual passholder photo package! We most definitely did not get 25% off, even though there was an exchange with the attendant that we're annual passholders, so can we get the annual passholder package. So one of the things I wanted to do today was to go to the photo counter and see if I could get that 25% off. And they were kind enough to do it, though they implied it was a one off and my fault for not telling the counter attendant who sold it to us that we were annual passholders 'cause then he would have given us the discount (which was not the case but whatever). So that also took up some time. But long story short, if you buy an annual pass, check the app and see what discounts/perks you may qualify for!

Ok! Discount detour done, back to Kung Fu Panda. Again, I'm not a huge fan of the movie or anything, but we were basically trying everything at this point (and if you're curious, Secret Life of Pets was indeed still down).

We saw this poster inside and I had to take a picture 'cause I'm pretty sure we're like some of the only people in the world who like that movie - it was one of the movies we saw early on while we were dating, and it's also just a cute movie.

We got a pretty good seat inside -

But I'll admit I was a bit distracted because during the show was when our 24 hour check-in window for our Southwest flight opened up and so I was frantically trying to check in while the movie was going! Thankfully the theater was pretty empty and I did have my brightness all the way down so as not to disturb anyone else. We ended up getting the middle of the B boarding group, so who knows what we would have gotten if I'd waited til afterwards!

What I did see of the show was cute.

At this point we'd ridden pretty much everything, so we were a bit at loose ends. We decided to wander around a bit more, in the general direction of Secret Life of Pets to see if it would open, or if we could talk to the employees and see if they had any intel on when it would open. But as we walked out, guess who we saw?

King Julian! and with basically no line too

Then as we walked towards Secret Life of Pets, we passed Scooby and the gang!

I will say I was pretty impressed at how many characters they had out - and with no lines - considering how empty the park was. It was great for us though.

We kept going and also passed this neat facade for one of the HHN houses:

Looks cool. Still too scary for me. No thanks.

Down by Secret Life of Pets (which I hadn't seen and still haven't seen, really), we saw one of the pets out interacting with people!

He was funny - A+ Universal.

We did end up talking to some of the employees out in front of Secret Life of Pets. They were very friendly, but basically, it wasn't looking good for the ride to open today, sadly. Oh well. We decided we'd keep checking, but figured since we were there, might as well ride the Minions' version of Dumbo. Trevor filmed it (who knows why): Riding Super Swirly Fun Ride You can definitely hear me keeping an eye out on the employees out in front of Secret Life of Pets, just in case there was movement!

There was not movement, so we decided to get that bonkers looking Minions drink from the cafe there (Felonious Float - Raspberry Icee, banana frozen yogurt, banana candy, whip cream) 'cause I'm a sucker for fake banana flavor and fake raspberry flavor, and then head down to the lower lot.

Also isn't this statue whatever thing hilarious? Minions are funny.

This wasn't as good as I would have liked -- cold and nice that way, but the flavors were kind of weird. Oh well.

We decided to take the shuttle down to the lower lot (to avoid Trevor getting anxious on the elevators). We did end up having to wait about 15 minutes. But it gave me time to finish the "Felonious Float" .

At the shuttle stop.

We made it down to the lower lot at about 1:35, and who did we see but a baby raptor!

These dinosaur encounters are really fun - the team members are super skilled. Highly recommend making time to meet them. I was just a bit sad we wouldn't get to meet the triceratops! But the baby raptor was adorable.

Having met the baby raptor, we had to go ride Jurassic World!

This was the entire line. There was like no one there!

We rode it twice.

Afterwards we were thinking we'd go ride the Mummy but we saw the bad guy from Transformers out meeting and greeting, so we decided to get in line for that one, cause the line was really short.

This was by far our favorite meet and greet of the entire trip - and I'm pretty sure I'm counting Disneyland in that as well. We were dying of laughter. And thankfully, I got it all on tape: Meeting Megatron I guess 'cause he's a villain he doesn't have to be nice? It's just funny.

When we got to The Mummy though, there was weirdly enough, a line.

So we decided to try single rider instead, which was a good move - we only waited like 3 or 4 minutes.

That's Trevor there in the red shirt, 3rd row back.

I'm in the front row on the right side; Trevor's in the third row back on the left.

At this point, we had a dilemma: it was 2:30. Should we ride the Tram Tour again, knowing that by the time we rode it we probably wouldn't be able to make the WaterWorld show, or should we go for the Waterworld show? The timing wouldn't work out for us to do both - like, we could try but it would be really close. What to do?! I decided to let Trevor make the choice. What did he pick? You'll have to tune in next time!

 

[Araminta18]

Last Moments at Universal
Monday, September 20, 2021 (part 3)​

While Trevor was deciding, we knew we needed to be back in the upper lot, so we headed over to the shuttle to wait for it to take us back up. While we were waiting, the raptor encounter was happening and we could hear it from the stop, so Trevor decided to film a bit of it ('cause it's funny). Raptor Encounter video

We got up to the upper lot at little after 3, and what did Trevor pick? The Tram Tour!! Look at this line -- quite the change from yesterday:

We deliberately picked a line a little closer to the front this time. And since this was a Monday, I was hoping we'd get to see some actual filming going on...

And this time I was prepared - got a picture of one of my favorite movie's poster on that one hill you go down:

Pillow Talk! Not a deep movie, but a lot of fun.

And we did (sort of!) get to see some things in production -- we passed lots of trailers with signs for "GasLit" and even had to be quiet a few times since some stages were actively being used for filming.

This time I also got a slightly better picture of the Bates Motel with the house looming in the background:

And if you're interested in our filming from this second trip --
City Section of the Tour
Cars from the Movies section
Jaws Section of the Tour

We got a much better view of the Jaws section this time - it's pretty neat!

We got off the Tram Tour at like 4, and I think we decided to run for it, just to see if maybe we could get let in late to the WaterWorld show, but it was indeed closed. Oh well! We did run into Doc Brown though, so calling it a win.

Secret Life of Pets was still down - we'd had a fun conversation with a team member earlier and so we were kind of expecting that but *shrugs*. We decided to ride Minions again.

The theming in that queue (once you're inside the building) is hilarious.

We got a much better seat this time (more centered) but there was a family that was capital-S STRUGGLING with this ride. I don't know what it was but it took literally 10 minutes to get them all in and seated and comfortable. Like, the employees were telling us jokes and had us telling jokes to try and distract us 'cause everyone else was ready except for this family for some reason. But eventually it was all worked out and we got to ride the ride.

More Minions Dance party pics!

At this point it was 5 pm; the park closed at 6. We'd ridden everything (except Secret Life of Pets ) so what to do? Harry Potter! We went over to take some more pictures, see some of the shows over there (maybe...) and just kind of hang out.

I like that second picture - the sign pointing to Hogwarts and no people...

We got really lucky - the show was starting just as we got there so we got to see the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons show. No frog choir though It was still pretty neat!

Next, Forbidden Journey!

There was basically no line, so we rode it twice in a row.

We spent some time in the gift shop - I loved the theming!

I made Trevor take this picture - I was trying to get one without people in the background, but no luck. Trevor had been standing here for a few minutes by now, so he was kind of over it.

At this point, it was 5:40, so we really did just wander around taking pictures and enjoying the ambiance. There were lots of people playing with the wands, so Trevor especially had fun watching those effects.

Videos of wand effects that Trevor filmed:
Dominic Maestro's Wand Effect
Honeyduke's Wand Effects (1)
Honeyduke's Wand Effects (2)
Howler Wand Effect
Dervish and Bangles Nimbus Spell

To no one's surprise, I was not as interested in Harry Potter land as Trevor, so I'd bugged out a few minutes before him to go look at the gift shops at the front of the park (because I literally never met a gift shop I didn't like). The day before I'd bought a wallet that had the Hogwarts Express ticket on it - I really liked that design. They even had a paper ticket (kind of like a print that you could put up) but I didn't buy it. But today, looking in all the shops and at that design again, I decided I wanted the print. Unfortunately, I made that decision right after the Hogwarts Express gift shop in Harry Potter land closed (I called Trevor and asked him to pick it up for me since he was still back there but it was closed) and none of the other giftshops in the park had it. Oh well!

We meandered slowly out of the park, looking in all the shops. I made Trevor take a picture of me with the car from "The Mummy", cause that movie is amazing.

Once out of the park, we took a couple more pictures ('cause we had to!) and then over to Citywalk! We were hungry!

We decided to eat at Antojitos - the menu looked good and some vloggers we like (Ordinary Adventures) always recommend it. We only had about a half hour wait, which was great - it gave us time to do some more shopping. And we got lucky! The Universal store in City Walk did have the Hogwarts Express ticket print thing that I wanted. Huzzah!

At Antojitos we got the guacamole:

I got the steak quesadilla

Trevor got fish tacos.

All the food was delicious and very filling - yummy! The only issue we had is that on Universal's website it said that even Silver annual passes got a discount at this restaurant, but at the restaurant the waitress said they didn't. So that was a bit disappointing, but oh well. The food was delicious and that was the main thing.

We did some more shopping, including at the comic store they have there. We bought some blind box things, cause who can resist? Trevor got this Mandalorian keychain blind box:

I got this Aliens Remix blind box:

So fun! I love blindboxes.

And then, there's a Buca di Beppo in Citywalk and while I didn't want italian food for dinner, I do love their garlic bread. So I got an order of garlic bread to go. DELICIOUS.

We also wanted a bit of dessert so we broke into my sprinkles birthday cupcake: Chocolate Marshmallow

We were back in the room by 8:45 - those long Disney days were catching up to us! We needed rest! And I was hatching a plan -- Secret Life of Pets was the only ride we didn't get to ride; we had bought silver annual passes; our flight took off at noon so we needed to be at the airport at 10:30 am at the latest; the park opened at 10 am.... Do you see where this is going? Tune in to the last day of my trip report to find out!!

Fun with metrics:
Steps walked: 19,280 steps (8.3 miles)
Ride Count: 13 (Flight of the Hippogriff x2, Forbidden Journey x4, Kung Fu Panda, Super Swirly Fun Ride, Jurassic World x2, Revenge of the Mummy, Tram Tour, Minion Mayhem)

 

[FeistyDisneyMom]

What a great Universal day! Bummer about Secret Life of Pets - I can't wait to hear how your last day plan goes! The theming in Harry Potter land looks amazing - I can practically hear my kiddos squealing with delight. Which ride was your favorite overall?