First visit over four days with added bonus of HHN extension (early Nov '16)

[EdgeOfGlory]

Hi all,

We are a young married couple from outside of Boston who have been avid Disney fans for years. I have been going since I was in diapers in the early 80's and then introducing my wife to all of the fine Disney parks in the late 2000's since she never went as a child.

This time around, we decided we wanted something a little different, especially since my wife is a huge Harry Potter fan, reading most of the books and knowing the movies by heart. I myself didn't care as much but my opinion has changed drastically after visiting the parks over the past few days. We booked our trip back in September and I'll go over why we chose what we did in terms of tickets, hotel and airline.

I am currently going through a Google photos backup that is going to take hours and hours but hope to have a review of everything we loved and didn't love so much this afternoon and may even stretch my thoughts out over a few days worth of posts.

I grabbed an obligatory photo for now while I await the others to end up on the cloud.

 

[macraven]

First in line here for more

 

[EdgeOfGlory]

I am a frequent traveler for work so we tend to book vacations utilizing point systems for as much as we can. I am at the highest level for IHG properties which include Holiday Inns, Candlewood Suites, Crowne Plazas and a few other brands. I decided that I would save up my points for roughly six months and try and get this trip as cheaply as possible.

The Holiday Inn Express that is actually named "neared Universal" looked like a prime booking spot. We booked about two months out for a stay from Wednesday night through a Sunday the first week of November with no issues at all. I was able to secure three free nights for a total of 75,000 points and booked one night for only $110. So four nights in a hotel that is within walking distance to the parks for $27/night, I'll take it. This is the view of the hotel:



I actually got a little ahead of myself talking about the hotel because we did end up booking some cheap airfare FIRST, because that can obviously be the most important. I checked for room availability before doing so, making sure everything would still work out. My wife started looking into travel options about six months out and decided that the new program offered by JetBlue would work the best for us.

We decided on Option #2 on this page to get the best value from the card. The flight isn't exactly "free" since they charge you the $99 annual fee right up front in your first month. But it beats the $325 the second ticket cost from BOS-MCO. All we had to do is spend $1000 on the card in the first three months. It took shifting some regular bills like the cell phones over to it but we hit it pretty easily and received the bonus points in about six weeks after the spending threshold was met.

Booking the flight was a tad trickier. We knew we wanted to ONLY have direct flights but were more flexible on times. The end of October had flights that were far too expensive, points wise. But then when we began looking into November, we found a direct flight for mornings each way for only 22,500 points. So now we still have some banked JetBlue points for next time and didn't even end up using the added bonus. Also booking this about two months out, it was easy for me to buy my separate ticket and still get seats next to my wife going both ways.

Just a tad over $500 for four nights of hotel and two direct flights. Score one for the bargain hunters, TBC in the parks.

 

[macraven]

nice picture

 

[EdgeOfGlory]

After arriving in Orlando right before 11 AM, we had to get there ASAP to get in our first day of pass use. We gathered up our bags (free checked bags via the JetBlue card as well, so another awesome perk) and I called up my trusty Uber app. We had gone to Disney exactly a year prior and Uber was having issues at MCO getting clearance on taking customers out of the airport but this time, it wasn't much of a hassle at all. The only "problem" is that they can only pick up in one location which I wasn't familiar with. The app said a particular spot and I thought we were there next to all of the Mears vans but it was actually the alley way BEHIND us and the car rental windows. $48 later, we were at our hotel...

Since it was around noon, our regular king suite room wasn't ready yet but we wanted to freshen up and hit the parks as soon as we could. We decided to take whatever was available and man, was it a tiny room which couldn't have been more than 250 sq ft. We didn't think much of it, threw down our stuff, changed whatever was needed, and headed out.

There was a Wendy's a stone's throw away from our hotel so we figured instead of spending $11 per burger inside the parks, we could just go here for a quick bite and save a few bucks. Two junior cheeseburgers later and a lunch less than $9 for both of us, we began a walk to Universal with a paper cup of water in tow from lunch.

It was a tad over 80 degrees and we didn't know truly how long it would take for us to arrive. Google Maps was telling us 32 minutes but it ended up being more like 20. Not that the walk was pleasant, we had to cross an eight lane highway which was a bit harrowing and never did walk to or fro from the parks again. Florida just isn't as pedestrian friendly as we are used to in Boston, this always amazes me when I go someplace different and can't walk to and from and also feel safe. We finally arrived to the gates after walking roughly 10 minutes...



Nothing fancy to see here but we were happy to FINALLY be getting on to Universal property. Another 10 minutes of walking and we arrived at the metal detectors to finally enter. It's already picture time on Citywalk!



Look at that smile on my wife's face, she was sssooooo excited to arrive after being exhausted from work the past few months.

More photo ops at the Billabong just a few short feet from where the first photo was taken.



And us arriving at the gate.



We had our paper tickets in tow from Undercover Tourist, park to park for only $225 for four days (beat that, Disney!) and in we went to Universal Studios with about six hours to explore before closing time...

 

[EdgeOfGlory]

Listen to me when I say that THE FIRST WEEK OF NOVEMBER IS AN AWESOME TIME TO GO! Especially during the middle of the week, our first day was a Wednesday and the longest wait time we had for anything that day was The Simpsons Ride at 25 minutes. As soon as we walked through the main gate, we headed for the first ride we spotted (and only a 10 minute queue), Shrek.



Shrek was just meh for us, neither of us really enjoyed the movie(s) and the hydraulics noise from the bouncing seats really turned me off. It wasn't that memorable and we never rode it again over the next 72 hours. So is Universal going to be as good or even better in parts over its Disney counterparts? This wasn't exactly a good first impression.

Aaaahhh, but one thing we both love is coasters and Rip Ride Rockit has only a 5 minute wait, CA-CHING! This was our first experience though with the dreaded lockers which I will have some deeper opinions on later, at least it wasn't busy in that area and we got one immediately, scanned our finger and got in line. Although I took a day time shot of it the first time we walked up, this one I captured right at sunset was much better so I figured I would share it over the others.



OK Universal, you're starting to redeem yourself. I was legit scared going straight up that first drop but going down wasn't nearly as steep as I had anticipated. Beyond having some issues with the music selection disappearing almost immediately upon leaving the station and not picking the exact song I wanted, we loved everything about this coaster. The air time in parts was fairly intense and it's a pretty lengthy ride. We rode it five more times over the next few days.

Jimmy Fallon's ride is coming along quite nicely and a few days later at HHN, I caught the workers on scaffolding putting some of it together which I'll post later, can't wait for this to open!



We continued on around the park from left to right and stopped at just about everything we could do, next up was The Mummy. I don't know why but my expectations were pretty low heading into this one for the first time. You need to use the lockers here, WHY? Fffiinnneeee, in you go backpack and cell phones. The line said 10 minutes but we were on in about two minutes, I don't know if they count the time it takes to walk through the entire queue or not because some of these are pretty long, The Mummy meanders on for at least 4-5 minutes before you get to the actual steps to get onto the ride itself. There is a mummy yelling about our souls being in jeopardy *yawn* and now some popped up *yawns again*. Oh cute, fake beetles on the screen, this isn't what I expected and then OH MY GOD WHAT IS HAPPENING, WE ARE ON AN ACTUAL ROLLER COASTER!!!

So yah, The Mummy went from ho-hum to super excitement in less than a minute for me and quickly became one of my favorite rides in either park. I lost count but we must have rode this 6-7 times including a few times back to back when there was literally nobody waiting for it. Plus, why waste the free time on a locker when we can simply get back on a ride and not have to fumble around with our stuff?

So we heard that there is some Harry Potter areas in this park but we have yet to spot them. "Oh look, there is the Knight Bus" my Harry Potter crazed wife explains. "And there is a phone booth, let me dial all of the secret numbers!"



Meh, this part of Harry Potter isn't all that it's cracked up to be. "There is a hole in the wall over here, lets walk in"...................

TBC

 

[macraven]

So, did you come out to be a potter fan?