Orlando ~ Day 2

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Geo: 28.5377, -81.3774

May 11, 2010

I was awake at 6:32 this morning!! We had yet to decide what park we would visit but I knew Universal Studios opened at 9:00. We kept throwing around the idea of Universal Studios today and Epcot Thursday or a 2-day, 2-park pass to Universal Studios and skipping Epcot or hubby wanted to see about a gatorboat ride, etc. We decided to get Universal passes. Went downstairs and purchased them (on sale) from the hotel concierge desk. Nice. I don't know why I was surprised by this but I was. Prior to traveling here I had been unable to find a discount on theme park tickets anywhere. Odd, I thought.
Tickets in hand, we walk to Denny's for breakfast.. again, semi-across from our hotel, on I-drive, and an easy-breezy walk of less than 10 minutes. Hubby is complaining of indigestion/upset stomach. I feel sorry for him. THEN.. what does he order?? Spicey hot BUFFALO WINGS for BREAKFAST. Ya gotta luv vacation! Miraculously, he was fine after eating those stomach-healing hot wings.
Disclosure: some of this travel information is detailed because I joined an Orlandotravel forum and lots of people have questions about how to get around Orlando. Now that I'm here.. I don't get what is so difficult?? It is super easy to get from point a to point b and the I Ride Trolley is clean, cute, and there is always room for yet another tourist. It stops every two or three minutes, there are maps and directories at every stop, and you can get where you need to go in plenty of time. I suppose I don't understand all the complaints/concerns/questions/remarks on the travel forums about navigating Orlando ~ it's easier than most places we've traveled, by far.

After breakfast we take the trolley north to stop 9 - where the driver loudly announces this is the "Wet and Wild" and "Universal Studios/Citywalk" stop. We get off, walk forward approximately 20 feet, cross the street and walk straight until we are at the escalators up to Universal Studios. It was after 10:00 am at this point, wasn't 80 degrees yet, and there was a slight breeze. It was sunny and beautiful and the walk was easy with lots of beautiful photo opportunities along the way. We stopped 2 or 3 times to take some photos or to look at a bird in a marsh area however.. it was exactly a 30 minute walk from the trolley stop to the entrance of Universal Studios. To us, it felt like 15 minutes. There were two other small groups of people making the walk ahead of us so we know we weren't the only ones doing this but I wouldn't recommend it if you don't enjoy walking or if you simply want to save your legs for all the park walking. Regardless, we were proud of ourselves and glad we did it this way.

We get in the park and I feel like riding The Hulk roller coaster but hubby was hesitant ~ a complete roll reversal of our feelings prior to vacation. I force him. He takes his blood pressure pill and we get in line. This is one of Universal's slowest weeks all year so the lines to ride were super-short, if they existed at all. Five to ten minute wait for most rides all day. Fantastic. We ride The Hulk roller coaster. I had the good sense to keep my head back against the seat but I didn't like the ride. He loved it!! He wanted to ride it again. Me??
NO WAY! Next, I made hubby go on a "sissy" ride with me ~ Storm Force Accelerator ~ which is like big teacups that spin around as fast as possible and make you dizzy. THIS is my type of ride. Hubby says he has to look at me the entire time or he'll throw-up. This ride had no wait and no line but he wouldn't ride it again.

So, then we were off to Doctor Doom's Fearfall. By far, the most surprising ride of the day. You think this ride is going to slowly take you up and then drop you like a hot potato. Not so. You get on, you aren't nervous (yet), the ride starts to slowly move ...and then you are ZOOMED up to the top as fast as possible and then dropped half way down immediately thereafter... almost scared the pee-pee outta me! This ride had a full 10-minute wait and only lasted 10 seconds (or so it seemed) but it was worth it just for the surprise effect.

It was getting hot by now so we went looking for those frozen It was HOT now.. easily 86, humid, sunny. We were sweating. We needed our frozen drink and a water ride. We watched a little girl playing in the Toon Lagoons water for a long time and she was having such a blast we decided we needed to get wet. Off to Ripsaw Falls where we got fairly drenched and it felt fabulous!slushies everyone had and realized they were frozen strawberry margaritas. Awesome.

Next... my FAVORITE area of the park, my favorite ride all day, my FAV at Universal Studios IOA... Jurassic Park!! I had no clue what to expect but all the sudden, you walk through the Jurassic Park rainforest and it was spectacular ~ I felt like I was literally on the movie set of Jurassic Park. The Discovery Center (a replica of the visitor center from the movie) is just so-so but kids would love it ~ there were people in lab coats explaining things about the dinosaurs to kids. You know every little boy must love this area. Well, I did too. Then we tried the Jurassic Park water ride ~ again, NO WAIT for the ride ~ we walked directly on the ride and I assumed we would get wet and it would be over. WRONG. The ride is fantastic ~ you ride through water into the rain forest, enter these huge doors that say "Jurassic Park private entrance" and then there are life-like dinosaurs moving and making noises all over this area. It was fascinating how realistic all the dinosaurs looked!! There was a little kid behind me telling us all exactly what type of dinosaur each one was. Hubby was impressed. This ride has a splashing/exciting ending and was soooo great ~ we both later wondered why we didn't go again since there were no lines.

It was still hot so this time I got a frozen strawberry pina colada (no alcohol) and we went by the lake and took pictures of the park.

Then we walked by the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. This huge, amazing~looking area of the park opens June 18th. I'm sure the park will be packed that day and for several months thereafter. This is the one area of the park that may totallly revive Universal.
There was an oddly-curious duck in the water by the fountain. It kept coming-up to me but then when we went to get a picture, it was leary of hubby on one side and me on the other so we couldn't get a good close-up but I swear this duck would have let me pet it had I attempted to try. This reminded me of our little Simo at home, how he is always begging for love and attention.

And then... drum roll... Seussville!! Thing 1 and Thing 2 took a stroll around the ville, and we were amazed at the sights, it was such a thrill!

We finally walked out of the park and onto CityWalk around 5/5:30 pm ~ sunburned (how did that happen, I wondered), feet tired, hot hot hot. We stopped at Bubba Gump Shrimp Company ~ an entire restaurant themed on the movie Forest Gump. Cute restaurant. Great decor. Fantastic staff ~ they all talk with extreme southern accents like they, too, are from Greenbow, Alabama. We sat in the air conditioning and ordered big tall drinks in light-up glasses! It's the little things that mean so much on vacation. HA! Our waiter, Joey, sat and did a bit of trivia with us. We did well. The only question that stumped me ~ What color were Lieutenant Dan's boots???

I walked next door and bought a caramel nutty Cinnabon for later. Can we say 1,000 calories in a huge sticky bun??? Ya gotta love vacation!

By this time in the later afternoon we were beat. No way were we walking 30 more minutes to the trolley. I saw the Lynx buses. I had read online about them. They are $2 anywhere you want to go. We saw a bus sitting by the Universal Studios escalators so I asked the driver if he went to I-drive and he said it was his first stop. We paid $4 to ride 7 minutes and save our legs. Awesome move. The Lynx dropped us off at a stop on I-drive that was 5 feet from a trolley stop. It was also across from a discount touristy store where I went inside and purchased some new, cheap sunglasses since my prescious sunglasses I luved so dearly had gotten smashed on a ride earlier. We walked-up and down this end of I-drive buying a few items and being nosey and then we then hopped on the free trolley and rode it all the way to the other end of I-drive to our fabulous, air-conditioned Hilton. There was an older couple from Britain that had ridden the Lynx and the trolley with us from Universal Studios and hubby had an interesting conversation with the gentleman. Nice folks. They are flabbergasted at our oil rig catastrophe, too. We came home and noticed that 210,000 gallons of oil per day, every day, are STILL flowing into the ocean. Looks like BP and Haliburton have guilty hands. This could ruin some families way of life for generations to come. Drew told us on the plane that the state of Louisiana has already asked BP for $10 billion just in clean-up costs. This is all very sad and very frustrating considering the profits of companies like BP but I digress.

We finally got to our room and we were both soooo beat. My socks were nearly glued to my feet. Hubby says the balls of his feet felt bruised but I'm not sure this is even possible but I look very sympathetic, just in case. We went ahead and put on our swimsuits and got in the hotel's lazy river. Again, it was cooler and the clouds had come out and the water was wonderful. It was awesome. We floated around together a couple of times and then hubby read while I floated around another fifty times or so. :-D
We finally came inside and I purchased a soda from the vending machine on our floor ~ $3 for a Coke Zero. Geez. It made me feel better by drinking it in my light-up glass from Bubba Gump's, however. HA

Later, I thought we were about to turn out the lights and sleep when hubby decided we needed a midnight Denny's run. I was not hungry and didn't really want to go cuz I didn't feel hungry but Denny's is next door and open 24/7. The complainer this time (me) also got spicey wings ~ which were fabulous. What is it about those wings that seem to be a cure~all for complainers?? We were fast asleep within 30 minutes of getting back to the hotel. Tomorrow... Iron Man 2 on the IMAX big screen!!

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