This weekend Ryan and I made the trek to Orlando to join his mom and sisters at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. We've all been to these parks before but Ryan and I haven't been back since they added the Wizarding World of Harry Potter (which was pretty awesome).
If you live in Florida, chances are that you can obtain free or reduced price tickets to the theme parks. Florida resident tickets save you about $10-20 off admission. If you work just one day at Universal, you get a certain amount of free tickets to give to family and friends (Employees get in for free). Lucky for us, my sister in law is an employee of Universal Studios and so, between her free tickets and some from another family member, we all got in for free and enjoyed discounted prices in the stores and on food! Good thing too, because even with the discounted Florida Resident rate, tickets are $76.50 for one park and $106.50 to go from park to park. When you factor in $15 for parking, food, drinks and any souvenirs you might like to pick up (wizard wands anyone?) it can add up pretty quickly!
Universal offers a few options to save money such as all you can eat deals for $20.99/day/person for one park or $24.99 for both parks, and refillable soda for $8.99/day. Depending on how much you can eat, this could be a great deal for you. At the 3 Broomsticks in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, where we had lunch, you can get a "Great Feast Platter" for around $50 which includes chicken, ribs, potatoes, vegetables, corn on the cob and a big salad (I didn't really eat the meat and I was pretty satisfied with the salad, corn and potatoes!) It says it feeds four but with 5of us eating, we still had a ton of food left over. Add in Butterbeers for everyone for about $3/person and you have a delicious lunch! When you realize that fish and chips at the same place cost about $13, for less food, you understand exactly how much money larger groups can save with this!
We were pretty lucky that we went on a day that was predicted to be full of severe thunderstorms (but they didn't materialize until we left, after 6 pm) because the park was not nearly as busy as it usually is. Instead of waiting 1-2 hours for a ride, most of the rides only had 15 minute waits. If you're not so lucky, you could always purchase the Express Plus Passes for $20-25 to skip the regular lines. On busy days, those passes are well worth the money! A fun day quickly turns to a super irritating day when you're waiting for 2 hours, in the heat, for a ride that last 2 minutes. Apparently, if you stay at one of the on-site hotels, you get these passes for free...nice!
A few observations:
-The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is pretty cool, even with the super commercialization of everything from plastic golden snitches and broomsticks to ceramic (?) wizarding wands.
-I think the next thing they could mass produce is Harry Potter transition lenses...think about it Universal.
-Butterbeer is super delicious. Very sweet but you must try it!
-The Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit rollercoaster is a lot of fun! You get to choose a song to listen to while you're on it. I chose "Can't Touch This" and was soothed by MC Hammer while I thought I was going to die.
-It's time for the ET ride to be put to rest....just like the Jaws ride. I love ET as much as the next 80's kid, but it's time.
Very informative, thanks! And I think they are slowly replacing all the older rides, but it takes time and they have to make sure they have something viable to replace it! What current children's phenomenon (besides Harry Potter) has the staying power of E.T.??? So, they wait for something that'll be relevent for more than a year or two.
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