Can I persuade my family to wear matching Tshirts? August 2018 - Day 6 - Portofino Bay and Universal

[i love jack]

Thursday 23rd August

GCSE results day yikes!

I woke up suddenly at 5, I’d slept really well though and hadn’t woken at 3 for a change! Then remembered it was results day.

I had a cup of tea, and according to my notes did some ironing! I guess just some things we wanted to take on our overnight stay. We left the villa at 7.10

So, today we were going to Portofino Bay to stay overnight. This meant we could do the Universal parks with the benefit of Express passes for the next two days. We were also staying Club level to take advantage of all inclusive meals, snacks & drinks!

Josh’s results were going to be available online at 2pm uk time, our plan was to check in and settle ourselves in the Club room, connect to the WiFi and wait.

Anyway we headed up the I4 to Universal and were arriving at Portofino 30 minutes later, again the traffic on the I4 was fine. The car park was underground and we found a space easily. Then made our way to the lobby. It was beautiful.

We went to check in and received a really lovely, warm welcome from Trey. He gave us our welcome pack with keys and information to the Club room and temporary keys that we could use as our Express passes.

He sent a text to my phone and said to reply to it if we needed anything at all and that I’d get a text once the room was ready. The other thing I noticed about the lobby was the smell - it was lovely. I’m all about the smells this year! Last time we had stayed at Hard Rock Hotel and I’d found the check in quite cold compared to here.

We then went straight to the Club room, breakfast was available from 7am to 10.30. We found a table and logged into the WiFi it was around 8am now and we checked the school website and the results were up. Josh had done really well. His plan was to stay at his current school to do A levels and we were hoping he would achieve the grades required as we hadn’t made a plan B. So thank goodness we could stick to plan A. It was a huge relief to us all - especially Josh! Thinking back, he was very unsettled the night before with worry, and he was now quite emotional I think. He’d worked really hard and it must’ve been a big relief for him. We then spent a while texting family and friends with the good news.

Then went to check out breakfast. We were impressed. There were some hot items which we weren’t expecting, there was scrambled egg, hash browns, bacon and beans. Along with toastable items, bread, various flavour bagels, loads of different pastries, muffins and then fruit and yogurts along with juice, tea, coffee and sodas. It was good.

We left our luggage with luggage services then followed the signs to the water taxi to go to Universal. Outside was just beautiful. The hotel opened up to a square which led to the water with boats docked. Around the square were restaurants, Starbucks, ice cream shop, and a Universal shop amongst others. There was seating outside the shops. It was just so lovely.

I remembered last time you can’t take any bags on a lot of the Universal rides and when we went on the wet rides our tickets got soaked so I decided to buy a lanyard from the Universal shop so our tickets would stay dry. I then realised our Express passes were plastic, it was our park tickets that were paper but we wouldn’t need them on the rides duh!

We decided to wait for the water taxi it was such a pretty ride. We got to Universal at 9.20.

Minion mayhem was a 40 min standby and we thought we’d do this as we were passing, we didn’t wait long with the Express passes and were soon being turned into Minions - I like this ride.

Next up we came to Rip Ride Rocket, I’d decided I’d ride this this year, I’ve never done it before, I think the vertical bit has always put me off but I realised it doesn’t really go upside down and there’s no big drops (apart from the massive vertical climb and drop at the start!) so it would be fine, I’ve done Hulk and Rock n Roller, it would be fine... We couldn’t persuade Dan so he was in charge of the bag. Again we were pretty much straight on the ride, it’s an unusual loading system in that the cars don’t stop, you step on a moving walkway and quite quickly have to close the lap bar and you get to pick a song. I chose Hella Good by No Doubt. Then before you know it you’re going up the vertical bit...has anyone seen the clip from Radio 2 of Alan Carr on this? Well that was me. I didn’t like it! I think it was too high, I spent half the ride screaming and when I stopped realised I hadn’t heard most of my song as I’d drowned it out. I was also trying to keep my head back against the headrest as the instructions said but I couldn’t, I kept getting thrown forward.

Josh and Andy went straight back on, I definitely did not! I found Dan and he and I went on the Mummy. There are new lockers for Mummy which are fab, a nice big room and you scan your ticket to open one, no remembering which finger you used or which locker number.

Dan and I love the Mummy. We met up with the others, Andy was regretting RRR twice in a row (a bit too soon after breakfast!). We all went on Mummy then.

Next was a new one for us, Jimmy Fallons race through New York. We got given our coloured ticket and went upstairs. The Ragtime Gals came out, I was really enjoying this. It wasn’t long until the light changed to our colour and we could go through to the ride. I could have quite happily stayed watching the Gals.

I thought this was going to be a car ride like Spider-Man, but it’s not, I enjoyed it though, I’ve never seen any of the shows so didn’t know any of the characters, Dan keeps doing a fab impression of Sara “no H cos H’s are eww”.

The boys then went on Transformers while Andy and I had a sit as we’re not bothered by this ride. Then it was time for a Starbies.

Then another new ride Fast and Furious. I’ve purposely not read/watched too much about this ride although I’ve seen reviews that weren’t too favourable but I wanted to keep an open mind. We’re big fans of the films.

Very poignant. The fallen bottle represents Paul Walker

The first part of the queue is set out with cars in a garage/workshop, it was empty. There are some interactive quizzes and activities here on the Universal app which the boys were doing. You then go into a couple of pre show rooms, these frustrated me cos they mix up the queue as you could be first into the first room but last out of the second room and then we joined a really slow queue to load up the party buses. I think they were trying to go from 2 to 1 and this held up the queue a while.

The ride was quite clever, the boys really enjoyed it.

Next we went into Diagon Alley. Still think this area is amazing. As soon as we walked in the dragon breathed fire. I waited ages last time to try and capture that. We express passed Gringotts, another great ride.

Afterwards Dan wanted a butter beer, so we sat on the steps soaking up the atmosphere in the Alley.

Then to Men in Black. Love this. Dan got the high score of 183000 by pressing the red button. Josh and I were rubbish! I only got 16,000, my excuse is that I was sat in the middle at the back and couldn't see to shoot anything.

Then to Simpson’s another frustrating queue! We were basically straight into the first room but then waited ages to go through to the pre show.

It’s so good having the Express passes, you just get so many rides done quickly. It was now 2.10 and we decided to head back to the hotel. We hadn’t heard if the room was ready but we hoped it would be and we could have a swim. Unfortunately the water taxi was closed due to inclement weather...it looked ok to us!

We walked back, it’s a really nice walk, it probably took around 20 minutes. The sky was getting dark and we were hoping to make it back before the rain.

It was afternoon snack time in the Club room when we got back so of course we went to see what was on offer. There were various savoury snacks, Doritos, cheese popcorn, goldfish crackers. Toast, biscuits, tea, coffee and cans of soda.

It had started raining now and after checking at reception our room wasn’t ready. Andy and I went for an explore of the resort, found one of the pools, had a look at the shops and restaurants then back to the Club room to wait for our room.

It was around 4pm now and we decided we might as well wait until the ‘Evening Reception’ which started at 5pm, see what was available for tea and then hopefully our room would ready.

Tonight was Mexican night, there was beef enchiladas, rice and beans, corn, salads, crudités and then a selection of cheese and biscuits. You could have wine or beer too. It was really tasty. Dan especially loved it and had a couple of platefuls. He kept saying ‘oh my giddy aunt, this is amazing’.

We got into our room then, I never did get a text. The room was amazing. We had two double beds. I had requested a rollaway bed which wasn’t in the room but the boys said they’d just sleep in the double together. The room was really spacious and the bathroom was huge. There were robes in the wardrobe and a coffee machine. Neither of which we got to use though.

We got the cases, unpacked and then went back out to the park. It had stopped raining but the water taxi still wasn’t running so we walked. The sky was pretty black.

We did loads of rides, the Mummy twice, Men in Black, Fast and Furious & Gringotts, it was raining and thundering and lightening when we came out of MIB, we sheltered for a while under a stand, it wasn’t stopping so we decided to just get wet and get more rides done. Not sure why we didn’t have ponchos with us, I guess so we didn’t have to take the rucksack.

The rain stopped and Dan and I did Mummy again while Josh and Andy did RRR which must have just reopened.

The park was due to close at 9 and we left just before while it wasn’t raining in the hope the water taxi would be running. It was!

We got back to the hotel at 9.20, there were desserts in the club room until 9.30 so the boys ran in ahead to get some. Josh had got a plateful and was sat in the club room and Dan had taken a plateful back to the room. No photos of these and by the time Andy and I got to the Club room they were clearing away so I didn’t get any photos of the offerings.

Back at the room I had a lovely shower, though it did take me a while to figure out how to make it shower, found there was a washing line in the bathroom in the process!

We had apparently walked 7.3 miles today which considering we’d spent half the day in the Club room was impressive! We were in bed by 10.

[DisneyPCLI]

Great day, hotel looks fab and you definetly made the most of club level! 👍🏻😉

[Melbatb]

Well done to Josh on his results!

You got a lot done and certainly got your money’s worth out of the club room!

[mick]

Lovely day Emma. The hotel looks lovely - you could really imagine you're in north west Italy.

Don't recognise any of Universal but hardly surprising as we haven't been sine 2008.

Mick

[Goldia]

Phew, what a relief the gcse results were good. Nice that you could all then enjoy the day. I had to close my eyes on rip ride rockit, pretty much all the way around! Like you me and DD preferred to go on the mummy while DS got his big thrills kick.

The food at club level looked fab, and what a beautiful resort. We've never stayed onsite at universal...one day!

[Clairelly]

We were there the same day as you! Loved Portofino and agree, the club lounge was brilliant.

[i love jack]

Originally Posted by DisneyPCLI

Great day, hotel looks fab and you definetly made the most of club level! 👍🏻😉

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We did

Originally Posted by Melbatb

Well done to Josh on his results!

You got a lot done and certainly got your money’s worth out of the club room!

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Thank you we did

Originally Posted by mick

Lovely day Emma. The hotel looks lovely - you could really imagine you're in north west Italy.

Don't recognise any of Universal but hardly surprising as we haven't been sine 2008.

Mick

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I know, I kept coming across your photo of actual Portofino and having to remember not to include it as it wasn’t the hotel

Originally Posted by Goldia

Phew, what a relief the gcse results were good. Nice that you could all then enjoy the day. I had to close my eyes on rip ride rockit, pretty much all the way around! Like you me and DD preferred to go on the mummy while DS got his big thrills kick.

The food at club level looked fab, and what a beautiful resort. We've never stayed onsite at universal...one day!

See more...

It was beautiful, definitely recommend it
And yes a huge relief, the day could’ve been very different!

Originally Posted by Clairelly

We were there the same day as you! Loved Portofino and agree, the club lounge was brilliant.

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Aah hope you had a fab holiday

[Fuellady]

Great day, well done to Josh on his GCSE results

Portofino hotel looks lovely, nice offerings in the club room too.

[Floridaagogo]

Thank you for the review of club room.we are doing it fo 1st time this year and fab to see some pics x

[i love jack]

Originally Posted by Fuellady

Great day, well done to Josh on his GCSE results

Portofino hotel looks lovely, nice offerings in the club room too.

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Thanks Lynda it was lovely

Originally Posted by Floridaagogo

Thank you for the review of club room.we are doing it fo 1st time this year and fab to see some pics x

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Aah Cool, hope you love it I’ve put a menu on day 7 so you may be able to work out what will be on in the evening, if it’s still the same!