Do They Know It's Christmas? Helen&Andy-Nov17. Day 12: US, IOA, The Cowfish, DS & Blaze Pizza

[HelenJNT]

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Day 12: Universal Studios, Islands of Adventure, The Cowfish & Disney Springs

Fully in the stride of the holiday now, we slept for a solid seven hours. In hindsight it was probably a good thing that the planned #nogoff with the Hardings yesterday hadn’t come off, as it was Universal day today and we were pleased to be awake and feeling fresh rather than the prospect of facing the prospect of a day of simulator rides coupled with a hangover. It was a whole week since our first slightly traumatic day at Universal so we were excited to get out there and give it another go.

However, for reasons best known to us at the time (i.e. I really can’t remember and it isn’t in the notes) we didn’t manage to get out of the room until about 09:15. I think we’d banked on buying the FOTL passes and therefore didn’t think getting there at opening time was worth an earlier alarm.

We were in an Uber by 09:30 and once again grateful for the fact that we didn’t have to pay a fortune for a Mears cab. Moe was our driver today, and other than checking that we were OK with the level of air con, it was a completely silent ride. At some point during this trip, my Uber rating dropped from five stars to four and I have no idea why as we were always in the right place, utterly polite and tipped well so I genuinely have no clue what we did to upset any of our drivers. I’m quite upset about this as was ridiculously proud of my five star rating!

Anyway, we arrived without incident, and by 10am we were through the gates at Universal Studios and on our way to Diagon Alley.

We had seen from the app that Gringotts was only a 25 minute wait and we knew it wasn’t eligible for the FOTL passes so made that our first port of call.

We entered the locker room with a heavy heart (I won’t go into my feelings about the locker area being the seventh circle of hell again here but I know you all feel the same way and you can read my 2016 trip report if you want chapter and verse on this). The Gringotts locker area was actually blissfully quiet and other than a large family barging up to me to ask if I was “putting in, or getting out?”, which I thought was a little personal, it was incident-free.

Most of the 25 minutes was spent going through the queue and having that utterly, utterly pointless photo taken. Just another money spinner I guess, but we had no interest in getting the Universal photo pass – mainly as it seemed complicated from other trip reports I have read here.

I don’t know what it is about our timing on this ride but we always end up in a group of unusually tall people. but once again I found myself standing behind a potential entrant for the Guinness Book of Records “Tallest Spanish Gene Simmonds lookalike” category. He’d have been a shoe-in. Per usual, I spent most of the time in the queue dodging him – not because I don’t like KISS, or tall Spanish men (far from it), but just because I didn’t want to get caught sitting behind him on the ride and risk not being able to see any of it.

As it turned out, Gene was my seat buddy and he found the whole ride harness thing very confusing and needed some help.

We were in the back row of the ride vehicle and I quite like it there actually as the drop at the beginning feels much more intense from the back row than it does if you sit nearer the front. I love that bit where they hold you, and hold you, and hold you, and then you’re off!

The audio on the ride seemed a lot clearer this time around as I remember saying last time that I found it hard to clearly hear what Bellatrix and Voldemort were saying. Anyway, we loved it and it was over too quickly. I think it was over too fast for Gene as well as he didn’t understand that at the end of the ride he had to push his harness up and away from himself and he just stayed parked in his seat.

As the queue was still showing at 25 minutes, we quickly ran into the locker area and moved our gear (I think you get an hour for free on the lockers at Universal?) to another locker, then went and got back in the queue to go round again. This time there were no gigantic 80s hair metal lookalikes in the queue, more’s the pity, and we were in the front row. Obviously the screens are more intense in the front row but the ride feels more tame. Column A, column B.

After this, we had a little look round Diagon Alley which we’ve never done in any great detail before as it is always rammed. It wasn’t mega busy today so it felt quite pleasant and not overwhelming. We went into the Gringotts Bank room which we had never noticed before (we just thought it was another shop) and were a little surprised when we were face to face with a goblin behind the desk there! It was a funny moment and I guess is the equivalent of Turtle Talk as all of a sudden the goblin started chatting away to us, which was very awkward as we really didn’t know what to do with ourselves.

He asked us if we had any questions for him, which we didn’t, as we were totally put on the spot. I was a bit worried that Andy was going to try and make him talk about the various woes of Newcastle United but he kept quiet. Luckily a couple of American ladies had followed us in so they managed to have a little chat with the goblin but it freaked Andy and I out a little and we quietly crept from the room. I think had we known what we were walking into, we might have been a little more prepared – and I bet ineracting with a grumpy goblin would be so much fun for kids, and I wish we had made the most of it. It was funny though, with us both just standing there with a sudden attack of the mutes.

We had a little look in Knockturn Alley as well – the shop in there is great.

Andy took this photo of me (below) which will only make sense if you read Gopherlass’ “And When Did You Last See Your Father?” trip report. The comments section of this report came alive as everyone took the Pottermore patronus test to find out what theirs would be. People were coming away with fantastic beasts, and my patronus turned out to be a rat. Yeah, a rat. Not very glamorous or exciting (sorry rat fans). So obviously I needed my photo taken with Scabbers.

The wait time app was telling us that the wait time for The Mummy was only five minutes so we made our way over there. I was so excited to ride this as it is without a doubt my favourite ride in Universal. By the time we had got there though – and it’s only a couple of minutes away from Diagon Alley – the wait time had gone up to 30 minutes. I don’t know if this is because the app doesn’t sync fast enough or whether everyone had gone there when they saw it was five minutes but there you go. We debated going in the single rider line to save a bit of time but decided against it as we really wanted to ride it together for the first time on this trip.

My notes say that the queue took 26 minutes exactly. There are no photos as I had left my phone in the locker but the queue isn’t really that interesting. It’s dark and there are a few inexplicable interactive things but it wasn’t worth taking my phone in.

Considering that we rode this multiple times - I think even four or five times in a row last year – I did find the ride to be a little harder on the bones this year. No idea why as I know the track really well but I did find I was jolted about a fair bit, I don’t know if it was because we were on the back row maybe? We noted that they haven’t updated the ride from Brendan Fraser to any of the new Tom Cruise movie, and were quite pleased about this. One other thing we noticed was that where previously you exit down the ramp and could clearly see your ride photo displayed on a screen there, Universal have now splashed huge watermarks all over the screens - obviously to deter people from just taking a photo of the screen and not buying the ride pic. Swizzers.

It was about midday by now and we were pretty hungry so decided to leave the park and go and have some lunch. I’d had The Cowfish on my list of places to try for about two years and I was excited that today was finally the day.

City Walk was absolutely deserted. We were the only people walking along from Universal and it was incredibly eerie, especially as we were now fully used to all of the Thanksgiving crowds and it felt a bit post-apocalyptic to be wandering along completely alone. I half expected Will Smith to bust out of a wall somewhere in an armoured tank.

As a result, we didn’t have to wait for a table at The Cowfish at all and were shown straight upstairs, where we chose to sit outside. We were given a table right on the perimeter of the balcony so we had a lovely view over City Walk and both parks.

It was a beautiful day today and this was just perfect – such a lovely respite from the mania of the past week or so, and also – get us! We’re having lunch at a sensible time!

The menu looked amazing and I was really hard pressed to make a decision between the sushi and the burgers. I’d pored over the online menu for ages before we went away as I knew if I was faced with that menu on the day, it would take me an age to read it all and decide what I wanted. In the end, I decided a lighter lunch would probably be more sensible given that we had an afternoon of simulator rides ahead of us, and opted for the firecracker roll. Andy decided to have the veggie burger, and we each ordered a Kona Big Wave beer to wash them down. Perfect.

My sushi was lovely – it wasn’t as good as the stuff I had had at the California Grill last year but it was still streets ahead of anything I have ever eaten in the UK.

Andy really enjoyed his veggie burger as well, polishing it off in no time at all. He let me have one or two of his fries which were really delicious. I’d read on here that people had trouble finishing meals here and I was secretly hoping the same would be true of Andy, but no such luck as he demolished the entire thing and didn’t leave any fries behind. Foiled!

Our bill, including tip, was only $50.00 which I thought was pretty reasonable for the quality of the food we had had, plus a couple of bottled beers. Service was really good as well. I think if we go there again, which I do intend to do next time, I’d have a starter as well as the sushi as whilst I felt satisfied, I didn’t really feel properly full. Still, it was a good lunch and I would definitely recommend it. Also, as it was quiet and we only had one course, we were in and out inside an hour without feeling rushed at all.

Continued below...

[HelenJNT]

One of the main things on our agenda for today was to upgrade our 14 day passes to an annual pass for Universal as our dates for next year’s trip had already been booked and once I realised we were going to be back there inside a year, I had started researching the cost to upgrade to an annual pass. Universal tickets aren’t cheap at the best of times – I think we paid £320 for our 14 day three park tickets and thanks to the Dibb, we had learned that we could upgrade to the annual pass for just a few dollars more.

We went to the ticket window at the entrance to Universal Studios and he looked at our 14 day tickets and made a quick phone call. He said to us that because we had already used the tickets, he wasn’t able to upgrade them there and we had to go to Guest Services inside the park. I didn’t really understand this but that was what we were told so we went back through the barriers and tried to find Guest Services on the map, which was a first for us as we had never needed to visit there before.

However, before we headed over there, we noticed that Minion Mayhem was only a 20 minute wait which must be something of a miracle, especially in the middle of the day. It was a no brainer that we needed to capitalise on this and so got straight in the queue. It was dead on 20 minutes and I think that’s the shortest wait we’ve ever had – we almost made it in as a walk on but we got stopped so we were first on the next ride, which was good enough for us.

We’d gone to Universal today with every intention of forking out for the front of the line fast passes (which are something obscene like $80 each for a one-day use) but actually realised that we probably weren’t going to need them. The park wasn’t exactly dead, like it was one day last year where we really struck lucky and everything was a walk-on, but most of the rides had sub-30 minute waits and we decided the money was better off in the bank and that we should still be able to ride everything we wanted to do, if not multiple times then at least once. We’d already got Gringotts and the Mummy under our belts and had done a few bits in Islands of Adventure the previous week that we didn’t need to repeat so it was all feeling pretty relaxed and groovy and we were happy not to be spending the money.

As a side note, we have contemplated staying in a Universal resort on every single trip but it just never works out as cost-viable for us, as there are only two of us. We’ve looked at every which way of doing it and the price of return Uber trips and buying the FOTL passes has always worked out cheaper than booking a room and paying for it on top of 14 nights in Disney. I guess the only other solution for us would be to do a 16 night trip and start off in Universal but that’s never seemed to have worked out either. Shame as I would like to stay there, if only for a night, but we’ve never caught any of the hotels with a sale on that’s been good enough to make it palatable.

Anyway, in the spirit of saving money, we went into guest services. When we bought our Universal tickets, we got Volcano Bay thrown in “for free” and we hadn’t actually been there which was a bit of a shame but not one we were weeping over – as I have previously mentioned, we aren’t crazy about water parks, preferring to remain on dry land. It would have been another $200+ for us to upgrade for a three park annual pass so we didn’t bother with that, figuring that if we did decide to visit Volcano Bay on our next trip that we would just pay on the door.

We enquired as to whether there were passholder blackout dates for our next trip and my heart sunk a bit when we were told that there were. However, happily, it turned out that these were just on weekends so that wasn’t an issue for us as we would never visit Universal on a weekend anyway as it’s just too busy – whereas you never notice any significant increase in crowds in WDW at the weekend, as let’s face it, it’s always busy.

It was a grand total of $8.00ish to upgrade to the annual passes. It took a while though so that’s something to bear in mind if you’re planning on doing the same. We were told that we had to exit the park and be re-fingerprinted in order to activate them. At this point we made a decision that we would come to kick ourselves over and didn’t exit and re-enter the park then and there, figuring we would do it later. This was a stupid decision, especially as we were right at the front of the park at this point, but you’ll have to read on to find out why it was stupid (Oooh! The suspense!)

As it was, we felt we had spent so much time getting the passes sorted that we wanted to get on and do stuff. Our original intention had been to go and see the Horror Make-Up Show as we hadn’t done this in years and remembered it being a hoot, but we had just missed one so that was a shame as we didn’t get time to go back and see another one.

Instead, we had a little look around the prop shop on the corner there, and I got quite lost in there looking at all the things. They had loads of Halloween Horror Nights props on sale which were absolutely terrifying and I am not entirely sure who would want such things in their home but I enjoyed browsing them nonetheless.

We then had a little walk through the Hollywood section of the park, which isn’t actually anywhere we have spent a significant amount of time. I don’t know what all those buildings are there – are they offices? Answers on a postcard please.

We also noticed this time in Universal that there were staff absolutely everywhere trying to stop people and get them to complete surveys. Everywhere. We spent the whole day dodging these survey monkeys (which is a brand name not an insult, I promise) and Andy eventually ended up getting a bit snappy with one of them who had already seen us say “no thanks” to several other survey people on the same pathway, as we were fed up with running the gauntlet and having them step out in front of us at every opportunity. I know they have a job to do and it’s good to get feedback from visitors but it was driving us slightly potty.

We didn’t really have a plan for the afternoon but seeing as we were headed in the direction of ET, that was where we ended up. I don’t really like this ride but we do it on every trip as we are convinced that at some point, it won’t be there any more and we will wish we had had one last ride.

This was a walk on, and was notable for the fact that for the first time ever, ET said both of our names at the end. Winning.

Exiting via the shop, we saw some kids having their photo taken against the green screen and also in the wardrobe set.

We also found a tiny and seriously dusty shelf containing the only Back To The Future merchandise we have ever seen in Universal. Andy decided to model the holo baseball cap from BTTF2 for your enjoyment.

We decided against buying a dusty model Delorian, and carried on towards the Simpsons area, managing to take a photo of the floor as we went. Two thumbs up.

We had something of a wait for the Simpsons ride but nothing significant, I think it was about 30 minutes. There’s always a wait for this one though as it’s quite a long ride so we weren’t bothered.

There are two things I always have to make sure of on this ride – 1) that I don’t stub/cut my toe on the way in as I have done this on every visit without fail, and 2) to make Andy sit on the outside of the car as the end of the lap bar is agony when it’s digging into your thigh meat, and, well, he is significantly less meaty than I am so it doesn’t affect him. Pain and peril avoided (or so I thought), the ride began.

We were at the bottom of the ride this time and it was massively uncomfortable. We were craning our necks to try and see the whole of the screen above us and it was a very long and painful few minutes trying to look up to watch the screen with our necks at that angle, all the while being bounced around by the simulator. It’s still a fun ride but in future I would try and avoid loading bay 1 and ask to be higher up, I think. Even Andy, who usually adores this ride, said he felt a bit pained and iffy by the end of it.

After this, we decided to recover with a beer from the Duff bar. Andy hadn’t been able to have one on our last trip due to being off alcohol for health reasons so he was looking forward to this.

I went and snagged a seat by the water and it was really pleasant there sitting in the sun and relaxing.

It took Andy ages to get the beers though as they would only serve one per person and even though he’d taken both our driving licences with him, the bar staff actually wanted to eyeball each person. Andy managed to get round it with a series of pointing at me across the way and explaining “that’s my wife” and eventually the staff relented and let him purchase two weak beers. This was the only time on the whole trip that anyone was remotely bothered about our ID – we had no issues in Disney whatsoever. I wonder, now that alcohol is included in the dining plan as to whether Disney are going to be more vigilant and consistent with checking ID. Hope not as it always feels like a nuisance, although I understand why they do it.

Once we had finished our beers it was time to go on Men In Black, which was a walk-on.

Andy had forgotten all about the red button (cue dirty sexist joke), but rest assured I had not, and so I was the clear winner. Ha. He was puzzling for ages afterwards as to how I had got such an outstanding score and in the end I relented and reminded him about the red button (cue dirty sexist joke). Kind wife.

Continued below...

[HelenJNT]

I have no idea what was significant about this tree. A lizard maybe, but I’ll be damned if I can see it now. Anyone?

Next on the agenda was to re-ride the Mummy, and go on Transformers and Shrek so we made our way over but the Mummy was at 40 minutes which was too long really, and we had just missed a Shrek showing so decided against that as well. I think we had said we would only go on Transformers if the wait were 20 minutes or under and it can’t have been as we didn’t end up on that either! Neither of us were that bothered about missing it as we didn’t really enjoy it last time …lots of banging and shouting and no coherent story….so pretty true to the movies then.

As all of this was a bit of a fail, we decided to get the Hogwarts Express over to Islands of Adventure so we could go and ride the Forbidden Journey as we both really like this ride and hadn’t had the chance to get on it as yet. But……foiled! We realised we couldn’t use our annual passes on the Hogwarts Express as we hadn’t activated them at the main turnstiles.

So we did yet another 180 and walked back to the front of the again park to get this sorted. I took these two photos on the way out, one which made me laugh and the other which made me despair.

We exited via the shop where we were both distracted from our mission by the sweets section of the main gift shop, and decided to buy a couple of bottles of water and a piece of phallic-looking fudge to share.

It was pretty warm still and so the fudge was getting a bit melted. We decided to sit on the wall by the exit turnstiles and eat the fudge, which turned out to be a bit of an endeavour, as, well, it just wasn’t very nice.

It was a bit like cheap pic&mix fudge, kind of plasticy and I am sad to say, just not worth the calories. We took it in turns to have a bite each and eventually saw it off but we wouldn’t buy it again. Sad times.

We exited the park for the second time that day and walked round to the entrance so we could activate our passes. And wouldn’t you know? They didn’t work. I don’t know why or what went wrong but luckily the lady operating the turnstiles was able to do something fancy with an iPad and get them up and running again for us before too long. It did take a while though and we were conscious of time ticking away once again. The entrance turnstiles were quite busy and for the first time, WE were the annoying wombles whose passes weren’t working and I could feel that all-too-familiar glare of the people in the queue behind us.

Finally back in the park again and we went back to where we were, about to board the Hogwarts Express. We saw that Minions had dropped to a 15 minute wait as we went back into the park but we swerved it as had lost too much time already and needed to get over to Hogsmeade. The sign outside the Hogwarts Express (as beautifully modelled here by a staff member) said it was only a ten minute wait, so we were confident that we hadn’t lost that much time and would still have plenty of time to ride Forbidden Journey prior to watching the new Christmas projections on the Hogwarts Castle.

Hmmmm. This doesn’t look like a ten minute queue to me…

…and it wasn’t. As it would turn out, this was the worst queue of the whole trip, made even more so as we had been lulled into it by the promise of a ten minute wait.

It ended up being 50 minutes, and had we known this, we would have just walked round and come in via the Islands of Adventure entrance.

People in the queue were furious and all chuntering at the tops of their voices about how ridiculous it all was.

Luckily Andy and I managed to bypass a large section of the end of the queue by being called forward as a two, otherwise we would have been waiting for a clear hour.

During the time we had been waiting, it had got dark outside and I think we disembarked into Hogsmeade at about 17:45.

We emerged into a scene of utter and unexpected chaos. Maybe I was naive but I had no idea that Hogsmeade by night was going to be such a Monday night destination, even with the Christmas projection show that had been feted. I was so taken aback by this that I didn’t even think to take any photos but I am sure that by day 12 of this trip report, you all know what an elbow-to-elbow crowd looks like.

Well, this was worse. It was more tightly packed than the front row of a Bieber concert at Wembley* and it was impossible to get through. So weird, what with it being a Monday night and all the signs were that the Thanksgiving crowds had all but gone.

*I am guessing, having never attended such a thing, as you know, I would rather spend nine hours on a WDW transportation system bus.

We decided that we were going to do our best to get through the crowds to the Forbidden Journey anyway as we figured we would be OK seeing as most people were there for the projection show. We got as far as Moaning Myrtle’s toilets where an officious cast member stopped us and told us we weren’t allowed any further as the scrum in Hogsmeade was the “queue” for the projection show. Excuse me? There were thousands of people there and you can’t even see the castle til you get parallel to the bridge on the left anyway so it was going to take some time for all of them to be allowed in.

Apparently there was a restricted number of people who were allowed to be let through for each showing of the projection show and there was no telling how long everyone would be waiting for as they could only be let forward in small increments. Oh. We asked if we could access the ride and the answer was no as it was closed during the show. Nothing about it closing early in the park guide for the day, so we were pretty peeved.

We took a right by the loos into the courtyard of the Three Broomsticks just to get out of the crowd and make a plan. We felt pretty deflated – we would have liked to have seen the show but knew we stood no chance of that unless we wanted to stand in that nightmare for hours. As it was we could see the top of the castle from the courtyard so just decided to stay put three for a moment and see if we could see anything.

It was never going to be a full view and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone as a vantage point but we got the general idea. It would have been OK if it hadn’t been for some awful woman who hopped up onto one of the benches in the courtyard to get a better view, picking the only two foot area where the view wasn’t obscured by trees. I do wonder what it is about Harry Potter that makes grown women lose the plot so compulsively? Her husband said to her quietly “you do know you’re blocking the view of everyone behind you, don’t you?” and she turned to address the rest of the people in the courtyard shouting “OH! AM I BLOCKING YOUR VIEW?” then she giggled like a loon at us all, and carried on sarcastically “I’m SOOOOO sorry you can’t see but to be honest I DON’T CARE, I NEED to see this show as I LOVE HARRY POTTER SOOOO MUCH!” and then just turned around again.

So, we couldn’t see a thing, and we couldn’t get on the ride, and we were feeling pretty sad about it all, so just gave up in the end. Giving a silent “FU” to the woman on the bench, Andy and I pushed our way out of the courtyard and pleaded with one of the cast members to let us out down one of the emergency roped off areas.

We were both quite down in the mouth after this episode as it really hit us that we were going home in a few days and there was so much that we hadn’t managed to do. I think we still had busy days by anyone’s standards, but compared to other visits we have had, we felt like we had barely scratched the surface of the parks. We never feel like we’ve had a successful trip unless we’ve managed multiple rides of our favourites, and not to get on some of them at all was a bit upsetting.

Islands of Adventure was much busier than Universal Studios had been. I think this is the only time we’ve ever been there after dark actually and we really enjoyed seeing it all lit up around the Hulk and that area. Not as pretty as Disney but still fairly spectacular. Speaking of spectacular, I saw THE most amazing t-shirt here – a guy in a flesh coloured tank top which was printed with one huge image of a photo of Nicolas Cage’s face on the front, so from a distance he looked like he was naked from the waist up, but with a gigantic tattoo of Nicolas Cage’s face on his chest. Bravo that man – and I really wish I had got a photo but I was scared the flash would go off.

We were down but not quite out, and were very happy to see that Spiderman only had a five minute wait, so we got in the queue. It must have been quiet for some time as the ride staff seemed really pleased to see us and whooped as we arrived at the boarding area.

The ride was slightly marred by two girls sat behind us who just chuntered on all the way through it, oblivious to anyone else in the ride vehicle, not caring that other people might have wanted to listen to the ride narrative and not to theirs.

By the time we came off the ride, Andy and I felt a bit wiped out. The original plan was to go back to Universal Studios for the final hour and finish off the stuff we hadn’t done, but there was only half an hour til the park closed so we didn’t think we’d have time. We were just stood still on the Hulk bridge for a little while, neither of us wanting to voice the fact that it was time to leave, I think as we didn’t want to quit on what felt like something of a low. We snapped out of it though and realised now would be a good time to be getting out of there as we didn’t want to get stuck either waiting for an Uber or with surge pricing at park closing time.

We made our way out of the park, feeling like we really hadn’t done Universal justice on this trip seeing as we’d only managed a couple of hours on our first day there, and that the unexpected IoA crowds had put us off our stride this evening. Still, we’d had a fantastic morning and afternoon and we were glad of that.

We decided not to eat on City Walk again as we had so many Disney meal credits left so didn’t want to be spending real money, tempting though some of the restaurants and bars were. Plus it was getting pretty busy so we decided to cut our losses and head back to the Disney bubble.

As it was, it was still pretty busy around the transport area at Universal and it took ages for Jose, our Uber driver to find us as cars were parked in drop-off areas and not moving, and there was no constant flow of traffic due to this. It was pretty bad – my notes say “like Bedlam”.

Eventually we were on our way but it was slow progress as the roads around Universal were really busy. It was very unexpected for a Monday evening and Jose didn’t know why it was so uncharacteristically bad either.

As it was only about 7pm, we decided when we ordered the Uber that we were going to have a bonus visit to Disney Springs as we weren’t quite ready to head back to the hotel.

Turns out there’s a proper drop-off point at Disney Springs which we didn’t know as we had always just been dropped off in the outdoor car park behind Cirque du Soleil. There’s a massive drop-off area which I think may have also been a bus stop for non-WDW buses which felt like it was in the middle of nowhere and we had to walk down a fairly dark path in order to hit the main drag to come out by House of Blues.

We didn’t have an agenda for this little bonus visit at all but first up was a decision about food. We were trying to decide between Blaze Pizza or a return to the Polite Pig, and as we were debating it, our walk (passing The Edison en route) had taken us more or less to outside Blaze anyway so that was a done deal and in we went.

There weren’t a vast number of people in the queue this time but it was slower than on our previous visit.

There was a very officious lady meeting and greeting all the arrivals and directing them to a queue and she told me off when I put one step in the wrong direction. Suitably told, I moved back and I think it was a good 15 minute wait to put in our order which was a bit surprising but the queue down the other end just didn’t seem to be budging for some reason.

Andy decided to go maverick off-menu this time and select his own toppings, choosing mushrooms and peppers “with double tomato sauce please”. I went for jalapenos, mushrooms and extra garlic. The pizzas are the wrong way round in this photo for some reason and I can’t work out why but I know the jalapeno one is mine and I took the photo!

We also had a couple of blood orange lemonades from the urns at the back of the restaurant. These were really delicious and really hit the spot at the end of a long day. As before, the pizza was utterly delicious and we were thrilled that we had been able to come back to Blaze for a second innings. I think they were pleased as well - they have a really good social media team who really interact when you tag them on Instagram.

Before we left, we grabbed another blood orange lemonade each – we weren’t sure if the refills were free but we thought we’d be rebellious and chance it anyway – turns out they are free and we needn’t have worried.

It was only a fleeting visit to Disney Springs to get something to eat as we were uncomfortably aware that the next day was our final full day and we supposed we had better get back to the hotel to think about packing, for all we didn’t want to. However, I couldn’t resist one final trip to Sephora, the mothership to pick up the lipsticks that I hadn’t quite managed to purchase during my previous visit when I had been struck down by Earl of Sandwich.

I nabbed the Kat von D lipsticks that I wanted, and then went to have another quick look at Anastasia Beverly Hills to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. Turns out I had as they had a Sephora exclusive liquid lipstick that was just in my perfect shade (which my friends like to call “s**t lips” and I prefer to refer to as “mauve”), so I grabbed a couple of those and also decided to see what all the fuss was about and buy one of the Anastasia Beverly Hills highlighting kits, as I figured I may as well see out the last year of my 30s by giving in to the disco ball trend. Andy, however, hates it when I wear this, and says it looks like my skin is falling off. Just what I was going for, ta.

That was us done at Disney Springs and it was time to head for the bus stop. We had a little wait, not helped by a man and his family not understanding the configuration of the chain queuing ropes and just standing in the middle, refusing to move down. But if we’ve learned anything from this report, it is that people behave oddly at all times and you just have to ignore it.

We were back in the room by 21:00, which wasn’t bad actually. We made an executive decision not to start the packing as we didn’t want to acknowledge the fact that the holiday was drawing to a close, so got in to bed. Andy read for a bit and I caught up with the notes from the day and I think we were zonked out long before 22:00.

So it was a bit of a hit and miss day at Universal but definitely with more hits than misses. Having said that, I am off to watch the Harry Potter projection show on You Tube now as I haven’t remembered to do it so far, and I want to see what all the fuss was about!

Please join me for the next instalment which is our last full day…and an evening at Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party!... which can now be found here

Essential stats:
2 parks
9 attractions
22,679 steps
9.87 miles

[kat90]

Great day at Universal, shame about IOA though!

Also thanks for the tip about upgrading your ticket to an annual pass. I didn't know you could do this, all this time I could have been saving loads of money. Definitely on my to-do list for my next visit!

[HelenJNT]

Originally Posted by kat90

Great day at Universal, shame about IOA though!

Also thanks for the tip about upgrading your ticket to an annual pass. I didn't know you could do this, all this time I could have been saving loads of money. Definitely on my to-do list for my next visit!

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I know, we were badly disappointed by IOA, which was a shame as the rest of the day was brilliant.

Oh good, glad I could help. There are some good threads on it in the Ticket forum on here which is how I learned about it, and probably explain it better than I did!

[Redrach1903]

Ok I did NOT know about the other bank room at Gringotts! Mind blown!

Your meal at Cowfish looked fab (even though sushi is the stuff of nightmares in my book). That view!

Such a result that it was so quiet and you didn’t need to pay for the ridiculous express passes! Groovy as you hilariously put :
Totally agree about it not being cost viable to stay at Universal if there are only 2 of you. It's something I have looked into multiple times and I just can't bring myself to pay £300 for one night in a hotel!

There are some strange buildings around the Hollywood bit, I've always wondered what that odd looking house is too! I wonder if someone secretly lives there haha!

Never go to Nashville if you find getting ID'd a pain in the chops! It was ridiculous! Like you say, it is understandable, but do I really look under 21? Don’t think so!

50 minutes for the train – that is crazy town! And how annoying that you lost that time sorting out your passes! And after all that faff you didn’t even get to ride FJ or see the show properly Cannot believe that woman! WOW!

Hmmm Blaze pizza. My tummy is making the most incredible noises looking at that just now! Drool!

"Andy, however, hates it when I wear this, and says it looks like my skin is falling off" – dead! What a guy!

Can't wait for MVMCP!

xxx

[HelenJNT]

Originally Posted by Redrach1903

Ok I did NOT know about the other bank room at Gringotts! Mind blown!

Your meal at Cowfish looked fab (even though sushi is the stuff of nightmares in my book). That view!

Such a result that it was so quiet and you didn’t need to pay for the ridiculous express passes! Groovy as you hilariously put :
Totally agree about it not being cost viable to stay at Universal if there are only 2 of you. It's something I have looked into multiple times and I just can't bring myself to pay £300 for one night in a hotel!

There are some strange buildings around the Hollywood bit, I've always wondered what that odd looking house is too! I wonder if someone secretly lives there haha!

Never go to Nashville if you find getting ID'd a pain in the chops! It was ridiculous! Like you say, it is understandable, but do I really look under 21? Don’t think so!

50 minutes for the train – that is crazy town! And how annoying that you lost that time sorting out your passes! And after all that faff you didn’t even get to ride FJ or see the show properly Cannot believe that woman! WOW!

Hmmm Blaze pizza. My tummy is making the most incredible noises looking at that just now! Drool!

"Andy, however, hates it when I wear this, and says it looks like my skin is falling off" – dead! What a guy!

Can't wait for MVMCP!

xxx

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No, we didn't know about the bank either - totally caught us on the back foot! Was pretty cool though; you might want to go in with some prepared questions if you're going to do it so you don't just stand there like guppies as we did.

No to sushi? You shock me...

Maybe when we do our WDW Wife Swap holiday the four of us can just book a room at Universal to take advantage of... the passes, hahahahahaha.

I suppose it's more flattering to be IDd than not, but it's going to be a pain if it happens every time you want a drink. I think it's more to prove that you are going to be drinking said drink and that you aren't planning on sneaking it to an under-ager. Same reason most places we've been to in the US won't let one person buy a round of drinks at a bar and they want to eyeball each person who is going to have one.

Yeah we were pretty gutted about the whole Hogsmeade debacle. Hopefully it'll be better this year, I was really sad to miss out on FJ, especially as it is a bit sentimental for us as was the first ride we went on on our honeymoon, on Andy's first ever trip to Orlando.

Mmmmmmm Blaze...

Oh yeah - maybe I just need to get better at applying highlighter *fires up You Tube*

Right, I had better get on and actually finish writing the NVMCP day then, hadn't I? #chopchop

xx

[moosha]

“But if we’ve learned anything from this report, it is that people behave oddly at all times and you just have to ignore it.” Absolutely, especially on an Orlando holiday. I’m so glad you include those irritations in your reports.

Cowfish looks great, it’s on our list for this year already, and glad you had a productive first half of the day at Universal.

The Hogwarts Express / castle nightmare sounds like a right pain. We had an ‘issue’ at IoA last year with some technical problems that weren’t handled great by the staff causing us to lose over an hour of precious park time and at the time I kept thinking ‘it wouldn’t happen at Disney’. Sometimes I think Universal are not quite as ‘on it’ as they should be .

Loving the report and sad that it’s almost over. I absolutely understand feeling like you’ve not achieved anywhere near as much as you’d have liked on a trip. Very frustrating. At least this time you knew it wasn’t long before you’d be back again .

[HelenJNT]

Originally Posted by moosha

“But if we’ve learned anything from this report, it is that people behave oddly at all times and you just have to ignore it.” Absolutely, especially on an Orlando holiday. I’m so glad you include those irritations in your reports.

Cowfish looks great, it’s on our list for this year already, and glad you had a productive first half of the day at Universal.

The Hogwarts Express / castle nightmare sounds like a right pain. We had an ‘issue’ at IoA last year with some technical problems that weren’t handled great by the staff causing us to lose over an hour of precious park time and at the time I kept thinking ‘it wouldn’t happen at Disney’. Sometimes I think Universal are not quite as ‘on it’ as they should be .

Loving the report and sad that it’s almost over. I absolutely understand feeling like you’ve not achieved anywhere near as much as you’d have liked on a trip. Very frustrating. At least this time you knew it wasn’t long before you’d be back again .

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I think one positive of trip reporting is that you learn to embrace the irritating people as you know how they'll resonate with people who read them and know exactly where you're coming from!

Cowfish is really good - Andy is usually a committed carnivore but he loved his veggie burger, and the sushi was delicious. I definitely recommend it.

Universal generally are more functional than magical and I think their cast members are perhaps less diverse but there are some things they do better, like security screening. I certainly don't think that their ride wait times are as accurate though.

Thank you - I've enjoyed writing this one - I need to get a shuffle on with day 13 really as it isn't complete yet. Soon!

[Lisa_Lollipop]

Ooo I love a Universal day! It does always amaze me when it is so busy in one of the parks but then quiet in the other, given they are so easily interchangeable you would think the crowd levels would be similar in each (although I guess the HP projection show had a lot to answer for in IoA on this day!)

Such a great idea to upgrade to APs, I can't believe how cheap it was! Such a great saving when you come to your trip next year and you won't have to but tickets!

I cannot believe how short the queue time for Minions was... surely this has to be some sort of record? We have waited longer than that in the express pass queue!

Your lunch at Cowfish look delicious, this too has been on my list for years but we are yet to visit there... although I will most certainly be avoiding the sushi when the time does finally come! What with Blaze for dinner too... a great day of eating, you have redeemed yourself!

Ok so you seem to be quite hung up on Justin Bieber concerts... do you secretly want to go to one? I'll be your buddy for sure!

So sad that the end of this TR is now coming into sight, I am absolutely loving it! Super excited for the MVMCP instalment that is coming next though!

Oh and one last thing to address before I sign off...

Originally Posted by HelenJNT

Maybe when we do our WDW Wife Swap holiday the four of us can just book a room at Universal to take advantage of... the passes, hahahahahaha

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The FOUR of you?! Why aren't I invited to this Dibber Doll wife swap party? And don't be giving me excuses about the rooms only accommodating 5 people... we can make it work!