If you book it, they will come! August 2015 - Day 9 - Checking into RPR Club Level/Universal Studios

[JoJo88]

If you book it, they will come August 2015

INDEX

Day 9 – Checking into RPR Club Level / Universal Studios

Thursday 13th August 2015

I don’t mean to go on, but I didn’t have a great night’s sleep, what with my shoulders. I just couldn’t get comfortable, and then when I did finally nod off, I’d turn over in my sleep, disturb myself and start the whole cycle again. Not wishing to be left out, my legs got in on the act too and became fidgety. Does anyone else get restless legs? Where you just can’t keep them still? Usually the only solution is to go to bed, but as I was already in bed, I was a bit stumped!

It was at around 7.30am when I finally woke up ‘proper’ and I began packing up ready for our final move. The others soon surfaced and between us all we gathered everything up checking all the drawers and nooks and crannies for anything we might have stored away during our brief stay.

At around 9.45 we loaded up the car and headed round to reception to check out.

I would have gone by myself to check out, but as we hadn’t paid anything up front, my Dad came too so that we could split the bill across two credit cards. It worked out $225 per night which we didn’t think was too bad at all, and we also had a little bit extra to pay where we had gone over our room credit.

We’d had a lovely stay and would certainly recommend it should anyone ask. The villa was very spacious and comfortable. Even the boys having to share a sofa bed turned out to be not too traumatic! The ‘quiet’ pool was exactly that, quiet, and the hotel was in a great location. However, with sooooo many different accommodations in Orlando, I’m not sure we’d necessarily book it again, for no reason other than to try somewhere else.

The same can’t be said of where we were heading of course, having already spent a week there the year before! However, there’s a difference between a lovely stay, and a fantastic stay, and we’d had a fantastic time at Royal Pacific Resort in 2014, and didn’t want to run the risk of being disappointed by booking somewhere else!

So, all checked out of the Caribe Royale, we got on our way, evidently stopping off for some fuel on the way as I found this photo on my camera

It didn’t take long and we arrived at Universal Resort at around 10.15.

We unloaded the car, and most of us went through to the lobby while Simon & my Dad parked up.

Check in was quick and easy. We were given a little welcome pack including vouchers for drinks courtesy of Virgin Holidays (a nice little perk, along with free parking). As expected our rooms weren’t ready, but it didn’t matter as we didn’t need our rooms, the boys only had one destination on their minds!

We checked our bags in with the bell boys, keeping with us our valuables and swimming gear and made our way towards the Tower 3 lift (elevator?), swiping one of our room key cards so that we could push the magic button up to the 7th floor.

The boys had been so excited to show Grandma & Grandad what was up on the 7th floor, and urged them to hurry up along the corridor to the special room at the end!

It was almost like we’d never been away! The same cans of fizzy pop, juice, water, coffee, tea etc were laid out exactly the same. It really did feel like going home!

We all grabbed a drink and caught up on the outside world with an assortment of iPads and iPhones.

I wandered over to the desk to have a chat with the staff and was delighted to see that Bryan, who had look after us so attentively the previous year, was still there. He recognised me also, but couldn’t work out if I was a current guest or a previous one! Well, both actually! I then pointed to the others, something twigged and he somehow remembered us!

I took a copy of the evening menu so that we could plan which nights we would definitely eat out, and which we might not.

The menu is on a five night rotation, so if you are there for six nights or more you will start to see the same things again.

We were a little early for the afternoon snacks, it was around 11.15 by now, and as you can see, the snacks wouldn’t be out until 12.

However, we were all happy to just chill out for a while, and while we waited we took it in turns to get changed and creamed up for the pool. Not right there in the lounge of course, there was a lovely big restroom just round the corner from one of the TVs!

Just down there, on the right

Bryan came over for a chat, and let us know that it was actually his last day at RPR and he was moving on to another hotel to try something different. We were pleased we’d caught him, as we’d said when we left last time that we would ‘see him next year’, and we do like to keep to our word

Eventually snacks were put out, again, exactly the same as last year.

There’s crisps, trail mix, yogurt coated pretzels, goldfish crackers, Bombay mix, PB&J sandwiches (so good!), cereal bars and fruit. It doesn’t look much, but to be honest, it’s perfectly fine to keep you going in between a big breakfast and an American portion sized evening meal!

I checked with the desk to see if our rooms were ready but they still weren’t, so once we’d all snacked, we headed down to the pool. Creatures of habit that we are, we went back to the same area of sun loungers that we’d used last time, just to the side of the water play area.

The boys were straight in the water, with the rest of us following, although I didn’t go too far as I wanted to keep an eye on our things.

It didn’t take long for the boys to find their way to the water cannons, and it didn’t take long for Adam to get in a tussle with someone. Ooops! In fairness, he was defending Daniel against a bigger boy who was trying to stop him from squirting. I’m sorry, but if you’re in a water play area with water guns, isn’t getting squirted par for the course? Bit like moaning about getting wet on Rip Saw Falls...

Unfortunately our time in the pool was short lived, as the sky turned this colour…

…and, in a repeat of last year’s check in day, we were told to get out of the pool as a storm arrived.

We quickly grabbed all our things and ran over towards the shelter of the little walkway by the hotel.

My little straw hat was a victim of the rain, and was reduced to a limp, soggy, sorry looking mess, that never did regain its shape.

We stood and watched the rain, hoping it would soon pass. It’s pretty amazing how you can have such a downpour, only for it to stop as suddenly as it started and for it to be bright & sunny again.



However, this downpour didn’t show any signs of stopping and so we all took it in turns to get changed into our dry clothes in the gym then headed back up to the club room.

We cracked out the cards and settled down for a game of Blob while we waited for our rooms to be ready.

Bryan came over and introduced us to another CM. I can’t remember his name, I think it might have been Colby, although Justin rings a bell too. Either way, he was very knowledgeable about the Universal parks and he stood and chatted for a while giving us the latest park news and telling us interesting stories from behind the scenes.

At around 4pm we were told our rooms were ready and so we hot-footed down the corridor to find them.

I’d been in touch with the Club Manager via email beforehand and had asked if there was any chance we could have interconnecting rooms. However, we both wanted Queen rooms, and there aren’t any that connect. I’d also asked if we could have the same room as before as it was very convenient to the lounge but again, this wasn’t to be. However, our new rooms were the same distance away, we just had to turn right at the end of the corridor rather than left. Mum & Dad were a couple of doors down.

We tried the keys in our allotted doors, but none of them would work. Neither of Mum or Dad’s would work in their door either, so we tried each other’s doors instead – Open Sesame! It turned out we’d been given the wrong room numbers but it hardly mattered, as I said we were only a couple of doors down from each other.

Simon & my Dad went downstairs to get the cases which we then dumped in the room before going back to the club room as it was now happy hour, or Royal Relaxation as they call it!

We all had a little bit of the food on offer, it was beef with rice and beans and was actually really nice. Daniel tucked into his favourite cheese & crackers and Adam had a little pick at a few bits.

We also enjoyed some of the beer and wine, but Adam had been chomping at the bit to get into the parks since we’d checked in, and as the rain had stopped we didn’t hang around for long.

I think this was taken from the lobby by the lifts

We had to call into the lobby first to get our FOLPs from the kiosks which was easy enough. I don’t have a photo, but here’s one from last year!

With all our tickets and FOLPs stowed away in lanyards, we wandered outside into the sunshine, the few puddles on the ground a giveaway to the earlier rain storm. We debated whether to walk or take the boat, and what soon became the rule was that if there were other people waiting for a boat, it probably meant there was one due in soon, if there was no one at the dock we probably just missed one. As there were others there, we decided to wait, which was only for a couple of minutes.

Riding the water taxi towards City Walk is a great feeling, a proper ‘I’m on holiday’ one for me, and that evening was no exception.

It was just before 6pm by the time we arrived, and we decided to turn left up the stairs and head for Universal Studios, specifically Diagon Alley to see if there was any chance of riding Gringott’s before midnight!

We had actual park tickets this time, rather than having to exchange a voucher so went straight to the turnstiles, and were through in no time at all.

There had been talk of Daniel riding Rip Ride Rockit, and his protestations that he was too short were soon proven to be nonsense. Obvious really considering he was tall enough last year!

Before we ventured too far into the park, I had something else I needed to do first. I’d pre-ordered the Photo Connect package, and so popped into the nearby shop to pick up the necessary card. I forget exactly how much it cost, but around $80 rings a bell, and that gave us a week’s worth of photographs. Despite not being quite as good as Disney’s Memory Maker (I imagine, I’ve never used it), with over 50 photos in the end, we thought it was great value. This was a brave move for me as I absolutely hate having my photo taken, almost as much as I hate looking at photos of myself, so I won’t be posting all 50! You do have to do your research to find out where Photo Connect can be used, as some of the places we’d never even noticed before, but hopefully I’ll be able to point some out throughout the next few reports 

I’ve just spotted Daniel in this next photo, and I’ve also found a receipt for a bottle of water ($2.75), so I’m guessing that’s what he is doing!

Anyway, with the photo card added to my lanyard, we carried on with our journey towards Potter Land, stopping for some photos on the way (I’m not showing you, they are awful! )
The park was quite busy, which was to be expected as it was still early evening but it didn’t matter, at that moment in time it felt like we had all the time in the world.

Predictably Diagon Alley was busy too, but Gringott’s was showing a 30 minute wait which we thought was too good an opportunity to miss and would save us attempting to make early entry. Besides, anything would be better than our last attempt, which was during early entry, when the ride had gone tech before the park had even opened and we ended up waiting what seemed like a week to finally ride!

Dad sat this one out, looking after various bags of the Kipling variety and the rest of us made our way through, cameraless unfortunately, so no photos this time, but I’m sure you’re all familiar with how brilliant the queueing areas are, either from seeing for yourself or from trip reports, or other online sources

I was glad to see that the bun fight that used to occur after the lifts has been sorted out and is much more civilised. Before, you would step out of the lift and it was a free for all trying to get back into some sort of line before climbing the stairs. Now you are filtered through barriers so pointy elbows and aloof expressions are no longer needed!

The ride was good fun, with some brilliant effects but I still don’t think it’s anywhere near as good as its counterpart over at WWOHP, Forbidden Journey, which is definitely one of my favourites.
Next up was a trip over to Springfield as Adam had been saving himself for a Krusty Burger. I knew there was a photo spot around somewhere which we soon spotted so popped in for a go. There were lots of fun photo opportunities here, definitely worth seeking it out.

We then popped in the foodcourt where Adam has his burger and Daniel had some chicken thumbs and tator tots ($8.99). Chicken thumbs! Love it! I don’t know how much the burger was as Simon went off to buy that with Adam and doesn’t know the rules of Trip Report Club

While we were in Springfield it made sense to visit The Simpsons Ride, and with the FOLPs it was a ten minute wait.

We were directed to the top deck queue, which I think was a first for us. It was quite cool to look out over the park, as day turned to night.

We were even able to spot our resident bench dweller down below too

Yep, Grandad sat this one out (something you’ll hear me say a lot!), but the rest of us enjoyed it as much as always.

Next up, Adam & I had one thing on our minds…… our first fix of brain freeze of the holiday! We trotted back over to Diagon Alley to pick up a frozen butter beer, enjoying seeing the park all lit up for the evening

Butter beer purchased, we took those first delightful sips.

Oh yuuuuuummmm!

Yup, brain freeze, every single time! It’s worth it though! We all had a sip – Simon & Daniel prefer just a small amount whereas Adam & I would probably keep going until we were sick or all our teeth fell out! We’re not doing the parks this year, does anyone know if you can get butter beer outside of the parks? My instincts say no, but I live in hope! Failing that, if anyone is going to be there the same time as us, so from 26th August, perhaps you could pop one out to me . I’m serious!

Continued in the next post...

[JoJo88]

continued from above...

We wandered back along towards Transformers, I have no idea what is wrong with my photos from today, but they are all pretty shoddy!

Having watched the Transformers movies since our last visit, we were all looking forward to the ride, as last time, enjoyable as it was, we didn’t have a clue what was going on! Not all of us went on though, I wonder if you can guess who sat it out!

The ride made so much more sense now that we’d seen the movies, but there’s still no escaping the fact that it’s just a re-themed Spiderman ride. That doesn’t bother me, I think they’re both very clever.

There was only one ride left that we really wanted to do that night, Rip Ride Rockit, although I’m now wondering why we didn’t go on The Mummy, as we all really like it (all except Grandma & Grandad! )

So, with RRR now having an Express Pass line, we decided to go for it. Ride numbers were dropping like flies though, and Daniel & Grandma decided to sit this one out with Grandad.

However, they decided they’d go and see if the rock climbing wall was still open as Daniel loves it and it would be nice for him to do something whilst waiting for us.

We joined what seemed like a really long line for RRR, but thought perhaps the ride had gone down and that once it started up again we’d be on in no time. Er. Nope. That’s not what happened. We ended up waiting 40 minutes for our go, Simon moaning constantly the whole time, saying we should leave and come back another time. It was one of those situations though, where you’ve invested so much time that it’s a difficult call between cutting your losses or waiting it out some more. Simon’s whinging did take the edge of the excitement of riding somewhat, perhaps he was a bit tired, bless him! We did suggest Simon left the queue but apparently that wouldn’t achieve anything as he’d still have to wait for us!

Instead Adam & I decided to concentrate on our song choices instead. There was only one song for me, same as on my first go, ‘Rollin’ by Limp Bizkit. Just love it, and whenever I hear it I’m tempted to ‘throw my hands up’! Thankfully it hasn’t yet come on in Sainsburys…….

Adam picked the same song too and before we knew it we were on that hideous vertical climb, which is definitely the worst part of the ride for me. I’ve not yet witnessed anyone sliding out the back of their seat, plunging to their death below, but that’s what worries me most when I’m on it…..

As we whizzed round the track with all the lights flashing and the music blaring, I was so glad we’d decided to wait. It was sooooo much fun as always and like a lot of rides, does seem better in the dark. I made the mistake however, of trying to keep my arms in the air (yep, trying to impress my teenage son!) and thought I’d put my back out as I was flung around. Definitely getting too old for that kind of hijinks!

We had a look at the video afterwards, which did nothing to improve Simon’s impatience as we did have to wait a little while for some help because we couldn’t get it to work. As much as I hate seeing photos of myself, this video was a million times worse! I’m pretty sure you don’t get it included with the Photo card, but even if you do, it’s not one I’d be looking at again any time soon!

We went back and found the others who had been waiting far more patiently than a certain someone else! Daniel had managed to do the rock climbing and loved it like before. Apparently he was up each different course like a rat up a drain pipe, you know, faster than a greyhound out of trap 3 at Hackney Wick

Evidently they had spent some time taking photos too.

Grandma obviously took this photo

Grandad obviously took this one

Daniel obviously took this one

Not a clue... !

It was around 9.30 by now, and we decided to call it a night. Simon & I were a bit peckish, and we both had the same idea for where to go for a quick bite.

Daniel made himself comfortable…

There was a bit of confusion with the server as she wanted to charge us for a whole meal whereas we really just wanted the hot dog. She seemed surprised that we didn’t want fries and a drink too!

Eventually we got what we wanted, and paid $13.98 for the pleasure.

I don’t know what it is, but my dog, which is the one in the first photo, seems a lot more appetising than Simon’s…….

I can’t quite put my finger on it…….. (In all honesty, nor do I want to )

Mum & Dad got themselves something too and while we all tucked in, Daniel took himself off with the camera, loading my memory stick up with all sorts of random shots.

We were feeling quite tired so plumped for the boat back and headed over to the dock

We were back at the hotel by 10.30. With the club room closed, we said our goodnights and retired to our rooms.

Showers all round, we then piled into the wonderfully comfortable beds, me with Adam, Simon with Hong Kong Phooey, and by 11.30 we were all chucking out the zeds

[Helen0705]

Another brilliant day - you managed to pack loads in.
I never thought about sliding out backwards from the vertical bit on Rip Ride Rockit but will always think of it now
Love those hot dogs ! We had about 4 or 5 cocktails at Margaritaville before devouring them last year !
Really enjoying your trip report as usual .

[ely3857]

We're staying Club Level at HRH for a week in Aug '17. I don't recall my DH ever being so excited about anything before!

[JoJo88]

Originally Posted by Helen0705

Another brilliant day - you managed to pack loads in.
I never thought about sliding out backwards from the vertical bit on Rip Ride Rockit but will always think of it now
Love those hot dogs ! We had about 4 or 5 cocktails at Margaritaville before devouring them last year !
Really enjoying your trip report as usual .

See more...

Oops, sorry! The hotdogs are lovely aren't they? Did you try and 2ft long one?! x

Originally Posted by ely3857

We're staying Club Level at HRH for a week in Aug '17. I don't recall my DH ever being so excited about anything before!

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I don't blame him, you will love it x

[Milner]

Another great read.

[Helen0705]

2 ft long hot dog ?
Wow !

[JoJo88]

Originally Posted by Milner

Another great read.

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Thanks Carole x

Originally Posted by Helen0705

2 ft long hot dog ?
Wow !

See more...

Hmmm, you've got me wondering now! If you're picturing me sat her measuring out one foot with my hands, you'd be right, and I'm pretty sure the hot dog I saw was twice that size!

You'd have to eat it with someone else, Lady & the Tramp style, starting at opposite ends ! x

Edit - found a pic!

[Cinderella]

Great day👍

[OB1LukeLucas]

Woo hoo finally back in your happy place, nice to see you take full advantage of the Club Room.