Orlando Adventure

[BigShadowtinytree]

I’ll include a few details before diving in, it’s taken me a few days to get started on this little collection of trip reports as our trip so far has been so full on and I’ve been too tired at the end of each day to write it.

Trip duration: 2 weeks during the summer holidays

Accommodation: Universal’s Endless Summer Resort, Dockside Inn and Suites

Group of: 6, 4 adults - me, my other half, his parents and 2 children

Parks we are visiting in no particular order:
• Islands of Adventure
• Universal Studios
• Volcano Bay
• Magic Kingdom
• Epcot
• Disney’s Hollywood Studios
• Animal Kingdom
• Typhoon Lagoon
• Sea World
• Busch Gardens Tampa

Day 1 - 27th July, Travel Day and quick trip to IOA
Our direct flight to Melbourne airport was at 10.50am so we had an early start and got to the airport at around half 7. We were flying from Birmingham which fortunately is only down the road from home. Everything went pretty smoothly, we were flying on a Tui Dreamliner which I’ve not been on before. It was certainly a step up from our usual flights with Ryan Air. It took off slightly later at around 11.30am but I don’t think I’ve ever been on a flight that has taken off at the exact time it was meant to so that wasn’t an issue.

It was my first long haul flight and I was a bit worried about how I’d cope but it was fine and the kids did really well too. Unfortunately there were a few issues with the onboard entertainment, it was very temperamental when it came to trying to watch shows or films, which was a bit annoying but we had brought other means of entertaining ourselves, so wasn’t the end of the world. The games seemed to work fine and although they were very basic, one cool feature was that you could play multiplayer games such as the bowling and poker with other passengers on the flight, a nice way to kill an hour or so anyway.

After nearly 9 hours in the air we finally landed at Melbourne at around 3.15pm Florida time. Luggage collection and then getting through immigration went relatively smoothly, we were on our coach transfer to the hotel in just under an hour. It took around 90 minutes to get to our hotel, we were lucky enough to be the first drop off so that was nice.

The Dockside Inn and Suites is a very nice hotel I must say. It’s a pretty new hotel along with Surfside and although it’s their more budget offering it doesn’t necessarily feel like it. It features 2 swimming pools, a canteen area, a Universal gift shop and Starbucks in the lobby, I’m pretty sure it has a gym somewhere too although I’ve got no intention of checking that out! It’s all very clean and modern from what I’ve seen so far.

We are staying in what they call a ‘2 bedroom suite’ although I wouldn’t say it’s any bigger than a normal hotel room although I guess it does have a few extra features that a bog standard room might not have. It has one double bed in its own bedroom with a tv, and two doubles in the ‘main’ room also with a tv. As well as a microwave, fridge, sink and a set of table and chairs, a safe of course, not forgetting the bathroom it suits us as a group of 6 just fine.

After we got settled in the room, my partners parents took our two excited kids down to pool 1. Despite being totally exhausted from a long day of travelling, my partner and I decided to hop on the shuttle bus down to the Universal parks, specifically Islands of Adventure to ride Velocicoaster, a coaster that we’ve both been looking forward to.

It was a 75 minute advertised queue time, and this was pretty accurate by our reckoning, this also included about 15minutes where the ride broke down so we might have been on in even less time without that minor hiccup. But wow was it worth it. What a fantastic coaster it is. We were seated in row 9 and it did not disappoint. The second half of the ride is absolutely nuts. Pretty sure it’s my new number 1 coaster at present. When we got off there was around 10minutes until park close, so naturally in our tired, delirious state we went round for another go, lucky for us the exit spits you out right at the entrance to the ride so it wasn’t far to walk. The queue went a lot faster this time, and we hit the jackpot by being seated in the back row. This ride was even better, it’s a really insane ride and the lap bars really give a sense of freedom. Operations were brilliant too, they were throwing those trains out at lightening speed, the queue was frequently moving and they were putting our frequent reminders over the tannoy to remind people to keep up with the queue in front of them. Great stuff. After our two rides the park was of course closed but we left feeling satisfied with our two rides on one of our most anticipated coasters of this trip. We stumbled through the park, through the utter craziness that is City Walk, found our shuttle bus back to the hotel, jumped in the shower and collapsed into bed before a long day at Magic Kingdom tomorrow, report for that to follow. Thanks for reading.

 

[Matt N]

Great first report @BigShadowtinytree; I’m interested to hear your thoughts on the Florida parks as a first timer, as someone who’s done Florida 5 times!

You’re certainly hardier than we’ve ever been to go to a park straight off the plane, particularly given you drove from Melbourne rather than Orlando International. On our trip last month, we didn’t even go to a park the day after we landed (albeit we arrived at our house at almost midnight local time on the day we arrived)!

I’m glad you loved VelociCoaster; I think it’s an absolutely sublime ride, and if I’m in the right mood, it could well be vying for my number 1 spot as well! (It’s placed at #2 behind Mako for me, but I’m sometimes unsure…)

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on Magic Kingdom and the other parks.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

28th July - Magic Kingdom



We took a taxi from the hotel using the Lyft app to Magic Kingdom, which I have found to be a good 10 dollars or so cheaper than Uber. After taking the monorail to the Magic Kingdom gates we got our park tickets sorted and then headed inside. One thing that surprised me whilst on the monorail is how vast and sprawling Walt Disney World Resort is. I knew it was going to be huge but I didn’t comprehend how huge. It is far bigger than Disneyland Paris which is my only experience of a Disney resort so far, everything is in walking distance at DLP, where as that doesn’t seem to be the case at Disneyworld. I also couldn’t help but notice how much game developers Bethesda had taken inspiration from DW to create their Nuka World dlc for Fallout 4 so that was pretty cool.

Walking down Main Street and seeing the castle for the first time was a really special experience. But I must admit as stunning as the Disneyworld Castle is, there is just something about the DLP one, it’s certainly my favourite out of the two I’ve seen in person so far.
Anyway our first port of call upon entering the parks was to head to Big Thunder Mountain. We queued for about 40 minutes and the queue moved frequently, I find I don’t mind queueing as much when it’s moving even if it is a longer wait. The queue had some great bits of interactive theming and the coaster itself makes for a great family ride, we all really enjoyed it!



As we came off and headed in the general direction of Main Street we saw some of the parade, the floats are really impressive with lots of details.






Once that was finished we walked around a bit looking for somewhere to have lunch and cool off from the heat and ended up in Pinocchio Village Haus for some pizza and chicken tenders, the food was good but very expensive as expected. At 1pm I had managed to book a slot for Tron, however the estimated ride time wasn’t until 10.59pm which we weren’t really feeling up for, so unfortunately we decided to cancel that. We do have one more visit to magic kingdom planned, so we are going to try and get a slot at the 7am opening instead and hope for a more reasonable time . Bit annoying this virtual queue lark, but I guess queuing virtually isn’t so bad when you can fill the wait time by going on other rides in the mean time. My other half’s parents took one look at Tron and decided they didn’t want to ride, so it’ll just be us and our 2 kids riding on our next visit, hopefully.

We walked around a bit taking in the sights and having a browse round one or two shops then decided to take a ride on Its a Small World which was advertised as a 30minute queue but in reality was more like 10 minutes. An enjoyable ride, a Disney park classic but nothing mind blowing to shout about.
We followed up with another dark ride, Under the Sea - Journey of The Little Mermaid. We thought this ride was really charming and well themed, lots of animatronics and only a handful of screens if I’m remembering correctly. Well worth it and we only waited around 15minutes as advertised.



We then headed over to Tomorrowland to do the Speedway, partners parents sat this one out. This one had an advertised queue of 35 minutes and we waited about 30 minutes. This ride is great fun, I was in a car with my youngest daughter and she drove whilst I controlled the pedal. Let’s just say she wasn’t the best driver and we were bouncing all over the place but we had a right laugh about it.
It was getting a bit hot to we took the kids over to the Casey jr Splash and Soak station for a cool off before heading to Barnstormer, a junior coaster which had an advertised queue of 35 minutes however, this queue moved incredibly slowly before the lightening lane merge point, which made for a pretty arduous wait in the Florida heat. The ride itself was mediocre, the seats aren’t the most comfortable either. Definitely a one and done for us.
Chip n Dale were doing a meet and greet nearby and the kids wanted a photo so we went over and queued for about 10 minutes, it was a really good experience. My kids are quite shy when it comes to meeting characters but Chip n Dale really managed to bring them out of their shells and we got some lovely photos.


We got the train nearby to Frontierland, it was nice to have a bit of a sit down and take in the views around the park. We then headed over towards Jungle Cruise which had an advertised wait of 45 minutes but we only waited about 20 so that was good. This ride/experience was fantastic and our guide was brilliant. Unfortunately I can’t remember his name now but he was really entertaining and made the experience what it was.



After that it was time for a ride on Pirates of the Caribbean. This was another one where it was an advertised wait of around 45 minutes but we waited about 30. Always nice when that happens. This ride was a really immersive experience that we all enjoyed. The physical props and special effects were fantastic. I understand this ride was refurbed a few years back, the other half and his parents who had been on this ride some 20 years previously said it was now far better. I even got a bit of a soaking on it from one of the water special effects after the drop.

It was getting close-ish to the illuminations so we stopped off for some food before going to find our spot. I got myself a Mickey pretzel whilst my partner had a turkey leg along with our eldest daughter, who was desperate to try one but when it came to it she barely made a dent in it before declaring she was full. Partners parents and youngest child had a hot dog each. We then headed towards the castle to find a spot to watch the illuminations. We found somewhere towards the left hand side of the castle and waited around half an hour for the show to start.

The illuminations were pretty good. I’m not a huge fan of large crowds and being on the shorter side means it can be even harder to get a decent view, but we did ok, could see most of what was going on and thoroughly enjoyed it, the projection mapping on the castle was really cool. There was only one incident towards the end, where two blokes came seemingly from nowhere and stood literally right in front of the kids, completely blocking their view, which I thought was incredibly rude and both my partner and I told them so.

Anyway after that we were all tired and decided it was time to leave the park, we stopped off in some of the shops on Main Street for a look around on our way out as the crowds were crazy and we weren’t in a huge rush to get to the monorail. Overall it was a fantastic day. My favourite attraction of the day was Jungle Cruise but they were all pretty great apart from maybe Barnstormer which I’d say was my least favourite attraction with the most annoying wait of the day.

 

[Matt N]

I notice you mentioned having gotten a virtual queue slot for Tron. If you don’t mind me asking, did you buy Genie+ at Magic Kingdom? I only ask because I was under the impression that the free FastPass system that was in place last time I went to Disney World had been scrapped, but that would be untrue if you managed to get free virtual queue slots.

I’m glad you had a good day! Interestingly, Magic Kingdom is actually one of my least visited Florida parks, despite it being the main event for many; I’ve only ever spent 2 days there across one visit, and it took us until our 4th Florida trip to ever go there!

One tip I’d recommend for the future if you want to avoid the carnage at the end of the fireworks would actually be to leave the park slightly before the show is over. It sounds like an odd recommendation, but the queue for the monorail will be far shorter, crowds will be far lighter when exiting, and you can still see and hear the show surprisingly well from the monorail queue!

 

[John]

I think Tron has no "main" queue at the moment, you have to use virtual queue. There may also be LL as an alternative.

Fastpass these days seems a complete mess really. First you have to pay a variable fee for the right to reserve timeslots (of which you may get just 2 all day), then some of the more popular rides excluded so that you're forced either wait 2 hours or pay $12pp (or whatever).

 

[Davezilla]

Just a tip for Tron, when I did it last month, I had the app open on the virtual queue page a few minutes before 7am, then kept refreshing until it said 'join virtual queue' and I managed to get group 13. This meant my group was called to ride around 45 mins after park opening. Literally walk on too!

Bit of hassle doing that at that time but was well worth it, it's a great experience! Just make you're at the park for opening if you get a lowish number, as they can call you much earlier than the estimated time.

If your planning on doing Guardians too, I joined the virtual queue in the park at 1pm (forgot to do it at 7am) and was called back around 6pm. Although with Guardians, it was around a 40 minute actual queue once in the line.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

I think Tron has no "main" queue at the moment, you have to use virtual queue. There may also be LL as an alternative.

Fastpass these days seems a complete mess really. First you have to pay a variable fee for the right to reserve timeslots (of which you may get just 2 all day), then some of the more popular rides excluded so that you're forced either wait 2 hours or pay $12pp (or whatever).

Yeah Tron and Cosmic Rewind at Epcot are both virtual queue only much like Mandrill Mayhem at Chessington.

Agreed about the fast pass system, some folk have also mentioned that Disney have been artificially inflating their queue times to encourage genie+ sales as well, which I have noticed to some extent at times on our visit to both Magic and Animal Kingdom so far although not on every ride so it could have just been coincidence and we caught the queue at a lower point before times could be updated

Just a tip for Tron, when I did it last month, I had the app open on the virtual queue page a few minutes before 7am, then kept refreshing until it said 'join virtual queue' and I managed to get group 13. This meant my group was called to ride around 45 mins after park opening. Literally walk on too!

Bit of hassle doing that at that time but was well worth it, it's a great experience! Just make you're at the park for opening if you get a lowish number, as they can call you much earlier than the estimated time.

If you’re planning on doing Guardians too, I joined the virtual queue in the park at 1pm (forgot to do it at 7am) and was called back around 6pm. Although with Guardians, it was around a 40 minute actual queue once in the line.

Thanks for this, will certainly bear that in mind! It’s such a faff but I’d really like to do both Tron and Guardians as not sure if/when we will get to come to Florida again!

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

29th July - Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios - Sorry for the double post!

As we are staying at a Universal resort hotel, we can get into the parks at 8am for early ride time. Unfortunately today we didn’t quite get up in time, but did get to City Walk for just before 9. We hopped on a shuttle bus from outside our hotel, which has been a really nice and convenient perk so far, it only takes 10 minutes from our hotel and the buses are frequent so if you miss one another shows up minutes later. Makes opting not to hire a car even more worth it as we don’t even have to fork out for a taxi.

Once we got into Islands of Adventure we walked through the park, bypassing Hagrids which had already amassed a 105minute queue, and headed straight for the Hogwarts Express to go over to the Studios park. We could have just gone straight into the Studios park from City walk but wanted to experience the Hogwarts express and since it only had a 15 minute queue, and how it usually gets longer queues later in the day we thought why not get it done. We all thought it was a really charming experience and a fantastically creative way of getting from one park to another.


We headed into Diagon Alley and my mind was blown, the level of detail in this area is astonishing and there is so much to see. We didn’t spend too long looking around though as Escape From Gringotts was on a 15 minute queue. After some faff getting a 2 dollar locker for our back packs we finally got in the queue and again my mind was blown, I have never seen anything like this level of theming any at any other park I’ve visited. As for the ride well it certainly didn’t disappoint, we all loved it.


After Gringotts we spent some time taking in the sights around Diagon Alley, before heading out of there and towards Men In Black Alien Attack. I could honestly spend all day in Diagon Alley though, but alas we don’t have an infinite amount of time unfortunately. Anyway as for MIB, I thought it was a decent shooting ride with a good enough backstory. I got the high score in our car of 170k, which annoyed the other half as he missed the ‘press the red button for a bonus’ announcement which would have meant he’d have beaten me. Snooze you loose that’s what I say! Good fun ride.

We are all fans of The Simpsons and The Simpsons ride was one of the rides the kids were most looking forward to. It only had a 20minute queue so we got in line. As for the ride, I actually thought it wasn’t too bad. A little dated yes, but it wasn’t as bad as I’ve seen some people say it is. We all enjoyed it although I did start to feel a little bit of motion sickness towards the end which is unlike me, maybe I’m getting old. I thought this little area was really well themed, although not to the level of Hogsmead or Diagon Alley.


It was coming up to lunch time by this point so we headed into the little quick service place for some food. The other half had a hotdog, eldest daughter and I had a burger from Krusty Burger whilst the youngest daughter and grand parents had chicken tenders and a chicken sandwich from the chicken place. The kids had a cup of melon to share between them as well as they’ve been missing their fruit on this trip so far. The food was decent for what it was and plentiful, the burgers from Krusty had loads of sauce on them, maybe a little too much but it was nice nonetheless.

It was after this point that the other half’s dad had realised he’d misplaced his phone. So his mum and dad went off to retrace their steps. In the mean time we headed over to Revenge of the Mummy, which only had a 35minute advertised queue time. This time proved to be pretty accurate, the ride itself was incredible. If I’m not mistaken it’s the same ride system as Gringotts. I think these coasters are great and make for some very unique experiences, especially when a park has the budget to really push the boat out on the special effects. I have yet to decide which one I prefer out of the two, it’s certainly very close and I may have to try and ride them both again.

By the time we had gotten off the ride, OH’s parents had found the missing phone so we met up with them again. We were feeling the heat so decided to head back to Islands of Adventure via City Walk to go on Popeye & Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges. There was barely any queue however we were warned at the entrance that the ride may have to close due to an incoming storm, our first incident of this on our trip. It was just our luck that right as we were coming up to the boarding platform, the ride had to close. We waited it out for around 20 minutes before conceding defeat and leaving the ride as the storm wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

We were all feeling a little tired, hot and bothered, the previous few days were catching up on us, so instead of doing one of the parks many dark rides, most of which had gained quite long queues due to the weather, we decided to head back to the hotel for a rest. Before that we went into the main Universal Store in city walk and I bought myself a Velocicoaster T-Shirt, the kids stopped off at Cinnabon and both bought themselves a Cinnabon each with their spending money, those things are huge and lasted them at least a couple of days as they could only manage about a quarter of them at a time. When we got back to the hotel the weather had cleared up, so the kids grand parents took them to the pool for a bit, only for the pool to be shut down again after about half an hour due to another storm incoming. Not the end of the world, just a bit frustrating as I had just decided I fancied a swim so had headed down there only for it to close! Oh well, these things can’t be helped.

That evening my partner and the kids headed into City Walk for some dinner whilst his parents fancied more of a quiet atmosphere so went for a walk around the local area. We tried to get a table at the Chocolate Emporium but there was a 90 minute wait - as this was a last minute visit we hadn’t booked a table so we kind of expected this would be the case but thought we’d try our luck anyway. We weren’t prepared to wait that long, so went next door to the Hard Rock Cafe instead who were able to seat us straight away. Food was decent but expensive, our most expensive meal of the trip by far as it happens. The other half had a Jack and coke which came in at over $11 it was a strong one though at least. We also didn’t have a clue how to pay and tip by card at the end, so that was a bit of a learning curve but we figured it out in the end with the help of one of the waitresses.

Another great day was had by all, despite the weather throwing a slight spanner in the works it wasn’t the end of the world and we still got to experience some awesome attractions.

 

[Matt N]

I'm glad you seemingly had a good day at Universal, even if the weather did stymie your initial plans!

For future reference, don't necessarily be put off if Hagrid's advertises a long queue time. From my experience on my recent trip, queue times on both it and VelociCoaster were often significantly overstated. On Hagrid's, for instance, the queue was advertised 70 on one occasion and we would have gotten on in 40-45 minutes had the ride not broken down, and on another, the queue was advertised 70 and we got on within 30-35 minutes.

If the queue is stretching to only just outside the indoor section, you'll probably wait comfortably under an hour. With an attained throughput of roughly 1,600pph, a constantly moving load station and no bags, the queue moves very quickly!

 

[Zeock]

It seems like you are having a good time! MiB seems like a model for shooting rides in general, and shows that they can work.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

30th July - Volcano Bay

This was our first out of two water park visits of the trip. Once again we didn’t make it in for the early ride time, with 6 of us including 2 kids to get up and ready in the morning the mornings can be a bit manic! We got the shuttle bus from outside the hotel and got into the park at around 9.15, so still not bad going really.

We managed to find some sun beds to set up camp and then everyone headed towards the lazy river. On our way there, my eldest daughter and I decided to try out the virtual queueing system and scanned our wrist bands for Ko’okiri Body Plunge which was a wait of 75 minutes. We then got into the lazy river and went round a few times, a nice relaxing start to the day. At least until we got separated on the river and the kids got off at the wrong exit, whilst we got off where we came on. We had assumed they had gone round again but we waited and waited and they were nowhere to be seen, starting to worry a bit, a couple of us went round to the other exit and there they were, waiting for us! My youngest daughter was understandably a bit upset, being in an unfamiliar place and not knowing where we were, and naturally we were worried too, but after a dip in the wave pool she soon forgot about that little drama.

By this point it was time for our ride on Ko’okiri, I couldn’t tell you exactly how long we waited as I didn’t have my phone on me. We climbed the 200+ steps to the very top of the volcano and there was a handful of people ahead of us which was fine. Unfortunately, the slide broke down briefly before we got on. An issue with the door I think, we decided to wait it out as we didn’t fancy going down all those steps. Maintenance were called and after a 15 minute delay the slide was open again. I’ve never done one of these slides before, where the floor disappears from under you and neither had my daughter, so we were both a bit nervous. I found it to be okay, very fast and it lasted longer than I thought, I also found it slightly painful as the water was gushing against me and disorienting as you can’t see a thing whilst on it, I’m glad I got to experience that kind of slide but I can’t say they’re my favourite.

After that we had a dip in the wave pool and met up with my partner and our younger daughter, who seems to much prefer playing in the pools rather than going on slides! The wave pool was good fun. After a sun cream top up my eldest daughter and I went off to explore a bit. We found the Ohyah and Ohno drop slides which had a 35minute virtual queue so scanned our wristbands for for Ohyah.

We carried on exploring and found TeAwa - The Fearless River. Kind of similar to the lazy river but more like a rapids with a much faster current and waves and things as you go along. Everyone has to wear a life jacket for this but we found there were more than enough jackets for everyone. I thought this attraction was fantastic. We ended up going round three times because we were having so much fun on it. I think this was probably my favourite attraction of the day, although trying to get out without getting dragged away with the current is quite the challenge! It’s one of the reasons we ended up going round three times

After that we saw that Taniwha Tubes was on ride now, so we got in line for that and must have waited around 20minutes for our ride. We went on the blue slide and it was an alright ride. By this point it was time for our ride on Ohyah so we headed over, there was a fair number of people ahead of us so we were waiting about 20minutes to get on. The slide itself was fine and I really enjoyed the plunge into the pool at the end.

At this point we thought it best to check in with the rest of our group and top up the sun cream so headed back to our sun beds. Whilst we were gone, my partners parents had gone off themselves to do a few slides whilst my partner stayed with our younger child who preferred to spend her time between the wave pool, lazy river and human rapids as I like to call them.

Once we were all reunited we decided to have one last ride before heading back to the hotel on the human rapids so went over to get our life jackets. It was around 1pm by now and the park had gotten much busier by this point, so the attraction was quite full of people and there were people everywhere on our walk to the attraction.

My other half’s dad went round once before deciding he’d had enough and got out, whilst his mum went round twice and the rest of us went round 3 times. Such a fun experience. It was now around 2pm, the park seemed to be getting busier and queues were getting longer. We had planned to go shopping at a nearby outlet mall in the afternoon so decided to leave the park. After some shopping for bargains at Premium Outlets, we went for a meal at Longhorn’s Steakhouse and it was great.

Although I only really got to go on one major slide, I enjoyed our time at Volcano Bay. I’ve come to accept that with it being peak summer holiday time, we won’t get to do absolutely everything on this trip and i’m generally fine with that (for the most part!). I was a bit nervous about the virtual queueing system as I’m not normally a fan and prefer to just wait normally, but when a park is actually designed for virtual queuing it seems to work quite well, it’s when it’s shoehorned into an already established park that seems to be the issue. The fact that there are plenty of things to do whilst you wait is also helpful. The wrist bands are a good way of going about it for a water park and we didn’t experience any technical issues with them and it’s relatively straightforward to figure out how they work. Overall I think Volcano Bay is a decent water park and the Volcano theming element right in the middle of the park is truly a sight to behold.

I found the sand annoying, not a fan of sand at water parks but that might just be because I find it annoying in general, it gets everywhere and is hard to walk on, it’s the main reason why I don’t really like the beach!

My favourite attraction of the day has to be The Fearless River. I really did have so much fun on that and could quite easily have gone round and round on it all day.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

31st July - Animal Kingdom Part 1
Due to the amount of photos I want to include in this report I’m splitting it across two posts if that’s alright.


Our second Disney park of the trip was to Animal Kingdom. We arrived just after park opening and headed straight for Expedition Everest as it was on a 5 minute queue. We all decided to have a go and walked straight on to rows 1, 2 and 3. I loved this coaster, a good long ride with some fun special effects. The only one in our group who wasn’t as keen was my partners mum, who doesn’t have the highest tolerance for thrills and found it a bit scary, and a bit much with the going backwards in the dark. We opted to have another go as it was only 15 minutes by the time we had our first ride, but partners parents decided to sit this one out.



After that we headed over to Dinosaur which was showing as a 30 minute wait, I think we waited around 20 for this. What I love about a lot of the rides at Disney World is that they are more than just rides, they are experiences, and Dinosaur was no different - I’ve not ridden anything quite like it. We had a brief moment during the ride where it kind of stopped for a minute and we were sat in awkward darkness, it felt like the ride was trundling along a bit still and with it being my first time riding it I didn’t actually realise that wasn’t meant to be part of the ride, it was only when i mentioned it to my other half afterwards that he pointed out, having done it before, that it’s not meant to do that anyway the ride was great apart from that little blip.



Next we walked over to It’s Tough to Be a Bug! A cute 4d cinema experience involving the characters from A Bugs Life. We all enjoyed this one and it only had a 15minute advertised queue which turned out to be walk on, so that was a winner all round. The walk through the queue under the tree of life was awesome too. The amount of detail in that centrepiece of the park is incredible and it’s been so well looked after all these years, truly mind blowing stuff. I hate to be that person who compares things to how things are in uk parks but say what you want about Disney, Merlin could not and would never meet these standards.




The tree of life is a work of art. I adored it, seeing it in person is truly an experience.


After our ride on ITTBAG, we went over to Kilimanjaro Safari’s. It had an advertised queue of 75 minutes, but this was something we really wanted to do, so we got in line. We all got some Mickey ice creams whilst we waited which were delicious and just what we needed in the 30°+ heat..


The queue for Kilimanjaro Safari’s moved fairly fast and despite the queue spilling out of the queue area when we joined, we only waited around 40/45 minutes to get on, which was great. But this does seem to be a running trend across the Disney parks - inflating advertised queue times in order to push Genie+ Sales, which is a huge shame that they’ve resorted to such tactics. Anyway, we got on and our driver, Cat was really informative on our ride round the safari. I learnt a lot of facts that I didn’t know before about the various animals. We also got to see a good number of animals as well including a baby Zebra, African Wild Dogs, Giraffe’s, Elephants, Hippos, Okapi, Bongos, Cheetahs, Goats, Warthogs, Rhinos, Flamingoes, we even got a glimpse of the Lions lazing around in the sun and probably more that I forgot to mention. This ride is a million times better than Zufari at Chessington - my only experience of anything remotely similar, which is really very poor in comparison in my opinion now and I didn’t think it was amazing to begin with.



Part 2 to follow!

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

31st July - Animal Kingdom Part 2
After our fantastic ride on Kilimanjaro Safari we decided to look at some of the animals. We found the area where some of the gorillas were including the baby, who was really cute.


We also saw a lot of birds.

After that we had some lunch (hot dogs) and then decided to head over to Pandora to do the two Avatar rides over there. This area is pretty spectacular. We got in the queue for Flight of Passage which was showing as a 60minute wait. We waited around 40 in the end before getting into the pre show room, but then the pre show took a good 10-15 minutes. The ride itself was absolutely incredible, we all loved it, it’s definitely one of the best rides of the trip so far. The only negative was that some of the seats were out of action, around 3 or 4 in our room I think, so our group had to be moved around but that wasn’t a huge problem. It’s just a shame that for a relatively new ride parts of it are already not working and that is bound to hinder its capacity.

Next it was time for the Na’vi River Journey which was showing as a 65 minute wait but we actually waited about 35/40 minutes. We liked this ride, it was much more chilled than Flight of Passage and not nearly as impressive but some of the effects and especially the animatronics were great. After that we had a walk around the Pandora area taking in all the sights, before heading back to the hotel with a quick stop at McDonald’s on the way.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

1st August - Busch Gardens Tampa


A much anticipated park visit today mainly because of Iron Gwazi but also for the other coasters Busch has to offer such as Kumba, Montu and Sheikra.

It was just the 4 of us today as my partners parents didn’t really fancy Busch and wanted a rest day. Our day began outside of Icon Park, where our free coach included in our ticket was due to pick us up at 8.45am. Everything went smoothly and we left at around 8.50, with one stop to pick up a couple more people on the way there.

We arrived at Busch after park opening at around 10.45. We hired a locker for the day for our bags and in our excitement to get on our first RMC plus the fact our youngest daughter was also tall enough to go on it, headed straight for Iron Gwazi which was showing an advertised queue of 75 minutes. In hindsight we should have gone towards the back of the park as according to the app (which I later realised was very unreliable for queue times) lots of rides were showing an advertised queue of 5-10 minutes. Not worry though, we decided to stick it out.

After about 20 minutes in the queue, the heavens opened and it started absolutely lashing it down with rain. A storm had arrived, so all the rides closed. According to the weather app this was to go on for at least an hour, so we decided to bail and go for an early lunch using our dining plan that was included in our ticket. Unfortunately the place we wanted to go and eat, Zambia Smokehouse, was all the way towards the back of the park, so we got absolutely soaked through on our way there, fortunately it was still pretty warm out, so although it wasn’t a great start at least we weren’t cold.

The food at Zambia was decent, my partner and I had the Brisket and fries whilst one of the kids had smoked ribs and the other had chicken nuggets. By the time we’d finished the weather had cleared up but the storm was still nearby so many of the rides hadn’t opened yet. We decided to start making our way back to Iron Gwazi via some animals, we saw some Turtles and got see a kangaroo up close as there was one lying across the walk way in Walkabout Way.


It was now 1.30pm and we still hadn’t done a single ride. We were starting to panic a little as our coach was due to leave at 7.15, so we went back over to Iron Gwazi as it was the one we all wanted to do the most and one of the coasters on park that we could all ride together and decided to tough out the 75 minute queue. Well it was 75 according to the app but when we got to the ride it said 60. In the end we only ended up waiting about 40, which was great! However operations were not so great, with trains taking around 4 minutes to be dispatched.



As for the ride itself we all loved it, it was our youngest daughters first ever ‘upside down’ coaster and what a coaster to go on for your first inversion experience. It’s totally nuts from the first drop right until the very end. I rated it as my new number one personally, just above Velocicoaster, where as the other half prefers Velocicoaster. He still went and bought an Iron Gwazi shirt after our ride though. I wanted one too but they didn’t have my size in the style I liked unfortunately.

After that my partner took the kids off to see some more animals whilst I went to ride Montu. It was showing as 5 minutes on the app but when I got there it was on 15, it was at that point I realised the app was going to be totally useless in terms of queue times today. Still, 15 minutes isn’t too bad of a wait and this was pretty accurate.


I thought Montu was a great ride! As far as b&m inverts go I’ve only ever ridden Nemesis and Inferno. Montu is much longer than both of those coasters, I certainly rate it above Inferno but can’t decide if I rate it higher than my beloved Nemesis or not, I think I do in terms of the layout and length, but Nemmy wins when it comes to theming and it’s surroundings. The operations didn’t seem so bad on this one, trains were going out fairly quickly.

I met up with the rest of the family again near Sheikra, the kids were enjoying getting soaked by the splashdown and tricked me into standing next to them as I was approaching them so I got a soaking too! It was hot so I didn’t mind having a cool off though. My partner isn’t a fan of dive machines, so he suggested I go on it. Once again the app was saying it had a 10 minute queue but when I got to the ride it was actually a 30 minute queue. I decided to go on it anyway and ended up waiting 25minutes. Only one station was in operation which seemed to be slowing things up a bit. I was seated on the second row and thought this was an excellent dive machine. Again I have only done two of these, Oblivion and Baron 1898. I didn’t find the first drop as forceful as Oblivions, but it was still good. The rest of the layout was incredibly fun too and much longer and better than both of the above. I would rate it as my number 1 dive coaster, with Oblivion coming second and Baron third.

When I came off Sheikra we went to get some Dippin’ Dots as we’ve been wanting to try them all trip. I had cookies and cream flavour and thought they were really nice. Will definitely be having them again if I get the chance.


We then went to see the tiger, who was out in his enclosure. I love cats both big and small, so was really happy to see him.


Next we decided to check out Kumba, which happened to be walk on, we had given up relying on the app queue times as they hadn’t been accurate all day so it was pointless. Both my partner and I wanted a go on this so I went first and got on the second to last row. I think the only coaster of this type I’ve done is Dragon Khan about 7 years ago now so my memory of it is fuzzy. Anyway I thought the ride was fantastic, and so did the other half who sat in the back row. I also love how photogenic this coaster is. It’s so pretty



We walked around some more and saw that Scorpion was pretty much walk on. We could have all gone on this together but our youngest daughter I think was getting a little tired and didn’t want to and preferred to have a few laps on the carousel instead. So I went on with our eldest on the back row, and then she went on again with her dad. I thought Scorpian was a neat little coaster, not as rough as I expected. I especially enjoyed the helix near the end.


My partner had decided he wanted to have a go on Montu so whilst he did that the kids an I went to look at the Asian elephants. Beautiful creatures. Montu was walk on for him and he said he thought it was miles better than nemesis and so much longer than he expected.

It was getting close to coach pick up time, but there was still one ride my eldest daughter and I were desperate to do, Serengeti Flyer. Again the youngest didn’t want to go on and my other half isn’t a huge fan of flat rides so they went off to Chick Fil A to get us some dinner using the dining plan before our ride back to Icon Park.


When we got to Serengeti Flyer, it was showing an advertised queue of 20 minutes. Great we thought, that should still leave us with plenty of time to eat and pop into the Emporium gift shop before getting back on the coach. Unfortunately this queue time was understated and we waited about 35 minutes. Only one arm was in operation and operations in general seemed a bit slow so that didn’t help. I started getting a bit antsy in the queue but we got on and had a great ride on it, the cycle was a little short but we still had fun on it regardless.

We weren’t left with much time after that so we decided we would eat our food on the coach and headed straight for the gift shop. We got our stuff and headed for the coach, I found the gift shop to be quite expensive, but then so are the Disney and Universal park gift shops although I think BG is slightly more expensive. The coach didn’t end up leaving until 7.30 as one party was a no show.

And that brings me to the end of our day at Busch Gardens. We didn’t get to do all the coasters we wanted unfortunately, like Cheetah Hunt and Cobra’s Curse. Cheetah Hunt especially had a long queue all day. And the day didn’t start off great with the storm, but in the afternoon things turned around, queue times for a lot of the main coasters weren’t too bad in the end and we had a good time overall despite the app being unreliable for queue times and operations on most rides not being the best. We all unanimously agreed that Iron Gwazi was our favourite ride of the day. I wish we could have gotten another ride on it. We definitely need an RMC in the uk soon.

One thing the park is missing is indoor rides, especially when there’s a storm there’s nothing really for you to do apart from take shelter or run to a food outlet to eat. I thought Busch was an okay park with a great coaster selection, but certain things that I’ve mentioned above let it down slightly. Will be interesting to see how Sea World compares.

 

[Zeock]

It seems like you had a great time, and liked Iron Gwazi!

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

It seems like you had a great time, and liked Iron Gwazi!

Yeah we did in the end! I must admit that at one point I was worried we wouldn’t get on much at all, but queues weren’t as bad especially for the b&m coasters as I feared and I think we didn’t do too badly on the ride count front.

Iron Gwazi is something else, totally amazing!

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

2nd August - Typhoon Lagoon


The final waterpark visit of this trip was to Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon. We weren’t in any huge rush and went to a nearby IHOP for breakfast. Delicious pancakes. We got to the park for around 11.30ish. We found a spot to set up camp which had a good view of the wave pool and then went into the lazy river for a couple of rounds. This lazy river is much longer than the one at Volcano Bay and I thought it was a slightly better one too.

After that we decided to go on Gangplank Falls, a family raft slide that we could all go on together, well 3 in each raft at least as we couldn’t all fit in one! This was a fun slide that gained a bit of speed on its way down but wasn’t too intense. Thoroughly enjoyed by all.

My eldest daughter and I then went off to explore the park, whilst my youngest went off with her dad to have a play in the wave pool. On our travels round the park we managed to get quite a few slides in as the queues weren’t bad at all, much less than those at Volcano Bay. We headed towards the large mountain area and went on Humunga Cowabunga, a body slide that goes straight down at a 60° angle, and Storm Slides, another body slide with a few twists and turns in it as you go down. Both great fun and we waited no longer than 15 minutes for either of them.

Next, we went over to Crush n Gusher, the parks water coaster. Once again we waited no longer than 15 minutes, and went down all 3 slides, which were all pretty similar but brilliant fun - hence doing it 3 times! You get a decent amount of speed on this and some airtime moments too.

We headed back where we’d set up camp for the day to have a drink and reapply sun cream, I was feeling pretty exhausted by then so needed a bit of a rest - water parks really take it out of you as you get older! So I had a sit down and then went to take a few photos from the viewing platforms in the park, whilst eldest daughter went off with her nan to ride a few more slides.






Once I was feeling a little more rested I fancied a go in the wave pool, known as Typhoon Lagoon Surf Pool. This wave pool is a little different from your standard wave pool. Around every hour-90 minutes or so it starts a cycle of unleashing huge 6-ft tall waves every couple of minutes across the pool that completely sweep you off your feet, if you’re not prepared it can be a little overwhelming. The kids and I spent almost an hour in there, they loved it and so did I, until it began to rain quite heavily, at which point it was around 5pm and we decided it was time to call it day at the park.

A good day was had by all, I actually enjoyed Typhoon Lagoon a bit more than Volcano Bay although I think both parks are great. The queues were much shorter at TL, although it still seemed quite busy, I also found the sand where the sun beds and chairs were to be far less intrusive than the sand at Volcano Bay which seemed to get everywhere.

We are now done with waterparks on this trip, which makes me a little sad as it means the end of our holiday is getting closer but we still have lots to do including our first visit to Epcot, our one visit to SeaWorld, our first visit to Disney’s Hollywood Studios and repeat visits to Magic Kingdom and the Universal Parks. So still a lot to pack in!

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

3rd August - Epcot


Another Disney park to tick off the list! I woke up at 6.45am to make sure I could get a slot for Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind. Getting up that early whilst I’m on holiday is unheard of but needs must when Disney insists on virtual queueing for this ride. Anyway I got a slot and we were group 83, our estimated time was 1.30pm! Absolutely crazy considering I was constantly refreshing the app from 6.50am and pressed the button to get our slot as soon as the clock struck 7 - you really do have to be fast.

Anyway we managed to get to the park for park opening which was 9am, and headed straight for Test Track. I had suggested we get this one done early as I had noticed it gets long queues going by the app. When we got there it was on 15minutes, but quickly shot up to 40 not long after joining. I think we waited a total of around 35 minutes, which I didn’t think was too bad. The queue moved frequently and there was lots to look at and do whilst waiting.

I thought this ride was really cool, I loved how you could design your own car and put it to the test on the ride. I designed one with my partners parents and he designed one with the kids. Unfortunately their car beat ours but only just! As for the ride itself it’s a really fun and unique experience. Glad we managed to get it done early. I enjoyed racing my car creation around the track after the ride. So cool!



Next we decided to do something a little more chilled out and walked over to Journey Into Imagination with Figment which only had a 15minute queue but was pretty much walk on. We all loved this dark ride and Figment is a fantastic character.


The area after the ride was awesome too with loads of interactive activities to do. We then bought the kids some Minnie Mouse ears from the shop as they’d been wanting some since we arrived. Expensive but they seem to be well made and they had some lovely designs. I’ve told them they best look after them!

We then decided to do a ride which gets longer queues which was Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure.


The queue for this was showing as 65 minutes, it did drop to 45 whilst we were in the queue, but in total we waited 35minute, not too bad really. I love the theming of the area the ride is in, and the ride itself was pretty good too. Really quite clever how they do it and the mixture of screens and physical props worked quite well.

After Remy’s we decided to have a walk around all the different countries, we noticed a few Disney characters were doing meet and greets off to the side of The American Adventure, including Mickey Mouse, goofy and Pluto. So we decided to take a detour and get some photos with them and we didn’t have to wait long at all. Surprisingly the kids were happy to interact with them, as I’ve mentioned previously they’ve always been quite shy about this sort of thing.

It was getting close to lunch time and we were all getting a little hungry so we took a walk around the different countries which had various food stalls as well as their own restaurants and quick service places. They currently have the International Food and Wine festival event on. The amount of choice was fantastic, Disney certainly know how to put an event on. We ended up walking around for some time before we made our choice, which was slightly taxing in the heat I must admit. Other half’s parents had a lamb gyro from the Greek stall, I ended up with some loaded Nacho’s from Mexico, and the kids weren’t as adventurous and just had Chicken Tenders and a hot dog whilst my partner couldn’t resist yet another turkey leg (his third of the trip!). The food was good, my nachos were delicious and really filling with all the toppings. I’m trying not to think about how many pounds I’ve gained on this holiday. Hopefully the 20k+ steps we are doing most days will even if out a bit!

Since we were nearby, we decided to get in the queue for Frozen Ever After which was a long one at 85 minutes. Unfortunately, we ended up bailing after about 20 minutes as the queue just wasn’t moving at all and we were stuck outside in the heat. I reckon part of the reason for the queue not moving was because of the sheer number of Genie+ users going in through the lightening lane. We decided to go and ride Mission: Space instead which had an advertised queue time of 35 minutes for the more intense version and 10 minutes for the milder version.

We headed in to the Orange lane and waited around 20minutes or so before we got into the pre show room. This ride is an incredibly unique experience. As well as being a lot more intense than I expected. I actually felt a bit nauseous towards the end, but was fine once I got off. I think it was because I’d not long eaten a fairly large meal and was still feeling full. My partners mum on the other hand, felt a little bit worse for wear after the ride, and had to have a sit down for a good 30 minutes or so afterwards before feeling ok again. With hindsight, we probably should have encouraged OH’s mum and dad to go into the green lane, but she was okay in the end to carry on with the day thankfully.

Whilst OH’s parents were having a sit down, the 4 of us decided to head to Spaceship Earth which had an advertised queue of 15 minutes which turned out to be pretty accurate. The ride broke down very briefly whilst we were on the upwards incline, but started up again after 5-10minutes. This ride was pretty good, like most of the rides at this park it was a very unique experience that also had an educational element to it. Very enjoyable all round, the kids found the part near the end where you create your own future amusing as they’d both pulled funny faces for the photo.

As you may have noticed, we hadn’t gotten our call back for Cosmic Rewind yet. The ride broke down for around an hour earlier in the day, which of course pushed our slot back. But by the time we had come off of Spaceship Earth at around 4pm, we had finally been called for it. So we all met up again and headed over, it was raining by this point so we were glad of the shelter.



We waited around an hour in the queue before finally entering the first pre show room. When you factor in the ‘virtual queue’ this is probably the longest I have ever waited for a ride. I must say though the whole experience from the queue to the end of the ride is absolutely amazing. The amount of money they must have thrown at this to make it what it is must be mind blowing. The storyline works really well and makes sense, I thought the coaster itself was a really fun family ride. We were lucky enough to get the first 3 rows, with my partner and I going in row 1. I thought it was definitely worth the wait. The amount of staff required to operate this ride blew my mind to be quite honest. It’s not just a coaster, it’s an experience, the total package. Really glad we got to ride it.

After that, queues were long and we were getting tired so we walked around a bit taking in the sights, stopped off at the Creations gift shop and then decided to call it a day. We were going to stay for the show at the end of the day but we were just too tired so have decided to do that another day. What a fantastic and unique park Epcot is though, I feel like I barely scratched the surface. If only we were staying for another week. Will hopefully be able to squeeze one more visit on this trip in though as we want to see EPCOT Forever and do a few other rides.

 

[Zeock]

2nd August - Typhoon Lagoon


The final waterpark visit of this trip was to Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon. We weren’t in any huge rush and went to a nearby IHOP for breakfast. Delicious pancakes. We got to the park for around 11.30ish. We found a spot to set up camp which had a good view of the wave pool and then went into the lazy river for a couple of rounds. This lazy river is much longer than the one at Volcano Bay and I thought it was a slightly better one too.

After that we decided to go on Gangplank Falls, a family raft slide that we could all go on together, well 3 in each raft at least as we couldn’t all fit in one! This was a fun slide that gained a bit of speed on its way down but wasn’t too intense. Thoroughly enjoyed by all.

My eldest daughter and I then went off to explore the park, whilst my youngest went off with her dad to have a play in the wave pool. On our travels round the park we managed to get quite a few slides in as the queues weren’t bad at all, much less than those at Volcano Bay. We headed towards the large mountain area and went on Humunga Cowabunga, a body slide that goes straight down at a 60° angle, and Storm Slides, another body slide with a few twists and turns in it as you go down. Both great fun and we waited no longer than 15 minutes for either of them.

Next, we went over to Crush n Gusher, the parks water coaster. Once again we waited no longer than 15 minutes, and went down all 3 slides, which were all pretty similar but brilliant fun - hence doing it 3 times! You get a decent amount of speed on this and some airtime moments too.

We headed back where we’d set up camp for the day to have a drink and reapply sun cream, I was feeling pretty exhausted by then so needed a bit of a rest - water parks really take it out of you as you get older! So I had a sit down and then went to take a few photos from the viewing platforms in the park, whilst eldest daughter went off with her nan to ride a few more slides.






Once I was feeling a little more rested I fancied a go in the wave pool, known as Typhoon Lagoon Surf Pool. This wave pool is a little different from your standard wave pool. Around every hour-90 minutes or so it starts a cycle of unleashing huge 6-ft tall waves every couple of minutes across the pool that completely sweep you off your feet, if you’re not prepared it can be a little overwhelming. The kids and I spent almost an hour in there, they loved it and so did I, until it began to rain quite heavily, at which point it was around 5pm and we decided it was time to call it day at the park.

A good day was had by all, I actually enjoyed Typhoon Lagoon a bit more than Volcano Bay although I think both parks are great. The queues were much shorter at TL, although it still seemed quite busy, I also found the sand where the sun beds and chairs were to be far less intrusive than the sand at Volcano Bay which seemed to get everywhere.

We are now done with waterparks on this trip, which makes me a little sad as it means the end of our holiday is getting closer but we still have lots to do including our first visit to Epcot, our one visit to SeaWorld, our first visit to Disney’s Hollywood Studios and repeat visits to Magic Kingdom and the Universal Parks. So still a lot to pack in!

If you have done Master Blaster at Towers, how did Crush 'n' Gusher compare to it? I have only ridden the former.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

If you have done Master Blaster at Towers, how did Crush 'n' Gusher compare to it? I have only ridden the former.

I have done Master Blaster. I think Crush n Gusher wins for me. The fact that there are 3 slides that whilst similar, do offer slightly differing experiences makes it for me, it also helps massively with capacity!