2022 February Vacation: Part I - Universal Studios

For midwinter break this year we decided to take the kids on their first cruise. The ship left out of Long Beach, CA, so we decided to fly in a couple days early and spend a day at Universal Studios first. It's nice that the kids are big enough to be their own pack mules. They looked cute pulling their suitcases and carrying their backpacks, like little veteran travelers.

At the airport Allison used her social skills to make friends with some kids playing a matching game. On the airport shuttle in LAX she told the lady next to her all about the cruise we were going on and the rides she would ride at Universal Studios.

Oscar and Tyler each got window seats and were able to enjoy beautiful views of Mt Ranier and Mt Adams from the plane. Tyler is typically pretty introverted, but he was surprisingly social with the people he sat next to. He told them all about volcanos, rocks, and space.

Allison is now 48 inches with shoes, so the first thing we wanted to ride was the Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey ride. We waited in line, got almost to the front, and then the line stopped moving. After several minutes they told us they had no estimate when the ride would be fixed, so we left the line. Just as we were getting our stuff out of the lockers and were heading out, they told us the ride was working again. We decided to head back later instead of waiting through the line again.  

Universal only has two 48+ inch rides, so we made our way down to the lower lot for her to ride "The Mummy." Oscar got Allison all reved up by having us all shout "Imotep" as the coaster started moving. Yay! She finally got to do her first 48+ inch ride, and she loved it!

Afer that we rode Jurassic World and remade our family photo from the first time we went on this ride two years ago. View previous photo here. We then let the kids play in the dinosaur play area before heading back to the upper lot. Allison does an excellent job roaring like a dinosaur.

There was a raptor encounter just as we were heading out. There was a long line we weren't willing to wait in, so we came to the side and got a picture from there instead. The neat thing is the raptor noticed us and snapped at the kids. We weren't videoing at the time, but the motion sensor on Oscar's camera picked it up. If you go to this link and click the play button on the top right on each of the photos, you'll see the raptor notice then kids, come towards them, then snap at them. 

Back in the upper lot we returned to the Harry Potter ride and were finally successful. The line moved quickly without any issues, and both kids loved it. 

From there we went over to ride Flight of the Hippogriff. The kids posed with Hagrid's hut and we enjoyed a nice view of the Hogwarts Castle that you can only get from the top of the coaster. I took a photo, but it doesn't do it justice.

I finally remembered to bring the wand Mike bought for me a few years ago so we could try the wand tricks going around Hogsmeade. Tyler and Oscar figured out most of them, but there were a few that we just couldn't get. 

From there we went over to pose with a minion and the kids played in the super silly fun land play area. We didn't do the Minion ride this time since the line was long. 

Nearby was the Animal Actors show where we got up close views of a couple big owls from the Harry Potter movies.

After the show they invited the audience to come up and pet some of the dogs. Allison totally used her charm to get us our personal dog show. She told Ariel the trainer "we've come here lots of times and I never get picked." Ariel invited us to stick around for some private dog training and cuddles. She also let the kids pick their favorite bird from the show and brought them each out a feather. 

Here are Scooby Doo and the Mystery Machine and Tyler posing with Frankenstein's monster. Allison didn't want to get close to him, but Tyler was fearless even when the monster put his hand on Tyler's head. 

The Secret Life of Pets line said it was 50 minutes on the app, but we'd been on it before, and the line had moved really fast. It's a constant loader where the ride vehicles are always slowly moving. You board them while they move, so you're never stuck in not moving through the line for very long. Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey is the same way. as long as it doesn't break down, the line is always much shorter than the estimated wait time. I figured it would be the same here, but I was wrong. The line took something like 75 minutes. By the time we got near the front I saw why - the employees would allow one small party of standby to go in and then about 30 express line users to go in. It was a very long line, but we really didn't have anything else to do at this point that would have been shorter, so we decided to just deal with it. Oscar had gone back to the locker to get our coats, which meant it was just me and two restless kids.

The Kung Fu panda 4D show was starting so we hit that up shortly before the park closed. We then danced and posed with King Julien from Madagascar.

10 minutes before the park closed we rode Harry Potter again, and they offered to let us get right back in line when we were done. Tyler and I rode it again while Allison and Oscar waited for us in the gift shop. When we came our the park was technically closed, but the ride line for Hippogriff coaster was still open, so we rode that too. I love riding roller coasters at night and the view of the Hogwarts castle is even more magical. The windows light up in the dark. 

The Uber app said traffic getting back to the hotel was bad, so we walked through citywalk and ate frozen yogurt at Menchies before scheduling our ride back. It took us about 45 minutes and only dropped our commute by about 5 minutes, but at least we got to enjoy a treat. The kids really liked the popping boba toppings.

Back at the hotel Oscar took his covid test required for the cruise, which totally looks like a pregnancy test. The rest of us didn't have to take them since we'd had Covid recently and had letters of recovery from a healthcare provider. The cruise required we buy proctor tests to verify we were using the tests correctly. The operator Oscar was talking to hung up on him since he couldn't understand her directions on how to position his phone. Fortunately the next person he talked to was able to direct him more clearly.