Saturday, January 21, 2012

Universal Studios and Harry Potter World

So, my wonderful, amazing, loving boyfriend surprised me with a trip to Universal Studios and Harry Potter World for Christmas!!!! Isn't he awesome? I think so.

This was one of the BEST vacations I have ever been on and I think the both of us really needed it. It was nice because it was just the two of us. We had nowhere to be and no one to answer to. Just us, enjoying a theme park :).

Our first day in the park was New Year's Eve and our day started out with a fellow Dallas Cowboys fan, upon seeing my license plate holders, giving us a free parking voucher. Pretty good way to start the day. Then we headed to Harry Potter World!!!!!!! It is beyond amazing! A little too crowded for my taste right now, but, it still didn't take anything away.

Hogwarts

Hogwart's castle from the Lost Continent section of Universal



hogwarts1

Hogwarts castle from the Forbidden Journey line

The Forbidden Journey ride is FREAKING AWESOME!!!!! Thankfully, we went during the perfect time of the year. The longest line was for the Harry Potter Forbidden Journey ride and it was maybe an hour and a half tops. I don't think we even waited that long. We were enjoying ourselves so much, I didn't really pay attention. The great thing about Universal is, even though you're in line, they still find ways to entertain you. For the Forbidden Journey you actually get to go through Hogwarts and Dumbledore's office and one of the classrooms. It's so cool. And the ride is something out of this world. I don't want to ruin it for anyone, but, Jon's not even a big Harry Potter fan and he loved the ride. 

After that we got to go into Zonko's and Honeyduke's where I got pumpkin juice and a chocolate frog :).

pumpkinjuice

Pumpkin juice is pretty good actually. It tastes like an ice cold pumpkin cappuccino. Butterbeer was surprisingly delicious as well. We thought it was going to be disgusting but we both enjoyed it. 

They really did a great job. They even have Moaning Myrtle yelling at you in the bathrooms and a Sirius Black wanted poster that moves. They definitely did it right. 

jonandi

Here's a picture of Jon and I in front of the Hogwart's Express. We saw a couple trying to take a picture of themselves in front of the train and we knew we wanted one too, so we just took each others pictures haha. The friendliness of strangers :).

snowman

Our other favorite part of the park was, of course, Jurassic Park!!!!! It's where we spent the majority of our time. It's one of our favorite movies as a couple and Jon got me the complete series on blu-ray for my birthday :). The great thing about Harry Potter World being in the park, the rest of the park is almost completely empty. So we rode the Jurassic Park ride like, 5 times, without ever really waiting in line. The last night we were there about half an hour before the park closed we ran to ride it one more time haha. It was dark, there was no one on the boat in front of us, no one in the boat behind us and no one in the boat with us. It was pretty scary the last time haha. 

tritops


This is the animatronic triceratops they have in the park. It's pretty much the closest thing you'll ever get to a real live dinosaur. Again, FREAKING AWESOME. I loved it.  

AND they have a new vendor in the Jurassic Park gift shop where they sell real amber jewelry with bugs in it!!! While we stopped for a restroom break, Jon snuck into the shop and bought me an amber necklace with gnats in it :).

100_4091-1

I was so excited. Again, isn't he amazing!?!

OH! Did you guys know they were shutting down the Jaws ride!?! Yeah, they are. I'm pretty sad about it. I think it's a pretty cool ride. So, we got to ride it one more time before it got shut down. Two people got wet...I was one of them :(. It was okay though, I got to be really close to Jaws haha. 

The other awesome part of the trip was we kicked butt on the Men In Black ride as a couple. On the Men In Black ride you have two teams going through an alien infested town and you have to shoot the aliens with laser guns. Jon and I totally carried our team. We were both in the hundred thousands while everyone else was below a hundred thousand. We won because of us. Chyeah. No big deal. 

Okay, I'm done indulging myself. One of the best trips ever with one of the best guys ever and Harry Potter gets a big two thumbs up!

No comments:

Post a Comment

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...