Universal Trip

Our first day in Universal studios is super packed but we will then return to the hotel for a good night's sleep to rise and shine nice and early all over again. The second day is going to be entirely Harry Potter centric so it will be a little more relaxed. I wanted to make sure that we have time to hit up all of the shops and things, and I am bringing my wand so I had to make sure I had time to do some magic as well.

We are entering the park at opening once again and heading straight for Escape from Gringotts, it seems like the perfect ride to rope drop. We then have two and half hours of wander and shop time (like I said I want to hit absolutely everything in Harry Potter world). In that time we will also be visiting The Hopping Pot, the Leaky Cauldron and Florean Fortescue’s Ice Cream. I will be trying every variation of butterbeer (it's the only thing I insist on getting everytime we go to Universal) as well as a lemony drink they have and a few others. I have been studying menus for weeks now and I will be trying everything that they don’t have at the Hollywood one. After our wandering time we will park hop once again on the Hogwarts Express. We will do all the rides there once more and eat our dinner at the Three Broomsticks. I also want to make sure we see any and all shows that are happening. Universal is also firmly in their spooky season so I want to make sure we see the toad choir and the Beauxbatons girls and any night show there may be.

Our drinking list for both parks includes stops at Chez Alcatraz, Flaming Moes, Finnegan’s, Mythos Restaurant and The Watering Hole. We will definitely be drinking our way around Universal. Especially as the sun sets. Our secret third day in Universal will not be a full day. We will be using the first half of our third day to rest and recover but we will return to the park as the sun goes down for horror nights.

We will get a chance to ride any rides that we missed during our first two days along with scare zones and haunted houses. There are a bunch of scary options but I am for sure going to be experiencing the The Last of Us haunted house, and the Universal Monsters haunted house. Along with the Vamp ‘69 and Jungle of Doom scare zones. And I will have to make sure that I have a death eater encounter. We will also be hunting for themed snacks and drinks as we make our way around the parks. I don’t have a definitive list on those things yet as I am leaving that open to how we feel in the moment (I know actual spontaneity among my scheduled spontaneity). Theoretically Horror nights ends at 2AM but we will be rope dropping Disney the very next day so there is absolutely no way that we will be closing out the park. It starts at 6:30 so if we get there right as they open up everything I should be back in the hotel and asleep by midnight.

The last two Universal days are going to be more relaxed mostly because I want to make sure that I’m not too worn out before our Disney days. Because those are going to be fully scheduled and completely packed. We are going to do our best to keep my joints in shape, the last thing I need is an arthritis flare up in the middle of my vacation.