Universal Studios - Hollywood, California

As you know I'm a very lucky girl and one of the highlights of our California trip was a day out at Universal which was a Christmas present from my lovely family.  Now as most of you regular readers know the highlight for me was not only having my American Mom with us but also the Wizarding World of Harry Potter which I have posted about separately. Now most of the time you can guarantee the weather in LA but not at the start of the day we went it was drizzly to say the least.

First things first is parking. We got there in time for the park to open at 9am however opening times change throughout the year so best to check this on their website. Parking was easy, well marked, themed and very organised however it did cost us $20 for general parking on top of the ticket price. It was only probably a 10 minute walk to the entrance from here:

A nice rainy welcome from Universal Hollywood:

Usual bag checks and security are in operation but it wasn't too invasive and we were in!! We were advised to start at the back of the park which we were going to do but we got temporarily sidetracked by the Grinch doing Christmas. We met the Grinch - it was hilarious but I can't bring myself to talk about Christmas in March...... 

Now we had queue jumping passes and if you were to spend your money on one thing then I would spend it on this. The passes meant that the longest we waited for any ride was 15 minutes and bearing in mind that some of the queues were 90 minutes long this was a god send and enabled us to get on every single ride in the park. The front of line passes cost around $100 depending on time of year, which is a lot of money but like I say we felt they were worth it as we only had enough time to spend a day there. However if you are here for a few days and want to spend a lot of time here then you're better to buy a season ticket which is only about $20 more than normal entrance fee depending on the time of year you visit as there are black out days in peak seasons.

We decided that we would head on the studio tour first as this lasted about an hour and we assumed would get pretty busy. This is the more traditional side of Universal and if I'm honest the first 20 minutes was, in my opinion, pretty boring as it was just looking at back lots etc. If you want to get off and explore then you need to upgrade to VIP.

I honestly didn't take too many pictures of this mainly because it was raining and the splash guards were down so I figured they wouldn't turn out well anyway and I was too busy being entertained but our crazy tour guide!! I did enjoy touring Wisteria Lane and seeing bodies being carried out of the Bates Motel. The fun for me really started when we got to the action rides and although it's probably a bit outdated now my favourite was Jaws:

Some of the more modern interactive, virtual experiences were cool too. My favourite of these was definitely the Fast and the Furious one as you felt like you were flying. The King Kong and dinosaur fight one made me feel a bit sick but that's more down to my ear problems than the actual experience.

From here we headed to the back of the park and did Jurassic Park log flume which was brilliant, the Mummy rollercoaster (not for me!!) and Transformers ride too. The man and the girl enjoyed these whilst I visited with my Mom. We may have found some time to peruse the giftshops too. I am loving these photos and the ridiculous happiness of them:

This one of O is pretty much my favourite of her from the whole trip and it makes me giggle everytime I look at it:

We then headed back up top to Harry Potter and food at the Three Broomsticks (AMAZING!!). We spent quite a lot of time at Harry Potter mainly because I am huge fan! From here we took in the waterworld show which we loved so much we watched it twice, both times sitting close enough to feel the spray but not close enough to get absolutely drenched:

We also spent some time in Springfield meeting the Simpsons:

The man went on the Walking Dead walk through attraction which he said has a lot of the sets of the key scenes from the film. The animatronics are decent and the actors jump out at you. It was shorter than he expected it to be and if you have slow people in front of you then you know what's coming. It's certainly not for youngsters (or for me) but he said it's not that scary. We attended a civilized story telling session with Cindy Lou whilst he was scaring himself!!

Then we moved on to Despicable me:

 From here we went on a couple of the rides that were meant for smaller kids and then hit the gift shops. As it started to get dark we went back to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter so that we could see everything lit up at night including the castle. It's just so damn magical and my photos in no way do it any justice:

At this point it was getting towards closing time but as we were heading back there was a concert taking place back in Grinchland so we stayed and watched that for a while before heading back to the car. We'd taken a picture of our car parking details so that we knew exactly how to find a way back. Getting out was easy and no traffic hold ups.

Overall I would say that the majority of the park is getting a bit outdated now (Waterworld is from the 1990's!!) however that it no way detracts from what a brilliant day out it is or how much fun we had. In mine and O's opinion it was worth it for the Wizarding World of Harry Potter alone however the man isn't that big a fan. 

It is an expensive day out though although on a par with Disney! Have listed costs above to give you a rough idea but these are based on December 2016 prices and do change depending on the season and how far in advance you book. It's also cheaper to book the entrance and front of line passes together as you can save yourself about $30 each by doing this.

Do let me know if you are planning a trip!

  

Adventures of an English Mum in................... The Wizarding World of Harry Potter - Universal Hollywood

We were lucky enough this year to have spent Christmas and New Year over in the grand ol' US of A (before all of the recent craziness started!!!) One of the highlights of the trip for all three of us was a trip to Universal Hollywood and the Wizarding World of Harry Potter which was the most amazing Christmas present from my American family. I'm a huge Potter fan and the man isn't particularly but he enjoyed it too!! 

As amazing as it was there was some advice given to us that made it even better so I thought that I'd share some of those tips with you guys too. First off, as it's still shiny and new, EVERYONE heads to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter first as it's the thing they all want to see. Going against every grain in my (very excited) body, we took the advice of park staff and started right at the very back of the park and left it until last. Now don't get me wrong, it was busy all day but we certainly missed the crush!! This is the entrance:

Eeeeeeek so very exciting! The geek in me was actually pogo-ing at this point!! The first thing that we saw was the Hogwarts express;

There is also the station there where you can get your photos taken on the Hogwarts Express with a green screen behind you and they then add the scenery. It's a lot of fun as they give you scarves and wands and you get really get into the swing of being part of the books and films. The only downside is that you can't take your own photos on there and the Universal photos are about $35 dollars each!! Ouch - too much money for me to warrant spending unfortunately!!

The second piece of advice that I would give you is, if you can afford it, then buy the passes that enable you to jump to the front of the queue. Both of the rides in the Wizarding World had long queues all day but Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey was at least a 90 minute wait for the entire day!!! We were again very lucky and had the queue jump passes which meant we got on every single ride and didn't have to wait for more than 15 minutes for anything. It's certainly worth the money. The only plus side of the queue for this ride is that it winds through the Hogwarts Castle and has some amazing features including Dumbledore speaking to you. We  loved this although the ride made Chick feel a bit sick!! These are the views inside the castle whilst you are queuing:

One of the other things that I also thought was cool, is that as there are a lot of larger people in America, each ride with height/size restrictions had a 'sizing' carriage before you got into the queue so you knew if you would fit into the ride or not.

Of course there are also plenty of places to spend your money in the Wizarding World!! We couldn't even get in to Ollivanders because the queue was nuts the entire day but they do sell the wands and interactive wands (around $50) at all of the other shops in the park too. Almost everyone we saw had the interactive wands and there are certain spots in the wizarding world where these then enable you to 'cast a spell'. The kids we saw all day were absolutely spellbound by this and had we taken the youngest two we would've bought them both one but (probably incorrectly) decided that we were too old for this!! There were markers on the ground indicating the spots and telling you the spell however at the trickier ones they had members of staff assisting!! Just so unbelievably awesome and a great part of the magic!

So we missed out on the wands but we may however have spent a good amount of time and money in Honeydukes:

So exciting seeing a huge, colourful variety - just like being a kid again. The man treated me to a chocolate cauldron and erm this was the photo I sent to my best friend of it......

Attractive I know ;) The only thing I would be tempted to avoid from Honeydukes is Bertie Botts all flavoured beans...... Vomit and Ear Wax are not nice flavours to accidentally bite in to.............

The absolute highlight of the day for me without a shadow of a doubt was eating lunch at the Three Broomsticks! We waited until after 2pm as suggested to us and although we still had a half an hour wait the line moved pretty quickly and the staff seemed to do a good job of getting you seated as quickly as possible. The food was amazing and the puddings were out of this world. We couldn't have eaten one each. As it was we shared two puddings between the four of us and still struggled to eat everything. 

A word of warning though the refreshments are limited to juice/tea or iced tea/Pumpkin juice or Butterbeer (yuck), you can't get a soda in the Wizarding World. The  food was incredible and some people had the Great Feast which looked amazing - we weren't that hungry!! Considering that it was theme park food I felt that it was fairly reasonably priced too especially for such a great experience:

After lunch, we needed a break so had a walk around the park and went shopping and to see some of the shows and then came back at night once it was all lit up. It was certainly much quieter at night and we actually got to look at the shop windows including self-stirring cauldrons, wands and amazing outfits. Hogsmeade at night is something special:

As is the Hogwarts castle all lit up:

We had such an amazing time and would happily go back again. Like I say the only thing I would do differently is to buy a wand and get interactive. We may also be adventurous and try the great feast at the Three Broomsticks. If you've been and have any other advice for new visitors then please let me know and I'll add to it :)