Day 1- Saturday, January 29.
My flight out of O'Hare was at 9 am so it was an early morning for me. Went to McDonalds at 6 and arrived at the airport by 7:20. My friends dad was there waiting for me and we got checked in and made it through all of the metal detection devices(etc.) in a mere 5 minutes. It wasn't very busy. We boarded our flight at 8:30. We were flying with Ted.(United Airlines).
The flight was uneventful, but on takeoff I put my hands up. My friend thought I was crazy.
On the flight, I read a Universal/Disney book that I was given as a gift from my old neighbors.(Who are the people who treated me to this trip.) We arrived at the airport in Orlando around 1(EDT) I think. Then we got the rental cars and drove off onto the highway to our resort. It was nice to be in weather that is over 70 degrees!
We made it to our resort, Sheraton Vistana Resort, and checked in. I was with my friend, his parents, his sister, his aunt and uncle, and his little 3 year old cousin. The resort was about 2 or so miles from one of the entrances to WDW. The room was nice. It had a kitchen, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a huge living room, and a screened deck overlooking a pond. The resort had 7 pools and over 10 whirlpools.(including a huge one!)
Ok, as the first day, we pretty much unpacked and rested.
Day 2- Sunday, January 30. IOA and USF
We got up at 7am. Left the resort by 8:15. We passed SeaWorld on the way to Universal and wow, Kraken was huge! Too bad I didn't have a chance to ride it.
The skyline for IOA was awesome and there was one very nice parking garage where we parked. It was huge! I also liked the monving sidewalks that they had while you walked to the parks. The music also pumped me up.
The first park we decided to hit was Islands of Adventure. We were given our 5 day tickets and were let loose. I will now give my review of the park by each themed section, not in the order I rode the rides.
Port of Entry- This is a very nice and highly themed entrance area. There are no rides here, but the shops were very nice and it had some nice music.
Marvel Superhero Island- This was my favorite area of the park. It is to your left when you come to the end of the Port of Entry. I went this way first each day I visited this park because it has the most popular and best attractions. It had a small parade that goes through the streets with many Marvel Characters. This section is also very detailed to the Marvel theme,
The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman- This is probably hands down one of the best rides I have ever ridden. The queue was very neat and the loading process is very quick. I will not give away any secrets, but this 3d 'adventure' is not to be missed.
Rating: 10/10
Wait: None for all rides.
Vehicles running: Too many to count.
Rides: two
Best Part: All of the sensory details.(They compliment the ride perfectly.)
The Incredible Hulk Coaster- This was also a very popular ride. The queue is also highly detailed and the ride interacts with the paths around it very well. The launch was very intense the first time, but then it became rather boring. The zero-g roll after the launch was a blur and the Cobra Roll was awesome.(Even better than DejaVu's.) This is a very unique B&M. After the Cobra Roll, there is a vertical loop, an over banked turn, then a helix turn into a large Corkscrew, then a smaller vertical loop, then an overbanked turn that is similar to one of Iron Wolf's, then MCBR, then corkscrew, then a high banked turn, into straight track that leads into the breaks. It was awesome! They had 2 trains that were able to be operated while the other was sitting in pieces next to the storage track shed.
Rating: 10/10
Wait: 3 minutes
Vehicles Running: two
Rides: 1(my friend didn't ride it. I rode in the back.)
Best Part: Cobra Roll
Doctor Doom's Fearfall- This ride is your standard double shot S&S drop tower with a very detailed theme.It is situated off of the main midway, but this is a ride that you shouldn't miss. It gives great airtime! I liked that you were given a number and you walked around the tower and waited behind a door that opened when it was your time to load onto the ride.
Rating: 7/10
Wait: Walk-on
Vehicles: 1 of the two towers.(Maybe 2 later in the day.)
Rides: 1
Best Part: The launch upward
Storm Force Accelatron- This ride is very similar to Chubasco at SfGam. Execept, this one is highly themed. The sad part though is that this one was rather boring and not as good as Chubasco.
Rating: 4/10
Wait: Walk-on
Rides: 1
Best Part: The end.
Toon Lagoon- This area was actually quite neat. It had a lot of interactive elements and was also highly themed. Me Ship The Olive and Popeye and Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges were closed the whole trip for refurbishment. I didn't ride Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls due to the rather cool weather.
Jurassic Park- This section, just like all of the other sections in this park, was highly themed. It was very tropical and gave you the feeling that dinosaurs were not far away.
I didn't ride any rides in this section this day.
The Lost Continent- This was another great and highly themed section. It had great music and the shops were marvelous.
Dueling Dragons(Ice and Fire)- These two B&M inverts were great! They have probably one of the longest and most detailed queue lines I have ever seen!(and walked through.) They each can run 3 trains on a track and they have a load and unload station. They don't have to dispatch each train at the same time as the lifts slow down in order to time the duels just right. The 3rd trains for each side were in the shop.
Ice
Rating: 9/10
Wait: walk-on
Vehicles running: 1 each side(The one op said that the second trains might be added later. I never found out.)
Rides: 2(1 in the back and 1 toward the front.
Best Part: The foot chopper with the "castle" or whatever it was.
Fire
Rating: 9/10
Wait: 15 minutes
Vehicles running: 1
Rides: 1(front row)
Best Part: 2nd Immelman
Poseidon's Fury- This was a pretty neat show and I didn't really know what to expect. It had one actor and he took us to all these scenes. It had a neat plot and you got to walk under a swirling wave of water. It was worth my wait.
Rating: 8/10
Wait: 20 minutes
Rides: 1 show
Best Part: The 'finale'.
Seuss Landing- This again was also a very nice and highly themed area. It also had the most meet and greet characters.(My favorites were Thing 1 and 2 as they are the nicknames for my two friends who are twins.) This can be considered a 'kid' section to this park.
Cat in the Hat- I came to this ride not expecting much, but it blew me away. It wasn't fast, it wasn't amazing, but it was just 'fun'. You ride in couches that bounce and spin and tells the story of the Cat in the Hat. All I can say is that it was just plain old fun.
Rating: 9/10
Wait: 5 minutes
Vehicles Running: too many to count.
Rides: 1
Best Part: The spinning section.
One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish- The wait said 10 minutes, but it ended up double that due to Express passes. It had a neat little song and you had a controller that controlled whether your fish went up or down. You would get wet if you didn't listen to the words in the song. We luckily didn't get wet!
Rating: 7/10
Wait: 20 minutes
Rides: 1
Best Part: When the song stopped telling you whether to go up or down so you didn't know if you would get wet or not.
We went to Bob Marley's Margaritaville for lunch and decided to head over to Universal Studios next.
(As you can see, this is going to be a long trip report, so I will continue to add to the report as time progresses. I just I have way too much to say and I know no one will read it if it included my whole trip in one post.
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