Sept 2012 - Universal Studios Hollywood

Today was Universal Studios day. We have never really been that impressed by the Orlando park but decided that we should give it a try.

We grabbed breakfast in the hotel before setting off. The park didn't open until 10 and we actually didn't arrive there until around 11.

As we entered Citywalk they were filming the World's Strongest Man but we couldn't really stop to watch.

Shortly after we entered the park we saw a couple of characters from the movie Beetlejuice. They had long lines so we skipped them.

We went in search of a restroom and passed Shrek on the way. When we came back past there was no one in the line and so we decided to get a quick piccy :)

First attraction on the list was the studio tour - we decided to go and do this early in the hope that the line wouldn't be too long.

Along the way we got our photo taken in front of a pretty famous landmark!

The line was about 30 mins long but it was under shade and they had nice misty sprayers which helped keep us cool.

Before we knew it we were on the tram and off on the tour.

There were lots of fun bits on this ride. There is a king kong 360 3D experience which was pretty cool.

We also got to see some famous cars which was great for Rob.

We also passed some of the houses from Desperate Housewives.

We also passed by the square from 'Back to the future' which was quite cool as well as getting to see some of the special effects used in movies.

Help....we're going to get wet!

Oh no...the cars are going to hit us! :)

The tour lasted about an hour and it was really worth the trip. It is a shame the Orlando park doesn't have the same attraction - but obviously that is the downside to it not being a real film studio.

We then went down to the lower lot......wow was that a long way down!

Whilst down here we went on the Transformers ride - this was a bit similar to Dinosaur at the Animal Kingdom but was a little less bumpy :)

On the way out we saw Bumblebee and Optimus Prime....but they had such long lines that we couldn't meet them :(

Up next was Jurassic Park. We were concerned that we might get really wet so we put most of our stuff in a locker.

As it turned out we got wetter riding around at the beginning than we did on the big drop!

There weren't any other rides down here that we were interested in so we took the many escalators back up to the top.....they were really tall!

Back up at the top and we grabbed a drink while we planned our strategy. We decided to see the Waterworld show followed by the special effects show.

On the way we saw this little guy :)

Curious George :)

The waterworld show was a bit cheesy but entertaining enough. I am sure some of the cast were mildly famous in the US but we didn't have a clue who they were!

The special effects show was also quite interesting...no pics from here though as it was indoors and dark :)

It was now around 5pm and the only thing that I was interested in seeing was Shrek 4D.

This was fun...although the unexpected splashes of water were odd and the moving chair was interesting!

Afterwards I squashed a few pennies and then we headed home.

We went down to Downtown Disney to get some dinner and then went back to the room to watch World of Color from the balcony. We missed the start but nice to see a little bit of Disney on our last night :)

We then started packing and popped to the laundry room to do some washing.....took a while to get a machine but eventually all of the washing done before we left :)