Barb D
07-05-2003, 10:34 PM
Dates: June 27 through July 5th
Transportation: Drive from Seattle Washington to Los Angeles, California.
Who: Two 40 something adults
I decided not to do a day by day trip report since the reader would probably rather hear what we saw and what is different from Florida and California rather than a walk in our foot steps day by day. Plus it was much easier for me not to worry about carrying a notebook to keep day by day notes. I will try to keep things in order of the visits.
The DRIVE:
We left home 5PM on Thursday the 26th of June. I had to work and we had planned to drive all night and since I worked all day I figured I would fall asleep early in the car and then when my husband got tired I could take over. I don’t know if it was excitement of going, or just plain old hard to fall asleep in a car for me but I was only able to catch an hour or so sleep in Southern Oregon. We arrived about noon on Friday.
I have to say the state of Oregon really takes care of their roads. Washington and California definitely need to look at Oregon to see what they could do better in this area. One thing really good is there are rest stops about every 30 miles the entire way and other than on the way home when we ran into two in a row closed we didn’t notice any other closures than that. Gas prices were moderate and high. In Washington we pay about $1.59 a gallon. In Oregon we paid about $1.65 but in Oregon this is for a person to do the pumping for you. It’s illegal to pump your own gas in Oregon. In California we paid over $2.00 a gallon in fact once we paid $2.16 a gallon but in southern California we paid about $1.69. I figure we spent near $200 total for gas. If we would have flow it was about $250 a piece plus the cost of a car or other transportation.
Our first couple nights were near the famous Sunset strip near Universal Studios. We were really worried about pre booking since we heard so many areas aren’t safe. We stayed at a Ramada and it had a parking garage. It turned out to be a section of town that was frequented mainly by gay men but we didn’t feel unsafe there. Since we arrived midday on Friday and we were so tired we decided to check out the beach. The Santa Monica Pier wasn’t too far. My husband loves to fly his kite and I watched him then we walked through their little entertainment area with amusement park rides and many street venders/artists.
Saturday we wanted to arrive at Universal Studios at opening so we asked the hotel what time they opened. We was told 10:00. We found out later it really opened at 9:00 so the lesson here is check the Internet before you leave home and print it all out. We were so worried about lines since it was Saturday. I was very surprised to find we didn’t have to wait for anything we wanted to do. We did everything except the Nickelodeon play area for kids and then we missed the sound stage tour because it did have a small line but it was late in the day and my husband was wearing down. He has Muscular Dystrophy and so we do everything very slow and mix a lot of shows in between line waits. We choose not to do handicap entrances or wheel chairs due to his choice. So at a snail space we did everything in one day on a Saturday.
What we saw at universal:
Things similar to Florida Universal:
Back to the Future Ride. To us they were very much the same ride. The queue to get in is set up different but the ride is the same. Back to the future ride is a simulator in which 8 people get into but there are many of these simulators. We were raised above the floor in this Delorean simulator and there was a giant screen showing the larger than life scenes. The car bumps, turns and really feels like you’re in the air. The story is Biff from back to the Future stole a car and you have to catch him by bumping into his car to catch him.
Animal Planet: I have to confess I never saw the one in Florida but the one in California is a lot of really cute animal acts. The trainer claims they animals stared in shows but I have a feeling they may just be look a likes. The dog was actually jumping ahead of the trainer to do his tricks. He had the act down so well he didn’t even need his gestures to accomplish it all.
The Lucy Tribute: A walk through mini museum to showcase Lucy and Desi Arnez. We saw clothes and other memorabilia from Lucy’s collection. They also have Shows to watch and games to play.
Jurassic Park Ride: It’s a water ride with a plunge at the end. It’s a story where your car goes off course through a dinosaur infested area including a T Rex.
T2 - 3D: I think Florida does this one a bit better. It’s a much bigger stage and the lady who introduces the show in the pre show was so much better in Florida. Its one of those shows you have to wear the 3D glasses. The show has many special effects including live actors, Movie Screen, Robots, and other 3 D effects. It’s a cute show and the place is cook and air conditioned.
Things that are different than Universal Florida:
Mummy: It’s a walk through similar to a haunted house at Halloween time but of course everything if from the monster flick the Mummy. It was cute but not something I would do a second time.
Shrek 3D: This one may be in Florida too? I wasn’t sure as I haven’t been there in a year. The show is really cute and a lot of 3D effects. This may be the mom in me but I was concerned that so many children were in the audience and the content of the jokes were a bit adult rated. It was typical Eddie Murphy type jokes. I’m sure no one even thinks about this but I do. My kids are raised and we limited their viewing of certain shows including no rated R stuff. This was definitely rated PG-13 due to sexual innuendoes. I’m sure it goes over most kids heads but to me it should have a warning as to content for people who care to worry this way. For an Adult it was a super cute show!!
BackDraft: This is a walk through attraction that educates you to what a fire is and can do. They use people from the movie to narrate on a screen the real dangers of the movie and fires in general. We saw how they did a few of the effects and then the last section we went to we witnessed a real fire. It was awesome and had one frightening moment in it. It was a very well done attraction.
The tram tour of the back lot. In Florida you walk through a back lot of sorts but it doesn’t even compare to this tram ride. Its about 45 minutes long and you go through many attractions at once with it. They do a great job of telling you about films, mixing in some scenes on a tram TV in every car and then showing you where it was produced. We saw many different areas including the area they recently did Bruce Almighty (It’s the same place the Back to the future clock was at.) The tram does other attractions too. It has a Jaws scene (Can get you wet and maybe scare you a little especially on the right side of the tram). You go through an Earth quake I think they said 7.5, you almost get washing out in a flash flood, A bridge starts to fall apart with your tram on it, there may have been more that I’m not thinking of right now. One cool set was the cute little town from the Grinch who stole Christmas and its right behind the Bates Motel. Talk about opposites.
The shows were great. We saw one called Spiderman Rocks. It was a singing show and was well done. We also saw one called Water world. One thing I noticed is all the actors in these shows were real movie or TV stars. They introduce them at the end of the show. Water world has a lot of pyrotechnics and other effects. They also have many areas that get wet, no make that soaked. They even came out in the pre show to throw buckets of water on some people and groups of people. It was very funny and entertaining.
We did get to take some time to walk around the City Walk. It is very similar to Florida’s City Walk and really is a lot like Disney’s Downtown section. The shopping was almost like walking in a Downtown Disney area. There were many specialty stores. We didn’t go into many stores but instead soaked in the atmosphere instead. We also found some Pizza for dinner.
One thing I found to be a goo idea is to get a refillable bottle if you plan to get pop. They have straps you can purchase too. We got the cheapest one which was $5.99 but refills were only ninety nine cents so we did get many refills. We shared ours too. They had some refillable that were shaped like sponge Bob and many people bought them as well as a strap to hold it. I think that one was $11.99 (Not as good a deal but could be collectible to the right people)
Food: They had a lot of stands with anything from BBQ Ribs to Hotdogs or Pizza. We had some BBQ Chicken with coleslaw and I think Fries (Its hard to remember exactly.) My husband and I share our meals and it was about $12 for that lunch plus the ninety nine cents for our refill drink. The food was pretty good tasting especially for amusement park food.
My final thoughts: Universal is definitely a one day park in Hollywood. The only way a second day would be worth coming would be if we wanted to do things a second time. We left about 5PM and the park was open until 10:00PM so we really could have done things again if we wanted to. The ticket we purchased was from the MWR office on base in my home town and it was $37 for two days. We didn’t feel we wanted to pay the $8 plus subject my husband to more walking than he was ready for that day so we skipped the second free day. One thing that would have helped was if we could have used a Jacuzzi at our hotel. The one we were at didn’t have a Jacuzzi so we used a massager, a hot bath in the room and skipped walking Sunday instead. I think the ticket price at the gate was about $50 and for another $30 or so you can buy a special pass to get ahead of the lines and also better seating at the shows. I’m so glad we didn’t pay for that because we never felt we waiting for anything!! At least not more than 15 minutes and this was on a Sunny Saturday the end of June.
The hotel: Look for hidden charges before you go. We was not informed we would be paying an extra $20 a day for the parking and an extra $1 a day for the safe in the room. That raised our price on the hotel enough that would have made us consider more research before committing to stay at the Ramada Inn. I personally think I would wait to get a hotel next time until I get there if I were to go again. There were lots of them and the areas can go from safe looking to pretty scary looking in the area of a few blocks. We did see many of the famous Hollywood sites by driving down the Hollywood Blvd. That area is not a good one to stay at for most of the hotels we saw. It looked a bit scary and unsafe to me.
I will post a seperate report for Disney when I get it written.
Barb
Transportation: Drive from Seattle Washington to Los Angeles, California.
Who: Two 40 something adults
I decided not to do a day by day trip report since the reader would probably rather hear what we saw and what is different from Florida and California rather than a walk in our foot steps day by day. Plus it was much easier for me not to worry about carrying a notebook to keep day by day notes. I will try to keep things in order of the visits.
The DRIVE:
We left home 5PM on Thursday the 26th of June. I had to work and we had planned to drive all night and since I worked all day I figured I would fall asleep early in the car and then when my husband got tired I could take over. I don’t know if it was excitement of going, or just plain old hard to fall asleep in a car for me but I was only able to catch an hour or so sleep in Southern Oregon. We arrived about noon on Friday.
I have to say the state of Oregon really takes care of their roads. Washington and California definitely need to look at Oregon to see what they could do better in this area. One thing really good is there are rest stops about every 30 miles the entire way and other than on the way home when we ran into two in a row closed we didn’t notice any other closures than that. Gas prices were moderate and high. In Washington we pay about $1.59 a gallon. In Oregon we paid about $1.65 but in Oregon this is for a person to do the pumping for you. It’s illegal to pump your own gas in Oregon. In California we paid over $2.00 a gallon in fact once we paid $2.16 a gallon but in southern California we paid about $1.69. I figure we spent near $200 total for gas. If we would have flow it was about $250 a piece plus the cost of a car or other transportation.
Our first couple nights were near the famous Sunset strip near Universal Studios. We were really worried about pre booking since we heard so many areas aren’t safe. We stayed at a Ramada and it had a parking garage. It turned out to be a section of town that was frequented mainly by gay men but we didn’t feel unsafe there. Since we arrived midday on Friday and we were so tired we decided to check out the beach. The Santa Monica Pier wasn’t too far. My husband loves to fly his kite and I watched him then we walked through their little entertainment area with amusement park rides and many street venders/artists.
Saturday we wanted to arrive at Universal Studios at opening so we asked the hotel what time they opened. We was told 10:00. We found out later it really opened at 9:00 so the lesson here is check the Internet before you leave home and print it all out. We were so worried about lines since it was Saturday. I was very surprised to find we didn’t have to wait for anything we wanted to do. We did everything except the Nickelodeon play area for kids and then we missed the sound stage tour because it did have a small line but it was late in the day and my husband was wearing down. He has Muscular Dystrophy and so we do everything very slow and mix a lot of shows in between line waits. We choose not to do handicap entrances or wheel chairs due to his choice. So at a snail space we did everything in one day on a Saturday.
What we saw at universal:
Things similar to Florida Universal:
Back to the Future Ride. To us they were very much the same ride. The queue to get in is set up different but the ride is the same. Back to the future ride is a simulator in which 8 people get into but there are many of these simulators. We were raised above the floor in this Delorean simulator and there was a giant screen showing the larger than life scenes. The car bumps, turns and really feels like you’re in the air. The story is Biff from back to the Future stole a car and you have to catch him by bumping into his car to catch him.
Animal Planet: I have to confess I never saw the one in Florida but the one in California is a lot of really cute animal acts. The trainer claims they animals stared in shows but I have a feeling they may just be look a likes. The dog was actually jumping ahead of the trainer to do his tricks. He had the act down so well he didn’t even need his gestures to accomplish it all.
The Lucy Tribute: A walk through mini museum to showcase Lucy and Desi Arnez. We saw clothes and other memorabilia from Lucy’s collection. They also have Shows to watch and games to play.
Jurassic Park Ride: It’s a water ride with a plunge at the end. It’s a story where your car goes off course through a dinosaur infested area including a T Rex.
T2 - 3D: I think Florida does this one a bit better. It’s a much bigger stage and the lady who introduces the show in the pre show was so much better in Florida. Its one of those shows you have to wear the 3D glasses. The show has many special effects including live actors, Movie Screen, Robots, and other 3 D effects. It’s a cute show and the place is cook and air conditioned.
Things that are different than Universal Florida:
Mummy: It’s a walk through similar to a haunted house at Halloween time but of course everything if from the monster flick the Mummy. It was cute but not something I would do a second time.
Shrek 3D: This one may be in Florida too? I wasn’t sure as I haven’t been there in a year. The show is really cute and a lot of 3D effects. This may be the mom in me but I was concerned that so many children were in the audience and the content of the jokes were a bit adult rated. It was typical Eddie Murphy type jokes. I’m sure no one even thinks about this but I do. My kids are raised and we limited their viewing of certain shows including no rated R stuff. This was definitely rated PG-13 due to sexual innuendoes. I’m sure it goes over most kids heads but to me it should have a warning as to content for people who care to worry this way. For an Adult it was a super cute show!!
BackDraft: This is a walk through attraction that educates you to what a fire is and can do. They use people from the movie to narrate on a screen the real dangers of the movie and fires in general. We saw how they did a few of the effects and then the last section we went to we witnessed a real fire. It was awesome and had one frightening moment in it. It was a very well done attraction.
The tram tour of the back lot. In Florida you walk through a back lot of sorts but it doesn’t even compare to this tram ride. Its about 45 minutes long and you go through many attractions at once with it. They do a great job of telling you about films, mixing in some scenes on a tram TV in every car and then showing you where it was produced. We saw many different areas including the area they recently did Bruce Almighty (It’s the same place the Back to the future clock was at.) The tram does other attractions too. It has a Jaws scene (Can get you wet and maybe scare you a little especially on the right side of the tram). You go through an Earth quake I think they said 7.5, you almost get washing out in a flash flood, A bridge starts to fall apart with your tram on it, there may have been more that I’m not thinking of right now. One cool set was the cute little town from the Grinch who stole Christmas and its right behind the Bates Motel. Talk about opposites.
The shows were great. We saw one called Spiderman Rocks. It was a singing show and was well done. We also saw one called Water world. One thing I noticed is all the actors in these shows were real movie or TV stars. They introduce them at the end of the show. Water world has a lot of pyrotechnics and other effects. They also have many areas that get wet, no make that soaked. They even came out in the pre show to throw buckets of water on some people and groups of people. It was very funny and entertaining.
We did get to take some time to walk around the City Walk. It is very similar to Florida’s City Walk and really is a lot like Disney’s Downtown section. The shopping was almost like walking in a Downtown Disney area. There were many specialty stores. We didn’t go into many stores but instead soaked in the atmosphere instead. We also found some Pizza for dinner.
One thing I found to be a goo idea is to get a refillable bottle if you plan to get pop. They have straps you can purchase too. We got the cheapest one which was $5.99 but refills were only ninety nine cents so we did get many refills. We shared ours too. They had some refillable that were shaped like sponge Bob and many people bought them as well as a strap to hold it. I think that one was $11.99 (Not as good a deal but could be collectible to the right people)
Food: They had a lot of stands with anything from BBQ Ribs to Hotdogs or Pizza. We had some BBQ Chicken with coleslaw and I think Fries (Its hard to remember exactly.) My husband and I share our meals and it was about $12 for that lunch plus the ninety nine cents for our refill drink. The food was pretty good tasting especially for amusement park food.
My final thoughts: Universal is definitely a one day park in Hollywood. The only way a second day would be worth coming would be if we wanted to do things a second time. We left about 5PM and the park was open until 10:00PM so we really could have done things again if we wanted to. The ticket we purchased was from the MWR office on base in my home town and it was $37 for two days. We didn’t feel we wanted to pay the $8 plus subject my husband to more walking than he was ready for that day so we skipped the second free day. One thing that would have helped was if we could have used a Jacuzzi at our hotel. The one we were at didn’t have a Jacuzzi so we used a massager, a hot bath in the room and skipped walking Sunday instead. I think the ticket price at the gate was about $50 and for another $30 or so you can buy a special pass to get ahead of the lines and also better seating at the shows. I’m so glad we didn’t pay for that because we never felt we waiting for anything!! At least not more than 15 minutes and this was on a Sunny Saturday the end of June.
The hotel: Look for hidden charges before you go. We was not informed we would be paying an extra $20 a day for the parking and an extra $1 a day for the safe in the room. That raised our price on the hotel enough that would have made us consider more research before committing to stay at the Ramada Inn. I personally think I would wait to get a hotel next time until I get there if I were to go again. There were lots of them and the areas can go from safe looking to pretty scary looking in the area of a few blocks. We did see many of the famous Hollywood sites by driving down the Hollywood Blvd. That area is not a good one to stay at for most of the hotels we saw. It looked a bit scary and unsafe to me.
I will post a seperate report for Disney when I get it written.
Barb