Wednesday morning we woke up and went to Universal Studios. Courtney had been there the week before so she was our guide. It didn't feel too crowded to me but there were quite a few people. We had to wear masks and socially distant, but they would squirt your hands with sanitizer before each ride instead of having to sanitize each ride after each rider. I felt it was better than Fun Spot when they took the time to sanitize.
We had park hopper tickets but started in the Universal Studios part of the park. There weren't as many people and there weren't as many rides, but we had a great time getting on rides easily. We rode on a few rides and then went on the Simpson ride, which did Bryan in. It was a rough virtual ride and I thought Bryan was going to lose it. After that ride, he decided that he is going to retire from rollercoaster riding. I don't blame him because it was a rough ride!
We went to Diagon Alley and got some frozen Butterbeer. There was a huge long line to get the Butterbeer. I had the Universal Studios app and had noticed that it had a payment button. I checked it out and realized that we could order the Butterbeer (or any food for that matter), pay for it on the app, and then we could go and immediately pick it up. So we tried it. I placed the order and then waited for a little bit. I decided to check to see if our order was ready and when I went to the front of the long line, the woman asked what I needed. I told her that I had an online order and she said it was ready. So we got to skip the line and drink our amazing frozen Butterbeer.
When we finished getting our frozen Butterbeer, we loaded on the Hogwarts Express to get to the Island of Adventure. The line was super short and it was a cool train ride.
There were a lot of rides on the Island of Adventure. I loved the Harry Potter rides but we never got on the Hagrid ride. You had to get a virtual ticket and we tried but couldn't ever get one. It was so annoying. We ate at Captain America's cafe, rode on the Hulk ride (that went upside down a ton of times, it was so fun), and rode a bunch of other rides. We tried to go on the pterodactyl ride but it was for little kids and we were too tall. It looked like a nice, calm ride though.
We went to Seuss land, although the rides were mostly for kids. The pipes told you a story if you listened long enough. We went on a ride through all the different stories and when we got over the water and looked down, there was a real turtle swimming in the water. It was so cool!
My favorite Seuss book growing up was (and still is) "And to think that I saw it on Mulberry Street" (which is now banned so I'm glad I have a copy already). I was thrilled to find that I was on Mulberry Street!!
We went to Hogsmead and went to Diagon Alley. They had Knockturn Alley and we went to Borgin & Burkes. It was a creepy shop but fun to look at all the Slitherine-inspired stuff there.
When we were ready to go home we got back on the Hogwarts Express to get back to Universal where our car was. It was a really long line but the video they show was fun to watch. I was impressed by how authentic everything was with regard to Hogwarts. The castle was cool and the ride that took you through the castle was amazing.
By the time we finished on the second train ride, we were ready to go. Our feet were tired and we were exhausted. We met Mike and Lisa at Cheesecake Factory for a "date night" with Courtney tagging along. It was fun and the food was good.
We went back to the townhome to get things packed up and ready to leave the next morning. We had an early flight so we wanted to get some rest.
