Disney 2016 Day Three

Today was a bit of an adventure for me, because I had to arrange for transportation to Universal Orlando from our hotel. A cab would have cost more than $40 one way, but a shuttle cost $21 per person, which worked out to $63 dollars round trip for us. Add the tickets to Universal Orlando for $300 plus total, and it was an expensive day. It was well worth it, however, when I saw both Natalie's and Eric's face light up when we got to the reason why we went there--The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Diagon Alley.

The shuttle turned out to be a Lincoln Town Car, so we ended up with our own private transportation to the park. We didn't have to make any additional stops or pickup other people, so that was really cool. there was a crowd of people heading towards the parks when we got there, but our first couple of hours were actually almost crowd-free. The weather was beautiful today--70s with a breeze, and sunny.

I haven't read the Harry Potter books in a very long time, and both Natalie and Eric have read all of the books since I last read them. The first photo opportunity was 12 Grimmauld Place, the ancestral home of the Black family. There were hardly any people there yet, so got a photo right away. The same thing happened for the Knight Bus, Natalie and Eric walked right up and took a photo with the "conductor" of the three-story bus. That bus was so big that I couldn't fit the whole thing in the frame when I tried to take this picture.

We then went into the Diagon Alley area, and Natalie made a beeline for one of the gift shops. Although I love shopping, I had to put my foot down and told her that we needed to do something else that was going to be crowded later, so we proceeded to Ollivander's Wand Shop. Interestingly, Eric went to all the sample wands and picked one out that he thought looked cool. It happened to be the Sirius Black's wand. Natalie chose a wand also, but I can't remember whose right now and she's asleep.

I had to tear them from their wand shopping so we could watch the show with Mr. Ollivander where the wand picks the person. There wasn't a line for the show, and later on in the day, there was a line out the door. Natalie grumbled, but we didn't have to wait in line to see the show, and she enjoyed it, as did Eric.

After the wand show, I bought them their wands, then I made them go outside to do something that didn't involve shopping. We went to Gringotts Bank where they have a ride. I had to no idea how the ride was, but as a rule, if there was a possibility of it being roller coaster-like at all, Eric refused to go. I stayed with him, of course, while Natalie went into the single rider line. They allowed us to go on a "bank tour" instead, which was awesome, because we still saw some of the bank scenes like the riders did, but we left just before we would be getting on the ride AND we didn't have to wait in as long a line. Eric was good about posing in front of some of the scenes from the books.

We had lunch at the Leaky Cauldron which included Eric's first taste of frozen Butterbeer. He seemed skeptical at first, but after he had some, he enjoyed it so much that we had to get some more in the afternoon before we left the park. We even had some Butterbeer ice cream, although that wasn't as special, It was like vanilla soft serve with some flavoring. Natalie and I shared the Beef and Lamb stew while Eric had the Kids' Mac and cheese. We've been able to save a little money (and not wasted extra food) with sharing entrees. Neither of us like sharing with Eric because of his very plain choices.

This is a picture of Eric dancing with a Minion. This was the last place we went to before heading out of Universal to the City Walk area. Even though I was sure that the Minion Mayhem ride would be tame (since very small children were allowed on it), he didn't want to ride it, and since Natalie and I had not been on the ride before, we couldn't vouch that he would be okay with it. The wait was 55 minutes anyway, and by this time, that would have made us potentially late for our shuttle bus pickup, so we didn't try to convince Eric to go on the ride.

We did end up in the gift shop that is at the end of the ride, however, and there was a short line to get photos with this Minion, so Eric of course wanted to do that. I was a little embarrassed that he started sticking out his butt like this, but as you can see from his smile, he was having a blast! Besides, that is the way the minions dance in the movie.

I saw this sign also on the way out, and I had to take a picture of Eric in front of it, especially since he was wearing one of his many minion T-shirts today. He hammed it up and made this silly face and held up his thumb. What a goof!

The rest of the time there we enjoyed some street shows. The Blues Brothers sang at one, and I got Natalie to pose in front of their iconic vehicle so I could send it to Patrick. He loves the Blues Brothers music. There was another show featuring the "Beat Builders" which consisted of four guys dressed up as construction workers who played percussion on construction equipment. The beat was catchy and they were entertaining. The show that Eric enjoyed was some guys pretending to sell fish and they did a combo of acrobatics and juggling (using fake fish and knives) to a catchy soundtrack. Eric was impressed, but his favorite part was at the end when they said, "#ourfishfly". He kept repeating that phrase for the rest of the day. Eric and I watched a show featuring rap music while Natalie was on The Mummy ride, and all of us watched one more show featuring two female singers that were supposedly competing. Both of them sang really well, but one sang 80s-era music while the other sang more contemporary tunes. Natalie enjoyed a lot of the songs, so she enjoyed the show.

Natalie rode on The Mummy ride by herself because, again, Eric wasn't interested. That one was probably one he would not have enjoyed anyway, according to Natalie when she came out. Eric and I noticed that the warning sign at the entrance to the ride warned people with prosthetic limbs to secure them or they might be jarred loose by the forces of the ride. That told me that the ride was most likely rougher than what Eric (or I) would be interested in. She would also have ridden the Men In Black ride (which Eric and I might have been interested in), as well as the Transformers 3D ride, but they were both closed when we were there.

We left the park at about 2pm, and ventured out to the City Walk area for a bit until it was time to go to the shuttle stop. We've taken pictures at this one spot before where there is a surfboard and it makes it look like you are surfing on the surfboard. Eric hammed it up when he was on it, but when Natalie got on it, she pretended to only be interested in texting on her phone. She can be a ham too, but in her own way.

Our shuttle bus back to the hotel was not so private, so it took us twice as long to make the trip as it did in the morning because of the extra pickups and drop-offs. We finally made it back to our hotel, we rested for a short period, then headed back out to Epcot to the countries we missed yesterday. We were hungry and ended up eating in the Mexico area. Natalie and I shared some beef tacos, and Eric had some chicken tenders. It was so packed at that restaurant that we had exit the restaurant to find seating on the ground a few feet away.

We then proceeded to Norway. I think we have taken a picture with this giant troll in the Norway gift shop every time we have gone to Disney. I should do a scrapbook page or album using all of those photos to show how the kids have grown.

Those were the two countries we missed, but we went ahead and walked in the opposite direction as we did yesterday, to go back through the other countries again, searching for something to eat for dessert. I was disappointed at the gelato choices when we got to Italy, so we didn't end up getting dessert in the Epcot World Showcase at all.

We stopped off at a playground that Eric could climb around in. There were two xylophone-like instruments and three different-sized drums in one area that Natalie played with. Eric did a lot of climbing, so much so that one of the mom's exclaimed, "Look, is that a monkey? That's a monkey!" to her small son. One of the other small children told him, as he hung upside down from one of the bars, "That isn't very safe." Although that is probably true, Eric really knows his way around a playscape.

Our last stop was the Test Track ride. Finally a ride that we thought Eric would enjoy. We originally had Fast Passes for the ride yesterday, but they closed the ride due to the inclement weather, so they said they would honor the Fast Pass today. I would have gone with them on the ride, but we didn't feel like finding a locker for our stuff, so I waited for Natalie and Eric outside. I got some Starbucks while I waited, and I ended up buying a Starbucks Epcot mug also. Natalie and Eric requested some favorite pastries for breakfast tomorrow, so I got those too.

When they came out of the ride, Natalie did not want me to get the ride photo because she thought she made a funny face when they took the picture. I saw it and she was actually smiling, although she complained that her hair was in her face. That girl! I added it to my Photopass, so now I can at least show it to the family when we get home. Eric looked excited when he came out, and he said he loved it. I'm glad he can still enjoy some rides.

We didn't get back to our room until after 8pm. It was a very long and exhausting day, but the weather was beautiful and we had fun. Tomorrow, we are going to Hollywood Studios.