Our first full day at Universal

Today was our first full day at Universal Studios! We started off today by rope-dropping Islands of Adventure.  The first ride we headed to was Hagrid's Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure. While a few of us chose not to ride it, it seemed like the rest of the group had fun! After that we walked through Hogwarts castle and some of us continued on to ride Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey. 

After these rides, our group split up to explore the parks in different ways. Ken, V, and I (Lance) rode over to Diagon Alley in the Hogwarts Express. We walked around the shops and bought wands and butterbeer. After lunch, we headed over to the Horror Make-Up Show, which was really cool. We ran into several Meet & Greets while were were walking around, including Beetlejuice, Hello Kitty, and Betty Boop.

Our assignment at Universal had us answering two questions. The first question was, “How much of Universal was inspired by Disney?” Everyone will have different answers to this question. As for me, I believe that Universal had taken from Disney was their T-Rex water slide. As Universal is a theme park that goes more foe the thrill they made the drop higher than the ride at Disney. The ride that I believe they took inspiration from is Splash Mountain, as it is a water ride that takes you though a little way to learn about it. The only true difference is the height of the drop. Disney’s ride is only a 50 foot drop and Universal’s is a 85 foot drop.

The second question is the opposite of the first question, “What in Disney was inspired by Universal?” Like with the first question there will be different answers from each person most likely. I will not go into detail as to what I believe, but how I came to my answer. When walking around all of the parks at both Disney and Universal you can see different parts of them that are similar, and when you know the order in which some of the rides and or attractions had came to each of the parks you see what was taken from each. Going to Disney first also aloud us to see everything that has changed since the last time anyone in the group had been there. When going to universal you can see the similarities of them both as well as the differences.

After we completed our assignment and our shopping we headed back to the hotel around dinner time so we could drop stuff off. Since the park was open late, we headed back to Islands of Adventure one more time to watch the Harry Potter night show which was quite a change from the Disney evening shows we'd been seeing. 

Tomorrow as it is our second day in universal we are going to meet two people, while we will not be able to meet our first guest in person we will be able to talk to them and find out how they made it to where they are, as well as their passion in the Disney and Universal theme parks. Their name is Travis Braun. Our second guest speaker works here at universal he works in the Hogwarts part of the park. She will be telling us about what it is like to work here as well as play the part in that area. We will be meeting her in person and at the park, as she has a background in acting due to this job she will also be talking to some of the theater majors on this trip. Her name is Kiera Shackelford.

Land and V