I get so behind on blogging if only I could do it work then I'd be a blogging fool. =) Well with our lovely tax return money my sweet husband suggested a trip to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. I am a BIG Harry Potter fan and always talk about going there so that's what we decided to do. We found a vacation package that included a three day park pass to Universal Studios and their neighbor park Island of Adventure, Breakfast at the Three Broomsticks, and our hotel was thrown in there as well.
Then we found our flights there and back courtesy of Southwest and JetBlue and it all added up to just under the amount of our tax return awesome. So we headed out for Florida right after our marathon on that Monday June 13 and were scheduled to be back home that Friday the 17th ( more on that later).
Day One: Traveling to Florida. We started out early with a 7 am flight which went off with no problems. We stopped in Chicago and stayed in the plane for about 20 minutes since it was taking us the rest of the way. That was kind of fun to have full reign of the plane with not that many people there. Then we made it to Florida about 3:30 Florida time, had a fun time navigating our way through the airport. ( It was HUGE) Then got a taxi to our hotel. We chilled the rest of the day, went to the pool and planned out our week.
( top pic: chilling in the plane, bottom the view of chicago from the plane.)
Highlights: Me tipping over my water on the plane two minutes after getting it. Supposedly I get really clumsy up in the air. It was a funny moment. Justin getting a job offer! Paying the Cab a reasonable amount. Pool Time.
Bummers: Forgetting our boarding passes but that was easily fixed. A not so great dinner. =( No internet in our hotel.
Day Two: Universal Studios, Hard Rock Cafe, and Blue Man Group.
We went to Universal Studios and just went on whatever ride was closest and walking around. There was a HUGE scary looking roller coaster called the Hollywood Rip Ride Rocket. It was a head banger that's for sure. Not my favorite ride. We went on almost every ride and saw lots of the shows. Some of our favorites were: The Men in Black ride, The Simpson's, and The Mummy. Some of the rides that need either a revamp or to possibly be shut down were: Jaws, ( way to long of a wait for what you got) and E.T. E.T did have a fun part where you are "flying" with E.T over the town and it's all small, so that was cool.
We had fun and after a while we had done everything and went looking for other stuff to do. We got a caricature drawn, had dippin' dots and looked through the Lucy Tribute. That was neat, Lucille Ball is quite the accomplished lady. I really liked looking at the old costumes and jewerly that they used.
Then we had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. I admit that I felt a little bit out of place since I am not that into rock and roll. But it was a fun and exciting place to eat dinner. They had music videos going, and the servers were dressed up like fun rock icons. They had lots of fun memorabilia from famous people. It is the largest Hard Rock so they had the most stuff. Funny story: We got a special glass since it's their 40th anniversary this year and when we got our bill our server told us to go downstairs and they would give us a new one in a cool box and all that jazz. So.....we thought we were supposed to go down to pay. Uhm....that was not the case. So we went downstairs asking if this is where we pay and the lady just looks at us and tells us that our server would take care of our bill. At this point we felt like crap because it looked like we had just Dined and Dashed. We saw our server head down and talk to someone but then we couldn't find her. We then went back to our table and it was already all cleared off. We eventually found our server and paid. Needless to say she got a fairly generous tip. It was pretty boss because I got a $25 gift card for Hard Rock from my credit card points so we only had to pay half of our bill. Sweet. So we hurried out of there pretty embarrassed.
Then Blue Man Group! They are crazy. They are the guys who have blue heads, and hands and then are dressed in black. They make music out of random objects and have brightly colored paint bouncing everywhere. It was the most entertaining show. They didn't say anything but it was awesome. We weren't allowed to take pictures or else I would have especially since Justin was asked to participate! Justin had been to a Blue Man group concert in Vegas and was familiar with it. They had other audience members participate and Justin's part wasn't till the end. They pulled him from his seat up on stage and dressed him in a white jumpsuit. They then took him back stage and dumped a bunch of blue paint on him. They put a helmet on him then strung him up by his feet. They pulled him back then let him fly right onto a big piece of white canvas. They did it twice to get a funny ink blot type of picture. Then while onstage the blue men were looking at this big thing of Jello on top of a box. They had done something with Jello at the beginning as well. Then they tore the Jello off and Justin's head came popping out of the box. It was a crazy magic trick. He then got a touch of paint on his cheek by one of the blue men and they then took their bows. Justin was over the moon. He was so excited. I really wanted to film it but it they wouldn't allow it. Then we took a Cab home and crashed it was a fun filled day.
Highlights: not having to wait more then 20 minutes for a ride. dippin' dots. Blue man group! Almost dining and dashing. Justin not getting sick on any of the rides.
Bummers: The massive headache I got from the Hollywood Rip Ride Rocket. Almost dining and dashing. Breaking my favorite pair of sunglasses.
