Somebody told my kids they were on vacation. Their average wake up time for the last week has been 7am eastern time, or 4am in their natural time zone, and they've really been doing pretty good. The last couple of days though, everyone was starting to drag a little as the evening came around, and the grumbling kept getting louder and louder in the morning. It's time to take a day off, so today's plan of Disney's Animal Kingdom has been moved to tomorrow, and today became a free day. Kind of. There's still riding to be done!We spent the morning hanging around the Hyatt, swimming at the pool and kayaking on the lake. There's a sign on the lake that says "No Swimming - Beware of Alligators". I'm fairly sure this is a long shot "cover our butt in case one shows up here" kind of sign, but it adds a lot of imagination to every little splash or ripple on the lake. Especially at the wedding pavilion which is right up against the lake. If I was an alligator, I'd wait for there to be a wedding going on before showing up on the bank, jaws snapping. Then again, I'm easily amused.
The afternoon was spent finding the thing that Lori most wanted to see on this trip: An upside down house. I'm not entirely sure why this house is there (it's a tourist attraction you can pay to go through) but there were plenty of people there to explore it. Apparently though, a turned over house is not enough to garner interest from my children, who didn't even want to get out of the car when we got there to take a look. They were, however, willing to drive all over Orlando chasing a red VW bug with a giant lobster on the top of it.
In the evening we went back to Universal Studios, as we still had a couple of days left on our passes. I know I've talked about the parks before, so I'm just going to add a few new things that we learned today.
Men in Black - The cars for this ride hold six people in two rows of three, thus there's almost always single seats available and the single rider line is continuously empty. Also, despite continued warnings from Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones, and just about everybody else you see, go ahead and press the red button. It's a 100,000 point bonus.Rip Ride Rockit roller coaster - There is a single rider line, despite it not being listed on the brochure like all the others. It moves really well too, as the ride never stops (you have to board from a moving walkway) so it's easier for the attendants to just take pairs of people from the single rider line than try and find the right size group from the main line. Also, I tried Finger Eleven's Paralyzer as my choice of music for the ride today, and while it was good, the correct song to pick is still Motley Crue's Kickstart My Heart.
Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey - I was interested to see if the line got shorter as the day went on. It doesn't. Right up until close the line for this ride was 90 minutes. We used the single rider line, and it took 32 minutes. That's a lot better, but still a really long time for a single rider line. Absolutely worth it though.
The Cat in the Hat - The write up on this ride says you'll "ride your couch through the pages of Dr. Seuss' book." What it doesn't tell you unless you're really paying attention is that your couch will spin. A lot! Of course the biggest drawback to this ride is that you leave the ride rhyming every sentence you say for the next hour or so.
The Hulk - We skipped this ride last time we were here as the mid-afternoon line was up to 60 minutes. We rode it tonight about an hour before close with a 15 minute wait. The single rider line was taking longer than the real line at that point.
Amazing Adventures of Spiderman - I don't have any tips for you here. Just wanted to say - Great Ride!!
Finally a July hint for you. It was a lot less humid at the park tonight, and that really let our kids have a much better time. You miss out on the shorter early lines if you come later, but you'll probably find the heat much easier to take. If you want to feel fresh and clear headed, come in the evening, and stay off that dang Cat in the Hat ride.
