Oh, my, where to start?....
First off, the CityPass thing is an
excellent value and a
great idea for any tourist visiting SoCal. It gets you into the two big players in the LA/OC area; Universal Studios and Disneyland. And then it sort of forces you to look south to the fabulous animal offerings in practically perfect San Diego.
CityPass also skips Knott's and Six Flags, which I think is a smart thing for tourists to do. Six Flags Magic Mountain is, well, a big huge Six Flags park. It's one of the most comprehensive parks in the Six Flags chain. It's on the scale of Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey, with over a dozen major extreme thrill coasters. If you are a die-hard roller coaster fan, or a gang-banger in training, then a visit to Magic Mountain would be of interest. Otherwise, Six Flags Magic Mountain offers nothing that isn't available at any of the other two dozen big city amusement parks in America. Plus, since it's at the far northern edge of the sprawling LA metro area, it's not at all easy to get to for Disneyland tourists centered in OC. On a weekday during peak freeway traffic times, it can take 2 hours to get from Anaheim to Santa Clarita where Magic Mountain is. Not fun!
Knott's Berry Farm is much closer physically to Disneyland, but sadly it's a park that isn't quite what it used to be. In the 1950's, 60's, and 70's, a day at Knott's Berry Farm was almost automatically part of a SoCal visit once you'd spent a day or two at Disneyland. Knott's has a wonderful history and holds an interesting place in the evolution of the theme park industry in the 1950's and 60's, but it's best days are clearly behind them. It's no longer family owned, as it was purchased by the Cedar Fair group out of Ohio back in 1997. Over the last 10 years Cedar Fair has shut down and removed many of the original structures and entertainment that had been at Knott's for 50 or 60 years. In place of the old Ghost Town buildings, 100 year old trees, and lakes with lazy steamboat rides, big modern steel coasters have been built surrounded by pavement and sterile new landscaping bought from a Home Depot. The look and feel of Knott's has changed for the worse, and unless you are 14 and want to be flipped upside down a half dozen times a minute, there's no charm or interest in the new additions.
The other problem at Knott's besides some very questionable design and theme decisions by Cedar Fair execs in Ohio is the change in demographics visiting the place. While Disneyland has become even more upscale and stylish in the last five years, Knott's has gone more downscale and bargain-basement. The Knott's entertainment is shlocky and poorly presented. The park's new themed areas are slapped together and amateurishly decorated. And the employees are noticeably inferior to Disneyland.
Disneyland is Nordstrom, and Knott's is Wal-Mart.
Now, as for Universal Studios, there is really no comparison to the Orlando version. What is important to understand in that comparison however is the fact that Universal Studios Hollywood is a real, live, working movie studio that has been there for 80 years. In the past 40 years a theme park has been incorporated into parts and sections of the working studio. The tram tour started in 1964, and it's grown from there. The billion dollar business of the studio comes first, and they put up with an occasional tram tour rumbling by their working sets. In Orlando, you've got a theme park built in a swamp in the 1990's that has no real association with the movie industry.
The tram tour at Universal Hollywood is the major attraction here, and it's a tour that lasts a little over an hour. You see real, working sets for movies and TV shows. The tour route changes daily, or even hourly, due to filming needs and your tour guide will give you very serious directions on being quiet when you near the working sets. On my last visit with out of town friends a year ago, we rolled by Wisteria Lane while they were taping a Desperate Housewives scene. The tourists on the tram were nearly wetting their pants when they saw two of the housewives sitting in chairs just off set awaiting their cue to go on. Several other movies were being worked on in the sprawling outdoor sets, with hundreds of technicians and support folks going about the unique work of the movie business. The tram will stop and the guide will explain the movie or production at work up ahead, and then you are told to be quiet while the tram slowly drives by. You also drive past offices and production facilities with big Bentley's and Ferrari's parked out front that belong to the bigwigs that work there. The big finale' on my last visit was when Tom Hanks himself stood next to a black Mercedes clutching a Starbucks and waved and laughed at our passing tram while the tourists onboard practically hyperventilated over the spectacle of it all. :lol:
Visit Universal Studios during a regular weekday, and hit the tram tour in the morning, to have the best chance of seeing live studio work happening at several points during the tour. A weekend visit has a much lower chance of seeing work happening, especially stars or famous faces.
Meanwhile, in between all of that very legitimate entertainment industry work, the tram tour takes you through several of the "theme park" experiences. You go through the Earthquake set and show, the King Kong attack, the flash flood, Jaws, Fast & Furious, War of the Worlds, etc., etc. You also see some of the historic sets that have been maintained, like the original Psycho house and Bates Motel, outdoor sets used in old movies like The Ten Commandments, or the gates to Jurassic Park, etc. The tram tour is a theme park in itself. But just remember to visit the restroom before you board because you will be on the tram for just over an hour. Last time I went to MGM and did their tram tour I was embarassed for them. I don't even remember a tram tour at Universal Orlando, but then I was really unimpressed with the Orlando version of Universal overall so I may have just forgotten what their tram tour was like. I'm sure Universal Orlando's can't be any better than MGM's pathetic tram tour. Nothing can compare to the real-deal tram tour at Universal Hollywood.
In addition to the marquee attraction of the tram tour at Universal Hollywood, there is the usual collection of theme park thrill rides, 3-D shows and live entertainment. Shrek show, Mummy coaster, Jurassic Park flume ride, Backdraft show, Terminator show, etc. are all there. I've heard they are redoing the old Back To The Future simulator into a Simpsons ride of some sort, but not sure when that opens. Maybe for summer of '08? There's also an attached CityWalk mall that has the usual stores, restaurants, bars and clubs that CityWalk has in Orlando.
So, clearly Universal Hollywood is a major player in the SoCal theme park market. There is just the one park, obviously no Islands of Adventure. But if you are interested in the TV or movie industry, it's an experience you won't forget. Is Universal Hollywood a 1990's theme park built in a swamp with wide walkways and huge restrooms and pretending to be a movie studio for European tourists? No, it's not. Is Universal Hollywood a 80 year old working movie studio that lets people come visit on a tram and has incorporated theme park style attractions in and around it's sprawling working facilities? Yes. It's up to the individual to decide which of those two Universal experiences is more impressive to them.
The fascination with how "big" a theme park property is by East Coasters always amuses me. Is the area of Universal Studios Orlando where park guests inhabit physically "bigger" than Universal Studios Hollywood guest areas? Probably it is. But then Universal Orlando is a 1990 prefab theme park in the swamp pretending to be a real studio. The experiences and facilities you will see at Universal Hollywood however are real, and many of them were built for a purpose other than simply being a theme park.
Similarly, is the Magic Kingdom physically larger than Disneyland? I have no doubt it is. Are the walkways at Magic Kingdom wider? Yep. Is the Castle taller? Yes. Are the restrooms bigger with double the number of hand dryers? I'm sure they are. But then there's that pesky little detail that Disneyland has easily 15 more rides than Magic Kingdom, and nearly double the amount of major entertainment than Magic Kingdom. So while the walkways may be very wide at Magic Kingdom, and you'll never have to wait for a hand dryer in the Liberty Square restrooms, you'll also have a lot fewer rides to go on and less to see and do compared to Disneyland.
I generally judge a theme park by its rides, rather than its walkways and restrooms.
But by golly get a few good pictures for the folks back home of those
WIDE WALKWAYS they have at Disney World! :ROFLOL:
