lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
If there is a short wait, Fast & Furious: Supercharged is a must do because it is so impressively bad.
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Visiting Universal Studios - how early should I plan?
- Thread starter mdcpr
- Start date
lebeau
Well-Known Member
The quietest one is Portofino Bay. It's the furthest from the parks (but not too far) and the most secluded. The Italian theme is as close to a European vacation as you can find in central Florida. Great dining options and a terrific pool. Highly recommended.
DISR
Well-Known Member
I won't pretend to be an expert on the Universal Resorts, but I will say you can discount location as a major consideration. Yes, some are slightly more convenient, but the overall area is much more compact than Disney. You can walk to anything there without a whole lot of difficulty. I'd opt for the cheapest one that had Express Pass.
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Disneyhead'71
Well-Known Member
Portofino Bay is the quietest. It also the nicest and most beautiful. It has a boat to the parks/CityWalk. And is about a 10 min. walk if you don't want to take the boat. It comes with express passes for each member of your party for each day of your stay including check in and check out days. There are 3 pools. A family pool with a nice water slide and hot tub. A quiet pool. And an adults only pool. It also has one of my favorite restaurants at UOR (Universal Orlando Resort) Mama Della's is awesome. Classic Italian and they have roaming musicians. There is also a nice pizza/sandwich shop that also has sundries and grab and go snacks called Sal's. There is also a Signature Restaurant called BiCE that is pretty high end. It is very nice and one of the most expensive at Universal. We go there for birthdays and such.
Portofino Bay is my favorite resort in all of Orlando.
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lebeau
Well-Known Member
Seconded. The other deluxes are all very nice and I can certainly see why someone might prefer Royal Pacific or Hard Rock. There is not a bad choice here. But for my family, Portofino edges out every other hotel in Orlando.
There's also a very nice gelato shop, several bars including a pool bar, a boce ball court, a nightly opera singer, and large rooms with bathrooms bigger than some people's apartments. If you're looking for someplace to relax and unwind, you won't find a better hotel in town that Portofino Bay.
Sounds like my type of hotel.
Tom Morrow
Well-Known Member
On average Universal's guest service is below WDW's, but still better than most other theme parks. There are some great Universal TM's and some not-so-great Disney CM's. Disney and Universal are some of the only parks that care strongly about efficient operations. In most regional theme parks, or SeaWorld and Busch Gardens, you will find frustratingly slow operations.
Jon81uk
Well-Known Member
I've never used Express Pass, but we do visit in September and October and find the crowds to be low enough that we can do pretty much everything in both parks across two days. So for most people 2 days with express pass should be plenty or maybe 3 days without.
If you want to fill a week and you like rollercoasters then SeaWorld (and potentially Busch Gardens) are worth a look, the coaster Mako at SeaWorld is a lot of fun.
Minnesota disney fan
Well-Known Member
We have only stayed at Royal Pacific Resort, because I love the tropical atmosphere! It is quiet and beautiful, and the staff is amazing. I have never had such great service as at RPR. The boat ride to the parks is nice too. We don't swim but the pool looked nice. Hope this helps.
Portifino Bay looks lovely too, but the Italian atmosphere is not what we are looking for. I do want to try Mama Rosa's Restaurant!
We loved Royal Pacific as well. I agree that the staff was amazing... Very friendly and helpful. We also loved walking to the parks in the morning. That was one of the things I ended up loving about Universal was being able to walk between the parks and City Walk. We visited Portofino one day on our first trip and it was beautiful, but we really like RP.
JillC LI
Well-Known Member
The main planning to do at Uni is to pick a relatively less crowded time of year, stay on property so you can get the EPs and early entry, and then take advantage of the early entry if you want to experience the Harry Potter rides. As for the rest, research what attractions appeal to you in advance but you don't really need a touring plan other than knowing what is in each park that you want to do.
Oh and we love RPR and the Three Broomsticks restaurant.
Oh and we love RPR and the Three Broomsticks restaurant.
JoeCamel
Well-Known Member
If you have EP you don't need early entry for the potter rides. Go anytime, it will be a year before Hagrid's gets EP but it isn't open for early entry usually and the wait time is less later in the day at present.
Except for today, I don't think it will open at all. Even with that big coat Hagrid doesn't like the cold apparently.
OG Runner
Well-Known Member
I would also recommend the Portofino. The boat ride to the parks is treat in and of itself. Having the Express Pass built
in is also great. I went last May and pretty much went on just about every ride with little to no wait. I am a big Disney fan
but you can't beat the Express Pass. If I were more of a roller coaster fan, I am sure Universal would be my favorite park.
All in all the crowds are a not as bad. I must warn you though, Fast and Furious will coast you a few brain cells. It is that bad.
lebeau
Well-Known Member
This is true although EPA is a nice time for spell-casting. If you're up. I wouldn't make a point of setting an alarm or anything.
Mike730
Well-Known Member
Another recommendation for Portofino Bay here. We like Wilderness lodge and Beach Club at Disney. We stay at Portofino every time at Universal. We've done many split stay vacations: 4 nights at Universal, 4 nights in Disney. We really enjoy this.
With express pass, 3 days is definitely enough to experience nearly everything at the two parks when we go in August, with room left over for relaxing at the pool. The 4th day we hit Volcano Bay, which we enjoy about as much as Typhoon Lagoon. The planning experience is much more relaxing than Disney.
My Universal planning consisted of booking a dinner at Mythos and one or two other table service places and that's it. We like to get to the parks early, so that wasn't an issue for us regardless. I definitely recommend getting to Volcano Bay at opening if that's something you want to do, so plan accordingly. There are upcharge cabins/chairs up to wazoo there, but the price seemed insane to us.
That being said, even though the planning and pacing of our days seem to be more relaxed at Universal, the park experience as a whole probably is not. Universal has significantly more "in your face' themeing and entertainment than Disney (in our experience), down to the volume level of the background music and aggression of the rides.
With express pass, 3 days is definitely enough to experience nearly everything at the two parks when we go in August, with room left over for relaxing at the pool. The 4th day we hit Volcano Bay, which we enjoy about as much as Typhoon Lagoon. The planning experience is much more relaxing than Disney.
My Universal planning consisted of booking a dinner at Mythos and one or two other table service places and that's it. We like to get to the parks early, so that wasn't an issue for us regardless. I definitely recommend getting to Volcano Bay at opening if that's something you want to do, so plan accordingly. There are upcharge cabins/chairs up to wazoo there, but the price seemed insane to us.
That being said, even though the planning and pacing of our days seem to be more relaxed at Universal, the park experience as a whole probably is not. Universal has significantly more "in your face' themeing and entertainment than Disney (in our experience), down to the volume level of the background music and aggression of the rides.
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