Associated parks:
Islands of Adventure, Orlando, Florida, USA
Universal Studios Florida, Orlando, Florida, USA
Universal Epic Universe, Orlando, FL, US
Pre-Trip
As a family of 4 with two young children (7 and 9) who are really in to the Harry Potter scene, we were excited to go and visit the Universal Parks for April break for the purpose of wizarding world immersion. Magic wands for all!! Plus, my wife and I LOVE roller coasters! So why not go all in and go to Orlando! We decided to add an Epic Universe day to our itinerary to kick off the trip before we did 2 days in Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure.
I was prepared for the trip to Epic Universe. We selected a day that was the least busy, according to crowd calendars, and also elected to do Express Passes (one time express, as unlimited is not available at Epic Universe) which saved us hours of waiting time, even for a 'slower' day at the park. I even bought the whole family the 'power-up' bands for use at Super Nintendo World, and the second generation wands for use in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, all at the City Walk the night before, and then paired all of these to our smart phones (just my wife and I, we paired our kids' wands to our devices, too), so we could be off and running without any unnecessary stops. My father is German, so efficiency is key ;). We were staying 'on property' at Dockside, so we had early access as well, which was totally worth it! TL;DR at bottom.
Day at Epic Universe
The park opened at 10:00 AM to general public, which meant we could have access starting at 9:00 AM. There is a shuttle service from Dockside to Epic Universe, however that line was forming before 8:00 AM, so, the excited park person that I am, got the family ready and caught an uber at 8:00 AM from Dockside to Epic Universe and arrived by 8:15 AM at the front gates. By 8:38 AM, we were passing under 'The Chronos' at the entrance to Epic Universe. Here is where families/patrons start making their early admission decisions for the morning. Most folks split for Super Nintendo World or the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. I grew up a Nintendo kid, so I knew where I wanted to go, but as a father, I understood the priority that Harry Potter held on our trip. Being the first day and all, and with wands at the ready, we joined the massive crowd and visited the Wizarding World portal first. While in line for the Battle at the Ministry of Magic ride, you end up touring the whole 'portal' as the line skirts the edges of the buildings, which BTW, have amazing theming! The buildings are so tall that you feel that you are in a completely different world. By 9:15 AM we were entering the Ministry of Magic building, where again, it was amazing, but the line standing would really start here for early admittance people. Luckily when, the queue got too thick, we hopped over the rail and used the Express Pass (It wasn't clear at first where to go if you had the Express Pass, we just mindlessly followed the lines at first when we entered). The ride itself was pretty unimpressive, and although it was the one ride we all wanted to do, at the end of the day, we all decided that it was one of the least impressive rides compared to all the other park offerings. For me, just walking around the Ministry of Magic was better than the ride itself. Afterwards, we wanted to watch Le Cirque Arcanus, the show that is performed in the Wizarding World portal, but it wasn't ready yet, and they had cancelled the previously scheduled shows.
So, we went to Isle of Berk (How to Train your Dragon portal) next. In retrospect, we should have come here first as Hiccups Wing Glider was one of the kids' favorite rides (mine too! it was the second-best ride). The line was fairly long at this point, so we opted to use the express pass. Fantastic launch coaster with fun theming! We hung around and did the other rides there, too. Dragon Racer Rally (flying ride) was fun, but short. The kids really like this ride, too. The Fyre Drill (boat on track, water squirt ride) was kind of fun for a water ride, however, the water cannons on our boat were fairly weak and couldn't properly knock down any of the targets, but again, the kids got a kick out of it. The Isle of Berk had the most offerings for kids in terms of rides and entertainment.
We went back to the Wizarding World portal to catch Le Cirque Arcanus show, which was really good, followed by lunch at Cafe L'air De La Sirene, which was absolutely fantastic! I recommend the Beef Bourguignon.
It was almost 1:00 PM now, and we ventured to our third portal, Super Nintendo World, which was hands down my favorite portal. I walked in and was transported back to childhood. I loved the look and feel of the whole place. We put on our power-up bands and had the best time playing all the games around the whole portal. We did rides, too. Only the Mario Kart and the DK Mine Cart rides were available that day as Yoshi's Adventure was closed for some reason. At this point in the day, the wait was over 200 minutes long for both rides. Luckily, we had the express pass and was able to pretty much walk on with a 15- 20 minute wait for each ride. Mario Kart: Bowser's Challenge was just kind of meh. Fun that you 'steer' a kart and shoot shells, but for me it was just OK. The queue in Bowser's castle was probably the best part. I wouldn't wait more than 30 minutes for this ride, and I think it's crazy that people were waiting 3 hours plus. Donkey Kong's Mine Cart Madness was also a lot of fun, again great theming, but the ride was not a 'thrill' coaster. And you guessed it; the kids loved it. This was the 4th best ride in my humble opinion. Again, I am blown away that someone would wait 3 hours plus for this ride. I loved all the power-up band games in the Super Nintendo World portal most of all. You can do several 'games' around the portal, collect 3 'keys', and then you are able to do the boss battle against Bowser Junior. So much fun!
We then traveled to the final portal with all the classic movie monsters, called Dark Universe. I was probably the least interested in this portal, but it was actually pretty good, and my youngest really got obsessed with monsters after this experience. There are two attractions here: Curse of the Werewolf, which is a fun launch coaster where the seats spin, however way too short of a ride, and Monsters Unchained, which ended up being a sleeper hit! It was excellent and won the third best ride of Epic Universe. Hardly any line for this, but we used our express pass anyway (because of course we did).
We went back to Isle of Berk to watch the show called The Untrainable Dragon. We again used the express Pass lane for the show and got real nice seats. This was an amazing show! Better than Le Cirque Arcanus in my opinion. However, the ending was never revealed as the show experienced technical difficulties. So, I don't know if the dragon was trained or not...on the bright side, we were given another one time use express pass for the inconvenience, and the family whole-heartedly decided to use the express pass on Hiccups Wing Glider again. Great ride. By the way, the mac-and-cheese 'cones' at Isle of Berk are disgusting.
After this, we felt we had seen most everything and we decided to split up and do our favorite non-ride attractions. So, one half went to Super Nintendo World to play more power-up band games (recommend) and had a wonderful treat in Donkey Kong Country, it was a mix of Dole Whip and Banana soft serve. Very Yum! And the other half of us went to cast more magic spells in the Wizarding World and consumed more Butterbeer. BTW, frozen Butterbeer is fantastic and better than normal Butterbeer.
We then met back up at Stardust Racers, which is located in the 'middle' of all the portals in Epic Universe. We rode the 'yellow' route, and if I had known that the Stardust Racer coasters were this fun and amazing, I would have spent more time lapping it! Stardust Racers is one of the best multi-launch coasters I have ever been on. Just one notch below Velocicoaster at Islands of Adventure. BTW, Velocicoaster at Islands of Adventure, is THE BEST roller coaster ever, with Stardust Racers at Epic Universe a close second.
We had made reservations at the Blue Dragon Pan-Asian restaurant, so after the ride, we ate dinner there. It was delicious and would definitely recommend. Oh, the night before, we ate at Flora Taverna in the Grand Helios hotel, and that was the best meal of the trip, just FYI. Would definitely 11/10 recommend Flora Taverna for a nice meal.
After dinner, we went back to Super Nintendo World for more games and to defeat Bowser Junior again. Great core memory with the kids! Finally, it was 8:45 PM; we decided to go to Stardust Racers again and do the Green route this time. The only difference that I saw between the Yellow Route and the Green Route on Stardust Racers is that you corkscrew up on Green and corkscrew down on Yellow. So, for me, Green is slightly better than Yellow as it gave me more of a thrill. We rode front row at 9:00 PM at night on Stardust Racers (Green) and is now a core memory for me. So amazing. As we departed the park for the shuttle back to Dockside, all the staff members said goodbye as we walked out and was a truly special touch for an amazing day. My only regret is not riding the Carousel. Epic Universe is new and it shows. Everything was clean, bright, well themed, and had amazing flow. We plan to go back and buy express passes again.
TL;DR
Best Rides
Best places to eat a meal
What I would do differently next time
Go visit each portal in a clockwise or counterclockwise circle instead of hopping around. If I went with kids again, I would go right to the Isle of Berk (and lap Hiccup's Wing Glider until a line forms) and then work my way counterclockwise. Without kids, I would begin at Stardust Racers and ride it as many times as possible before feeling ill and then go to Super Nintendo World and work my way around clockwise. Not eat the mac and cheese cones at Isle of Berk. Have at least 2 Donkey Kong sundaes.
Describing Battle at the Ministry as "pretty unimpressive" is definitely an interesting take.
I develop Superior Solitaire when not riding coasters.
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