USA - Part 15 - Universal Islands of Adventure

The final park I am going to discuss is the Universal Islands of Adventure.  We visited this park on Sunday afternoon via the Hogwarts train and then visited again on the second day (Monday).

The park had islands with very discrete themes such as Marvel Superheroes, Jurassic park and Dr Seuss.

The entrance

Stock Photo - First buildings inside

There were seven islands in the park:
Port of Entry - The Main Entrance area
Marvel Super Hero Island - An area themed around the Marvel super heroes, with the Spider-man ride and there one of the world-class rollercoasters "The Incredible Hulk Coaster" which was unfortunately closed for renovations.
Toon Lagoon -  This area was themed around cartoons - Betty Boop, Popeye, Dudley Do-Right etc.  It also had the water rides and play areas.
Jurassic Park - This area was obviously Jurassic Park themed, including a few rides, the visitor centre and lots of scenery.
The Wizarding World of Harry Potter - Hogsmede - This is the the other half of the Harry Potter world and had Hogsmede village and the Hogwarts Castle.  There were several Harry Potter rides, including the World-Class Coaster, the Dragon Challenge (which was a rebadge of the Double Dragon Coaster to make it Harry Potter themed.)
The Lost Continent -  This is an adventure/Atlantis themed area with the Poseidon's Fury show, a Mystic Fountain and the famous Mythos restaurant.
Seuss Landing - This is the kids area of the park and was themed on Dr Seuss and the Cat in the Hat.

Islands of Adventure Map

Port of Entry:

This is the entrance area and consists mostly of shops and food stalls, but it is themed as an adventure island:

Trading Company

Path into the park

Shops

The Christmas Shop

The new delivery man for the Pineapple Bank

Alana's new pet

Tomas working hard at his new job

Looking out from the Port of Entry lake towards Mythos Restaurant (The Lost Continent)

Looking out from the Port of Entry lake towards Jurassic Park

Panoramic shot over the lake. From left to right - Toon Lagoon, Jurassic Park, Mythos, Seuss

Marvel Super Hero Island
To the left of the entrance is Marvel Super Hero Island which is dominated by The Incredible Hulk Coaster, which was unfortunately out of commission for repairs - it looked pretty amazing.  We only rode one of the rides here - "The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man".

This was the second place we visited in the park (the first was Hogsmede) .  The reason we jumped from one section to another the whole way across the park is a bit of a story..

We started at Hogsmede and lined up for the Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey ride.  When we reached the ride, it turned out that the seats were really narrow and my shoulders were too broad to fit in (the harness fit perfectly but I couldn't get my shoulders within the seat.)  Kris and the kids got to ride and since I had waited so long in the line and didn't get to ride, the attendant suggested they could FastPass me into another ride instead.  They suggested that The Amazing Adventures of Spider-man Ride was similar and rang through to get us onto that ride.  So I waited until the kids finished and then we moved quickly through Jurassic Park and Toon Lagoon to get onto the Spider-Man ride.  After this we moved on to Toon Lagoon so we could try to explore this side of the park before we had to head back to catch our ride, so we missed a few of the rides in this area.

The kids being frozen by Iceman

Driving the Fantastic Four Car

Human Torch

The Tower

Comics

Captain America Diner

Wolverine

 Doctor Doom's Freefall
This was a tower-of-terror style drop ride.  We didn't get a chance to ride it:

Doctor Doom's Freefall

Storm Force Accelatron
This was a rapid spinning ride.  We didn't get a chance to ride this one either:

Stock Photo of Storm Force Accelatron

The Incredible Hulk Coaster
It was pretty sad that this ride was running - it really dominated this area of the park and looked awesome:

Part of the Incredible Hulk Coaster

The Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man 
After dashing through the park to get our free ride, we made it to the Amazing Adventures of Spider-Man.  To be honest I wasn't expecting much and wasn't super excited, but this ended up being one of my favourite rides.  Like the Transformers Ride and Gringotts, it was a moving car ride with a 3D movie that affected the car.  Spider-man caught the car in web, slinging it up onto a roof and catching it as it fell. Various villains attacked and smashed the car around, while Spider-Man tried to save it.  The story was that we were news reports chasing after the story and getting caught in a battle between Spider-man and the villains.

Ride Entry

Our ride photo

Toon Lagoon
This area was themed on various cartoons including PopEye and Dudley Do-Right.  This area housed the water rides and despite the warnings that "You will get wet" we decided to ride them in the afternoon after the sun had set and we got SOAKED. I mean absolutely dripping wet and we were planning on taking the Hogwarts Trains back to the Universal Studios Park and then getting in our Taxi.

We were so wet that there is no way I would have let us anywhere near a car, so we used one of the drying booths for $5 but still were pretty soaked.  During the day we would have dried fast but the sun had set so we managed to go from soaked to just wet.  We eventually made it back on the train and the taxi without soaking everything.

Main Square

Centerpiece and Blondies

Looking down the road

Tomas sending a message to his girlfriend in Australia

Betty Boop

Little Nemo

Comic Strip Cafe

Hagar the Horrible

Stock photo of the main street

Me Ship, The Olive
This is a kids play area that includes water cannons that fire onto the Barge ride below. Our kids were a bit old for this area so we didn't visit it.

Stock Photo - Me Ship, The Olive

Popeye and Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges
This was a white water raft ride with a big warning about getting wet.  We rode with another family and laughed that they all got wet while we stayed dry, then the ride cheated and took us under a waterfall so we so got DRENCHED. We then got hit by a bunch of water cannons and the final drop sloshed so much water into the raft and into my pants of course..

Stock Photo - Bluto

The ride and one of the smaller waterfalls that it goes under

Stock Photo - The Entry

Stock Photo - Popeye and Olive Oil

Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls
This was a themed log flume ride that ended with a big drop down a white water path.  We got soaked on the last drop in this one too.  The ride was fun but I made the mistake of breathing in as the harness locked in and I spent the rest of the ride only able to take shallow breaths and feeling pretty sore - but I did managed to keep my hat for this one...

The drop

Our ride photo

Jurassic Park
This was actually the last area of the park that we visited, on the Monday just before we left.  Since we'd explored Toon Lagoon and Super Hero Island on the first day, we came back to the right side of the park on Monday.

I loved the theming in this area and I ended up with the Jurassic Park theme song stuck in my head for ages.. Da, da-da, da, dah. Da, da-da da duh...

The gates

Dinosaur vs car photo point

T-Rex vs Car

Rarrrrr! The T-Rex is angry because he failed his driving test because he couldn't grip the wheel with his short arms

We did consider this a couple of times - could we swap the grumpy ones for happier kids...  But seriously this is a good idea they had at the park - if two adults had a young child that couldn't ride, they could line up together and one rides while the other waits with the child then they swap and the second rider goes without needing to line up again

Camp Jurassic
This was a playground for kids, themed as per Jurassic Park, including an amber mine and caves.  I was disappointing that it didn't have a velociraptor petting zoo.

Stock Photo - Camp Jurassic

Pteradon Flyers
This ride was a kids ride around the top of the Jurassic Park area.  The wait time was quite long so we didn't end up riding it.

Visitor's Centre
This was a recreation of the Visitor's Centre from Jurassic Park.  There was a restaurant, skeletons, models and interactive displays.

He just wants to be loved

Tom findsa pet but we couldn't bring it home

Using the X-Ray machines to find fossils in the wall

Skeletons in the centre

Skeletons in the centre

The view from outside the centre was awesome - you could see across the lake to most of the park:

Mythos and Seuss

The Hulk Coaster and Doctor Doom's Drop

The Incredible Hulk ride

Jurassic Park River Adventure
This is a boat ride through Jurassic Park, encountering raptors and the T-Rex.  It was the last ride we went on at the park.

Peek-A-Boo

Snort!

So after a nice peaceful tour, things start to go wrong...

Wrong way!

Oh no, the raptors are loose...

The rescue boat failed

Under the raptor crate

This is an awful shot, but I got told to put my camera away at this point, the T-Rex slams out and then the ride goes down a big drop underneath it.

This stock photo shows it a bit clearer

Seuss Landing
This was a Dr Seuss themed area that had many kids rides and play areas.

Entry to the Landing

Seuss Landing

Candy!

Cats, Hats and Things

Cara-Seuss-el
This was a Seuss themed carousel ride.  We didn't ride this one:

Stock Photo - Caro-Seuss-el

Circus McGurkus
This was one of the themed cafes,



The Cat in the Hat
This wait for this ride was too long for us to get on it, but it looked pretty cool - a trip through Seuss story themes.

The Cat in the Hat

The High in the Sky Seuss Trolley Train Ride
This was a monorail around the Seuss Landing.  We considered riding it, but it was so hot that we thought it wouldn't be very comfortable.

Trolley Train Ride

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish
This was a standard spinning ride that had water squirting fish.  The kids had a ride on this while Kris and I had a breather.

Alana rides

Tom and Cam ride

The Lost Continent
This area focusses on Atlantis and Sindbad the Sailor.  Apparently it used to be much bigger but now has shrunk due to the new Harry Potter area.

It does host the Eighth Voyage of Sindbad Stunt Show, the Poseidon's Fury ride/show and the famous Mythos restaurant.

Entry to Lost Continent (via Seuss Landing)

The area also hosts the Mystic Fountain, which sprays water and tells jokes. It is controlled remotely so it will address guests specifically and comment on what they are doing or what they are wearing.

Stock Photo - Mystic Fountain

The Eighth Voyage of Sindbad Stunt Show
We didn't visit this show, but we got some stock photos of the impressive set up.

The show setup

Mythos Restaurant
This is an award winning restaurant that was voted best theme park restaurant multiple times.  Since we interpreted that as $$$$ we didn't eat here, but it looked impressive.

The wall of Mythos

The Entrance to Mythos

Poseidon's Fury
This was a tour/show, where you were led down into an underwater chamber and a story played out over several rooms using special effects like projected images, explosions, water jets and a tunnel made of water. I got lots of photos of the outside, but inside it was too dark.  We did get some stock photos of the show with our photo pass:

Path to the entrance

The ride sign

Neptune's Arm and Trident

The show - including a projected battle

Skull Island - Reign of Kong
This was a new area that was under construction and opening in the next couple of weeks - it looked pretty cool:

Skull Island

 The Wizarding World of Harry Potter
This was the second half of the Harry Potter world and the final section of the park.



Hogsmede 
The Hogwarts Express train drops its passengers in Hogsmede, which has many themed shops and also more spells for those with wands to cast:

Coming off the train, sign to Hogsmede

Entrance to Hogsmede

Hogsmede

Hogwarts
The backdrop of Hogsmede was the impressive Hogwarts Caste:

Hogwarts

Hogwarts

And we got our photo taken outside the castle:

Outside Hogwarts

Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey
This was another 3D ride on a moving set of chairs. The ride flies around Hogwarts, past the whomping willow, dementors and a Quidditch match.

Entry to the ride

The ride photo

Flight of the Hippogryph
This was a family friendly rollercoaster over Hagrids hut:

The Hippogryph

Dragon Challenge
The final ride I am describing was also my favourite.  It is a world-class rollercoaster with two tracks - red and blue.  It includes corkscrews and loops.  The ride was rebadged from originally being called the Double Dragon to incorporate a Harry Potter theme - it is now a race on  Hungarian Horntail (Blue) or a Chinese Fireball (Red).

Unfortunately Tomas wasn't tall enough to ride and Alana and Kris weren't interested, so Cam and I rode both sides.

I don't have any photos ot videos, but a quick search online will find lots.  For example, here is a video of front row, both sides: The Dragon Ride.

So that wraps up our visit to Universal Parks.