We woke up early to get to Epic Universe before our 1 hour early entry started! We were very excited for this. We took the rental car over to Epic Universe and parked. There was a somewhat confusing path to get from the parking to the main entrance.
Once we got to the main entrance, we lined up and got through security to the tables where they scanned our tickets. Well, the tickets had disappeared from the app and I was not able to get them back in the app for some reason. We had to exit the secure area and head on over to guest services. This ate into our early entry time by about 20 mins.
Once we had our tickets in hand, we headed back through security and into the park. We knew that we wanted to head back to Dark Universe, where the Universal Monsters were the main theme.
We got back to the portal for Dark Universe and headed in. It was themed so well. Certainly Disney level here. There were mist machines pushing out what looked look creepy smoke from the areas around the walkways. We headed straight for Monsters Unleashed, which is the main “E Ticket” for this portal.
Since we were early, we were directed through the exit of the attraction, which bypassed a lot of the story in the queue. We got to the loading area pretty quick and started our adventure.
The ride system is the same as the Harry Potter Forbidden Journey attraction in Islands of Adventure. It is a Kuka arm that can swing in a bunch of different directions.
The animatronics on this attraction were very well done. There were only a few places where there could have been better theming to cover up some of the rough edges. Overall, amazing attraction.
Next, we headed over to Curse of the Werewolf, which was a coaster that your ride vehicle spun around based on the weight of the passengers on either side. The first time we rode this, there is a section that you don’t quite make it up, and then you roll backwards, before being launched again. It was a pretty cool effect, one that we were not sure was part of the experience as intended. Once we got off the attraction, we got right back in line to do it again since the park was about to open. The same effect happened this time, so we knew it was part of the experience.
We decided to leave Darkmoore (the Dark Universe locale) and head on over to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter – Ministry of Magic portal. The headliner attraction for this area is the Harry Potter and the Battle at the Ministry. The wait time for this was about 90 minutes. Most of the queue for this one is inside the Ministry, which is just amazing.
The attraction itself was another Kuka arm system, with parts of it as projection, mixed with real elements. It was very effective. I am still not sure how they did the Harry Potter characters, since they are all much older than they were in the movies now. I am thinking AI of some sort? Overall, a very good attraction. The animatronics were again top-tier.
Next, we headed over to Le Cirque Arcanus, which is straight out of the Fantastic Beasts franchise. We had no idea what to expect here. The preshow was amazing with a mix of projections and real actors and sets. After, we headed into the theater where the main show takes place, and it was also pretty amazing. Two of the most stand out things were the juggling of bubbles. You read that right – a person juggled bubbles. Crazy.
The other was the stage lifting up into the air to give the illusion that it was taking place inside of the suitcase where all the fantastic beasts lived. Pretty cool.
We headed over to How to Train Your Dragon – Isle of Berk, which was another portal that was highly touted.
It was lunch time, and we were pretty hungry, so we went to try the Spit Fyre Grill. This had some bowls and mac and cheese cones as their main dishes. I got Stoick’s Steak Bowl, which was sticky rice, tenderloin steak, roasted balsamic mushrooms, sweet potato hash, manchego cheese, horseradish sauce. It was very good. James got the PB and J – Pork, Bacon and Jam mac and cheese cone. It had creamy mac & cheese with bbq harissa pulled pork, peanut bacon jam and parsley served in a crunchy cone. It was also very good.
I forgot to mention that I purchased the Coke Freestyle beverage option at the beginning of the day so I could refill every 10 minutes throughout the park. There will be a theme on this trip.
We headed over to the Fyre Drill, which is the water attraction in the land. It was a LONG wait, at a low capacity attraction and not a good amount of airflow. I should mention that it was 95, with a feels like of 112. It was warm. The attraction was fine. The water jets didn’t continuously spray, so that took away some of the fun.
After, we headed towards Hiccup’s Wing Gliders. While we waited in the queue for this, it broke down. We waited it out and it still was about the posted wait time until we got on. It was a lot of fun. I would have rode this again if we had more time and the queue wasn’t so long.
We went next door and rode Dragon Racer’s Rally which is like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ride in the Mall of America. It was pretty enjoyable, but not something that I needed to ride again.
We rished over to the Untrainable Dragon show, which was good timing because a storm rolled in. The show was ok. The audio wasn’t great, and the giant dragons that were the highlight of the show were not flying for this performance.
Off to Super Nintendo World. We had experienced this one at Universal Studios Hollywood back in February, so we really only needed to see Yoshi’s Adventure, and Mine-Cart Madness.
We went up the escalator, which was like a warp pipe. That was pretty cool. Entering the land, it felt very small, and very busy. We headed to Donkey Kong Country, the expanded area that was not in Hollywood.
We waited a LONG time in the single rider line, mostly because another storm came through and caused a lightning delay. We spoke with a nice guy who was very into Epic Universe in the single rider line. The attraction was jerky, but pretty fun. I would not wait that long again for it.
We headed back into the main area of Super Nintendo World and rode Yoshi’s Adventure. This was a cute attraction that basically was a scavenger hunt for Yoshi eggs. It was a lot slower than I expected, and much less People Mover feeling.
We decided at this point that we wanted to wait on the last couple of attractions until it was dark, so we went back to the Harry Potter portal to see how the wait was for Battle at the Ministry single rider. It seemed short, so we took a chance. This was a very long, slow moving single rider line. The attraction was just as good the second time.
After, another storm was rolling in, so we decided to try the Das Steakhouse in Dark Universe. The experience of this location was amazing, however the food was not. The restaurant is setup to feel like you are in Dracula’s “cavern,” if that is what you call it. I got the Carved Staked Steak, which was carved strip steak served medium with a hint of blood, charred green onion mashed potatoes, roasted baby carrots, acorn squash, crispy maitake mushrooms with a bloody jus. It was a nice presentation, but wasn’t a lot or of high enough quality to justify the cost. James got the Das Burger, which was seared Angus burger with tomato pepper chutney, dill pickle aioli, white cheddar cheese, grilled onions, hot cherry peppers, jalapeño bacon, on a black bun with fries. James thought the burger was “fine, nothing extraordinary.” We got the Souvenir Monocane Mocktail to drink. This was pineapple syrup, blue raspberry syrup, passion fruit syrup, emerald prism powder, Sprite® served in a souvenir beaker. It was pretty interesting.
After, we headed over to The Burning Blade Tavern to get a drink. I got the Crossbow, which was Darkthorne Mead and Strongbow® Gold Apple Cider. It was pretty good! James got the Hyde’s Regent. It was a mix of tequila, orange liqueur, creme de cassis, sour mixer, simple syrup and chipotle essence. He liked it and “would drink a lot more of that.”
We went back on Monsters Unchained again, this time the regular line. The intro room with Frankenstein taking a couple of steps was not working, so we missed that again. The attraction the second time was just as enjoyable.
The center of the park, called Celestial Park, is beautiful. The fountains throughout are surrounded by amazing plants and trees. This area looks like it has always been there. One of the attractions here is the Constellation Carousel. We were told not to miss this one and to make sure to experience it at night. This was a very cute, and unique attraction that takes the experience of a carousel up a level.
We would agree that riding it in the evening is the way to go. The lighting here is just spectacular. The music is also pretty great! The first song on this video was my favorite while we were waiting. That pause and music drop! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtVUnIMsp34
After, we wanted to ride Stardust Racers, but it was down. We waited around for a while and basically walked around some of Epic Universe at night before it reopened and we “raced” over to it. This was another slowly moving queue, with little air movement, but the end result – spectacular!
This was a coaster that I was nervous to get onto, but once we got going, it was great! There were so many twists, turns, and loops. At night is the way to go on this one. We were “racing” with the other ride vehicle next to us, which was awesome. The dance that these two were doing was just unlike anything I was expecting.
At that point, the park was closed, so we headed toward the front, with a stop in the two shops at the entrance. I didn’t see anything that I really liked, so we left with nothing.
Finding the car was a lttle easier than finding the entrance in the morning. We drove back to the hotel and got to sleep before the next day where we would try and tackle TWO theme parks!