The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Yey, Harry Potter Land 🙂 I had been looking forward to this so much! We were up and out of the hotel by 7.45am to get to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter which is inside Universal’s Islands of Adventure. Our hotel has a special deal that gives us access to the park 1 hour before everyone else and fast track on all the rides. The Forbidden Journey (Hogwarts castle ride) is so popular that the hotel recommended we get there at 8am and head straight to this ride. It was amazing – part roller coaster, part simulator, part quidditch game through the halls and grounds of Hogwarts school. I was really scared in the giant spider forest and when the death eaters popped out, I had my eyes closed for most of the ride but it was still great!

Straight after this we got on the Flight of the Hippogriff and then Dragon Challenge which was so awful (in a good way) I really did wish I’d taken my Kwells. We then took a walk through the quirky streets and shops where you can buy wands, costumes, sweets and butter beer. The park really was magical, any Harry Potter fan will love it. See Paul’s cheesy video below (he’s gotten a bit keen with iMovie!):

After we spent a few hours with Harry, we explored the rest of Islands of Adventure. It was still quite early so hardly any queues in this park, we went into the land of Jurassic Park and got on the River Adventure which is like Loggers Leap but much more exciting; dinosaurs popping out everywhere and a BIG splash at the end. Then very very stupidly we thought it would be a good idea to get on Popeye & Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges (like the Rumba Rapids at Thorpe Park). We got absolutely soaked through, Paul had to ring out his T-Shirt and we were squelching around for the next hour. We may as well have been in the water 🙁

As I was feeling better and we needed to dry off, we braved it on the Hulk roller coaster and then got on the monorail to calm down! We were still very wet so called it a day and walked back to the hotel for some afternoon sunbathing.