This was a great day and one of the great highlights of our vacation. We absolutely loved Universal Studios. Our tickets and bus fare (direct hotel to hotel pick up and drop off) was $103 each which was excellent considering Universal is on the other side of LA to Anaheim, so around a one hour 45 minute bus ride. We started out at 8.15am and were there around 10am. It wasn’t a particularly big day as crowds go but there were a lot of people there so lining up for shows, tours, rides was around a 40 minute wait most times. To avoid this ( and we’d do it next time) spend an extra $65 each and get a ‘front of line pass’ which means you don’t have to wait no matter how long the line is, you go straight to the front and get on first.
After finally getting in the gate we got approached to do a survey with a front of line pass to the Studio Tour. This was well worth it to give them some info on how best to promote the studios. This was about a 10 minute process and as we started wandering down the studios we got ushered into the show ‘Water World’ as it was about to start and the venue was not full. This was an amazing show of special effects where I had to quickly protect my camera when a tower appeared to explode nearby and a huge wave of water ended up on the audience where I was sitting. The show was exciting enough as it was, but when a flaming aeroplane came over the set and landed in the pool in front of us it was truly awesome. Check out the video clip on this one.
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrivfjRoCek&feature=youtu.be[/tube]
From there it was off to see the Special Effects which again was excellent showing how the special effects were done in the classics (older shows like King Kong) and animation along with the latest computer generated special effects.
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtdOlbyC4so&feature=youtu.be[/tube]
It’s really hard to say which was the best part of the studios as there was nothing we went too that we could say wasn’t worth the effort. The Studio Tour of the set is also a must do as the open top carriages weave their way through parts of the studios (back lots) clossed off to visitors were they are working and filming. The tour bus goes around sets used in famous movies and while you are there the monitors in the bus show clips of actual movies where the scenes are filed, such a Jaws (Amity Island), War of the Worlds (crash site of a 747) and many others. Here’s some clips of those sites.
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vriE-l9_2ls&feature=youtu.be[/tube]
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slmqkQhH8wA&feature=youtu.be[/tube]
I don’t think there was one ride we heard anyone say they didn’t really like. We did the Jurassic Park ride which was a water based roller coast ride and for most of it the cars meandered through a park which had huge animated dinosaurs and the coaster went under waterfalls and other areas where large dangerous pre-historic creatures hissed and blew water at you. We would go up a level in the coaster in the dark and come out horizontal to another scene until finally the coaster climbed much higher in the dark, you had no idea what happened until it tipped forward and you felt like you were free falling until it hit the bottom and you got this huge wave of water dumped on top of you. This was a ride that was too wet to film in but I filmed the final piece of other people on the ride. which is also seen in an add for the studios.
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-ScGL5lxK4&feature=youtu.be[/tube]
The two best parts of the studio tour where were the carriage train ended up as part of the set. The best of these was where the train went into a tunnel and stopped at what looked like an underground subway. You can see subway on both sides of the carriage then part of the roof falls in with cars on top and a gas tanker slides down towards the carriage just as a train comes in and gets derailed. Just then water comes flooding down the stairs on the other side of the carriages. Amazing special effects. The other one is where a small town was set to have a flash flood and again I have to turn my camera away at the end to avoid the gushing water.
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RjTIpN6PPI&feature=youtu.b[/tube]
[tube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2oq3g16yYsM&feature=youtu.be[/tube]
We ended up back at our hotel around 8.30pm and wanded over to Schmidts brewery for some dinner and a few drinks. The baseball was on the big screens and was an exciting game so we watched before crashing for the night.
Oh all that sounds fantastic! Are you warned about the water so you can protect cameras etc.?
Yes and No. On the WaterWorld set some seats were marked ‘Soak Zone’ those further back weren’t but we were sitting further back but still got a little wet. On the Jurassic Park ride we were prewarned so the camera wasn’t taken out and on the Flash Flood set we weren’t expecting the huge rush of water to hit the rocks beside the carriage and splash over until the last minute when she said we were going to get wet…. but it was all awesome.
What an awesome place to visit, so many things to see and do……………..
Yes we loved Universal Studios. We would recommend buying Front of LIne passes if anyone visits. We didn’t, even though people suggested we do this. we stupidly thought we would be too old for rides! We were very lucky not to have too many waits in lines, but if we ever go again, we will buy them. So we were not too old for the rides at all!