We’re back! Like many others, this trip was supposed to happen in 2020. Like many others I spent 2020 creating and then undoing plans as the situation continued to evolve. I am thrilled to be making final decisions and paying things off in prep to leave.
I really enjoyed writing the trip report in 2019, and frequently come back to it, especially as 2020 dragged on. For both new and returning readers, Welcome! And thank you for giving me your time and attention.
Some background:
We are Bethany, long time Dis lurker and reader of trip reports. I’m a graphic designer in the midwest, and have spent much of the last 15 months working from my dining room table (as opposed to my corporate cube). My DH Todd (T in the last report) is along for the ride again, along with our 2 kids. DS Callan (C now 12) and DD Anna (A now 15).
We saved and saved for years to be able to take a bucket list trip to Universal in 2019. It was supposed to be a one and done trip for us (spoiler alert: it wasn’t). Just 3 weeks before we were booked to leave my mom passed away. The previous months had been a whirlwind of her getting sick, recovering then relapsing. Complicating that situation, I had knee surgery in January of ‘19 and just never had the opportunity to recover as I needed to be present for my mom. All of this to say while the trip in 2019 was wonderful and worth doing it was also done in a fog for all of us and for me, a lot of pain. By the end of the trip, I had gotten Todd to agree we really needed to come back when we were in better shape. Our passes weren’t set to expire until June of 2020 and we could fit another trip in without having to renew them.
Insert maniacal laughter here
Our 2020 looked something like this:
March – my you must be in your office if you’re working, no one works from home management sent everyone home for “2 weeks”. The parks shut down with no re-opening date in sight.
April – I begin to sweat that we may not make the June trip. I mean how much longer can this go on? (Insert naive face here)
May – I start cancelling everything and moving to August of 2020
July – me: Masks + August in Florida = No. I start cancelling everything (again) and punt to June of 21
I know many others did this dance as well. Honestly, none of us got sick (very, very grateful for this) and the changes forced on us during quarantine have been mostly positive. I’ve been able to walk daily, and really work on my knee strength. Todd lost his job in June, only to find a better position that he loves in October. While 2020 was horrendous for so many people, we got very lucky that it was a year of growth for us.
Bringing us back to Universal. Once it became clear that we really were going to make the June 21 date, I started to untangle the knot known as our hotel reservations. At one point I had 7 different deposits/cancellations. It was a nightmare, but everyone I talked to was really very nice and accommodating.
Where we wound up: 2 connecting rooms (Todd’s request) at Royal Pacific Resort for 2 nights. When we were down there in 2019, I casually mentioned that you could take a boat from the hotel to Citywalk. Ever since then it’s been, can we stay at the hotel that has the boat? How much is the hotel that has the boat? At one point I was convinced the boat only came to Portofino (one of my many cancelled reservations) the good people on here assured me that we could switch to RPR and still take the boat and save a tidy sum in the process. I’m just excited for Express Pass.
After 2 nights we switch to our “home” resort Cabana Bay. We loved this hotel in 19 and there was never a question as to where we would go once we needed to move on from the Royal Pacific. Again we will have 2 rooms. I had booked the 2 bedroom suite at one point, but switched to 2 family suites once those prices dropped. While I was initially feeling like the 2 bedroom suite cost was prohibitive, I was really sad when we dropped it. It really is a beautiful room. (shhhh don’t tell Todd. I complained enough over the cost I’ll never live it down if he finds out I wish we’d kept the room)
Cabana Bay offers interior (like a hotel long hallways with doors) and exterior (like a motel, you walk out to the parking lot) facing rooms. My preference is interior, and having experienced the view (and noise) of the pool view room last time, I did not change our booking when AP rates did come out cheaper for that room type.
As we did last time I contacted them beforehand to pre-pay for everything. Where I needed to send a fax with my CCd info in 2019, they have switched to an online system now. The rep emailed me a link for all 4 rooms and I was able to pay off the balance all online. It was a very smooth transaction, and I found it much safer than having to fax them my info.
The plan at the moment:
Sunday- we fly in and arrive mid day. Check into the hotel and get that EP. If the parks aren’t at capacity we begin what I like to call the wehaveexpressgooooooooooo strategy. I’m hopeful the parks either won’t be at capacity or Universal will have extended capacity to where it won’t hit that point like it did during spring break.
Monday-heavy park day. With EP I want to maximise our time here.
Tuesday- we move over to Cabana Bay, but will have EP until park close this evening. I may let up on the park touring this day as I suspect we’d wind up on youtube as that family who was shouting at each other in Universal if I asked for a third day of heavy touring.
Wednesday – I give my we don’t do park commando style family a real break. We ended up spending several hours at Disney Springs in 2019, so today is a planned down day in the morning then early afternoon/ evening at Disney springs. I’m hoping to be able to eat dinner here. If C is up early we may just hit volcano bay in the morning.
Thursday – off to Batu! It’s one day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios where Galaxy’s Edge is where I suspect we’ll spend most of our time. This Star Wars fan is really excited.
Friday – back to the Universal parks, or a dedicated day to Volcano Bay.
Saturday – we head home late evening, so I’m thinking we may plan a brunch on property, then spend some time in the parks before packing it in and heading for the airport.
Just about the only things set in stone on this are the hotels and the Disney day. Last time I found that we could go between 3 and 4 hours in the parks then everyone was done and we’d head back to the hotel where Callan and I would either go to volcano bay to swim or hang out at the hotel pool. I’ve deliberately made more of a plan this time as I found there were things I wanted to do that just didn’t get done because we were “winging it”.
I’m also hoping that with Express we can do more those first few days and find the sweet spot between park commando – which we are not- and what should we do now? (AKA where we were in 2019).
So come along with me as we head BACK to Universal for a 2021 family vacation!
Early May update: dining! dining! dining! I keep seeing post after post from people who are operating on the pre-covid you don’t need reservations anywhere saying you must have dining reservations.
One of my goals this trip was to make a more solid plan for the parks. My biggest complaint from 2019 was feeling like we didn’t DO anything. By the time I could get everyone up and TO the parks the lines were 60+ minutes for the headline coasters. I’m hoping to alleviate this with Express pass some, but also by creating a loose plan. The bones of which are going to come from our dining reservations.
Right now, we have dinner at Jakes set for Sunday night (arrival day) this may change to the pool bar depending on how we feel.
Monday afternoon we hit Mythos – Callan is a huge Percy Jackson fan, and I think will really enjoy the theming of the restaurant. The secret goal? Keeping us IN the park to keep going after lunch rather than hit the hotel and be “done for the day”. I’ll let you know if this works or if it’s “I’m done” after lunch.
Tuesday evening we’re set to return to Vivo. This was our favorite meal of the trip in 2019, and I’m really looking forward to it. The secret goal? I want to see the parks in the evening, and hope to herd my family toward the parks rather than the bus back to the hotel on this day. The hopeful goal? Cinematic Spectacular, but right now it’s only running on the weekends.
Wednesday is Disney Springs for us, so no chance of reservations but I’m hoping for a cookie at Gideon's.
Thursday is Disney Park day so QS at Woody’s lunch box and I suspect dinner in the room or off property somewhere.
Friday: Dinner at Cowfish, where we enjoyed a tasty lunch in 2019. Yes, this is a chain restaurant but one we don’t have here and we liked the food. This leaves our morning open if we want to go to Volcano Bay.
Saturday we fly home late afternoon. I have reservations at The Kitchen at the Hard Rock for brunch, hoping to avoid the we hit the park early and need to eat now meltdown that happened in 2019. I don’t want to go off property as the instant we leave we can’t get back in and we’d be unable to go back to the parks.
Of course all of this is subject to change on the day, but if the crowds and limits stay like they are I’m glad to have a plan in place.
Thanks for following my babbling and hang on, it's going to be a bumpy ride!
I really enjoyed writing the trip report in 2019, and frequently come back to it, especially as 2020 dragged on. For both new and returning readers, Welcome! And thank you for giving me your time and attention.
Some background:
We are Bethany, long time Dis lurker and reader of trip reports. I’m a graphic designer in the midwest, and have spent much of the last 15 months working from my dining room table (as opposed to my corporate cube). My DH Todd (T in the last report) is along for the ride again, along with our 2 kids. DS Callan (C now 12) and DD Anna (A now 15).
We saved and saved for years to be able to take a bucket list trip to Universal in 2019. It was supposed to be a one and done trip for us (spoiler alert: it wasn’t). Just 3 weeks before we were booked to leave my mom passed away. The previous months had been a whirlwind of her getting sick, recovering then relapsing. Complicating that situation, I had knee surgery in January of ‘19 and just never had the opportunity to recover as I needed to be present for my mom. All of this to say while the trip in 2019 was wonderful and worth doing it was also done in a fog for all of us and for me, a lot of pain. By the end of the trip, I had gotten Todd to agree we really needed to come back when we were in better shape. Our passes weren’t set to expire until June of 2020 and we could fit another trip in without having to renew them.
Insert maniacal laughter here
Our 2020 looked something like this:
March – my you must be in your office if you’re working, no one works from home management sent everyone home for “2 weeks”. The parks shut down with no re-opening date in sight.
April – I begin to sweat that we may not make the June trip. I mean how much longer can this go on? (Insert naive face here)
May – I start cancelling everything and moving to August of 2020
July – me: Masks + August in Florida = No. I start cancelling everything (again) and punt to June of 21
I know many others did this dance as well. Honestly, none of us got sick (very, very grateful for this) and the changes forced on us during quarantine have been mostly positive. I’ve been able to walk daily, and really work on my knee strength. Todd lost his job in June, only to find a better position that he loves in October. While 2020 was horrendous for so many people, we got very lucky that it was a year of growth for us.
Bringing us back to Universal. Once it became clear that we really were going to make the June 21 date, I started to untangle the knot known as our hotel reservations. At one point I had 7 different deposits/cancellations. It was a nightmare, but everyone I talked to was really very nice and accommodating.
Where we wound up: 2 connecting rooms (Todd’s request) at Royal Pacific Resort for 2 nights. When we were down there in 2019, I casually mentioned that you could take a boat from the hotel to Citywalk. Ever since then it’s been, can we stay at the hotel that has the boat? How much is the hotel that has the boat? At one point I was convinced the boat only came to Portofino (one of my many cancelled reservations) the good people on here assured me that we could switch to RPR and still take the boat and save a tidy sum in the process. I’m just excited for Express Pass.
After 2 nights we switch to our “home” resort Cabana Bay. We loved this hotel in 19 and there was never a question as to where we would go once we needed to move on from the Royal Pacific. Again we will have 2 rooms. I had booked the 2 bedroom suite at one point, but switched to 2 family suites once those prices dropped. While I was initially feeling like the 2 bedroom suite cost was prohibitive, I was really sad when we dropped it. It really is a beautiful room. (shhhh don’t tell Todd. I complained enough over the cost I’ll never live it down if he finds out I wish we’d kept the room)
Cabana Bay offers interior (like a hotel long hallways with doors) and exterior (like a motel, you walk out to the parking lot) facing rooms. My preference is interior, and having experienced the view (and noise) of the pool view room last time, I did not change our booking when AP rates did come out cheaper for that room type.
As we did last time I contacted them beforehand to pre-pay for everything. Where I needed to send a fax with my CCd info in 2019, they have switched to an online system now. The rep emailed me a link for all 4 rooms and I was able to pay off the balance all online. It was a very smooth transaction, and I found it much safer than having to fax them my info.
The plan at the moment:
Sunday- we fly in and arrive mid day. Check into the hotel and get that EP. If the parks aren’t at capacity we begin what I like to call the wehaveexpressgooooooooooo strategy. I’m hopeful the parks either won’t be at capacity or Universal will have extended capacity to where it won’t hit that point like it did during spring break.
Monday-heavy park day. With EP I want to maximise our time here.
Tuesday- we move over to Cabana Bay, but will have EP until park close this evening. I may let up on the park touring this day as I suspect we’d wind up on youtube as that family who was shouting at each other in Universal if I asked for a third day of heavy touring.
Wednesday – I give my we don’t do park commando style family a real break. We ended up spending several hours at Disney Springs in 2019, so today is a planned down day in the morning then early afternoon/ evening at Disney springs. I’m hoping to be able to eat dinner here. If C is up early we may just hit volcano bay in the morning.
Thursday – off to Batu! It’s one day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios where Galaxy’s Edge is where I suspect we’ll spend most of our time. This Star Wars fan is really excited.
Friday – back to the Universal parks, or a dedicated day to Volcano Bay.
Saturday – we head home late evening, so I’m thinking we may plan a brunch on property, then spend some time in the parks before packing it in and heading for the airport.
Just about the only things set in stone on this are the hotels and the Disney day. Last time I found that we could go between 3 and 4 hours in the parks then everyone was done and we’d head back to the hotel where Callan and I would either go to volcano bay to swim or hang out at the hotel pool. I’ve deliberately made more of a plan this time as I found there were things I wanted to do that just didn’t get done because we were “winging it”.
I’m also hoping that with Express we can do more those first few days and find the sweet spot between park commando – which we are not- and what should we do now? (AKA where we were in 2019).
So come along with me as we head BACK to Universal for a 2021 family vacation!
Early May update: dining! dining! dining! I keep seeing post after post from people who are operating on the pre-covid you don’t need reservations anywhere saying you must have dining reservations.
One of my goals this trip was to make a more solid plan for the parks. My biggest complaint from 2019 was feeling like we didn’t DO anything. By the time I could get everyone up and TO the parks the lines were 60+ minutes for the headline coasters. I’m hoping to alleviate this with Express pass some, but also by creating a loose plan. The bones of which are going to come from our dining reservations.
Right now, we have dinner at Jakes set for Sunday night (arrival day) this may change to the pool bar depending on how we feel.
Monday afternoon we hit Mythos – Callan is a huge Percy Jackson fan, and I think will really enjoy the theming of the restaurant. The secret goal? Keeping us IN the park to keep going after lunch rather than hit the hotel and be “done for the day”. I’ll let you know if this works or if it’s “I’m done” after lunch.
Tuesday evening we’re set to return to Vivo. This was our favorite meal of the trip in 2019, and I’m really looking forward to it. The secret goal? I want to see the parks in the evening, and hope to herd my family toward the parks rather than the bus back to the hotel on this day. The hopeful goal? Cinematic Spectacular, but right now it’s only running on the weekends.
Wednesday is Disney Springs for us, so no chance of reservations but I’m hoping for a cookie at Gideon's.
Thursday is Disney Park day so QS at Woody’s lunch box and I suspect dinner in the room or off property somewhere.
Friday: Dinner at Cowfish, where we enjoyed a tasty lunch in 2019. Yes, this is a chain restaurant but one we don’t have here and we liked the food. This leaves our morning open if we want to go to Volcano Bay.
Saturday we fly home late afternoon. I have reservations at The Kitchen at the Hard Rock for brunch, hoping to avoid the we hit the park early and need to eat now meltdown that happened in 2019. I don’t want to go off property as the instant we leave we can’t get back in and we’d be unable to go back to the parks.
Of course all of this is subject to change on the day, but if the crowds and limits stay like they are I’m glad to have a plan in place.
Thanks for following my babbling and hang on, it's going to be a bumpy ride!
and wound up walking over from a different hotel. I on the other hand got on the correct boat, and enjoyed the ride back.
. Callan and I both wanted to do the custom M&Ms where you can have them printed, but the machine was down - not sure if it was mechanical or covid related. We each got a small cup to fill from the flavors on the wall and what did he get? Skittles. Yep, visit the M&M store, get skittles. sigh. I got dark chocolate M&Ms as I maintain they're hard to find (Todd says he sees them all the time). Having found a couple of shirts at Pele Todd joined us at M&M and told Callan he knew where the Lego store was. we headed back that way and they dropped me off at Gideon's to wait for my return time. I got the text quickly and jumped in line. I knew the inside of the place would appeal to Anna so I was texting her to come join me. I waited maybe 10-15 minutes in line, enough time for Anna to find me and we both headed inside. I have video of the inside of the shop which I can post here. it was very dark, gothic and smelled amazing. It's also really small, and I can completely see why they structure the line the way they do. Because it was June 1, and the beginning of pride month the monthly slice was rainbow pride cake. Check them out on instagram to see how big the slices are. they also offer cookies, each one is a 1/2 lb and "bites" quarter slices of cookie dipped in dark chocolate. I was juggling my phone, my order in my head and my kid and her impressions of it so I kind of panicked when we got in there. The people working were great, and we did get our order in. We got out and I looked at the person working outside and said "that was like whoosh". She said she gets that a lot.
