BISis and I recently visited The Wizarding World of Harry Potter on one of her visits down here. This was my first visit to Universal in general in probably 15 years and my first ever to Islands of Adventure. These facts are the reason I should start this post with a caveat: I am not a theme park person. I don't like spending all day weaving my way through crowds, standing for hours in line on hard surfaces and overpaying for food. I'm also not fond of roller coasters. I flat out refuse to ride ones that loop or go backwards.
After saying all that though, I had a great time at the park. It was fairly crowded but lines weren't too bad and the weather was great (mid 70s). My initial advice is get there early and head back to the WWHP section first. It has entrances from both Jurassic Park and Mythos. Later in the day, as crowds build, they will limit entrance in that section to one side or the other. There are 3 rides: Harry Potter And The Forbidden Journey, The Flight of the Hippogriff, and Dragon Challenge.
We'll start with the Forbidden Journey. You can't take any bags on the ride. They have a section of lockers set up for you to leave your belongings. They're pretty nifty lockers too. They open and close with a fingerprint scanner. Also, when they tell you to empty your pockets they aren't joking. I sat in my seat on the ride, felt something lumpy and ended up with a handful of change from a previous rider. You're going to get set at a 50-55 degree angle at one point in the ride. Things will fall out.
That's the ride entrance on the right, by the way.
The premise of the ride is that you are taking a tour of the grounds and seeing a Quidditch match while riding a flying bench that has been bewitched by Hermione. For the first go through (and trust me you'll want to ride this multiple times), go through the regular line. It's long but keeps moving pretty well. You'll tour through Hogwarts visiting the Defense of the Dark Arts classroom, Dumbledore's office, one of the halls lined with talking portraits before stopping in the Gryffindor common room and then listening to ride instructions from the Sorting Hat.
The ride has 4 separate seats per section that are maneuvered on an arm. The effects are part virtual and part practical. The parts where you are moving through the Hogwarts grounds are all done on projection screens while your "bench" is moved around. The parts within the castle are more live action with Aragog and his kin, a dragon and dementors. The dragon will breathe "fire" on you and the spiders will spit. It's a fun ride but may be scary for anyone under 8 (if they're even large enough to ride it).
Once you've gone through the regular line once, go for the single rider line the rest of the time. The wait is generally under 30 minutes for that while it's about 90 for the regular line. You probably won't be seated with your group because they use single riders to fill in empty spots but you can't see who you're seated with anyway. You're also going to be getting on and off the ride on a moving walkway so be prepared.
We rode it as single riders the first two times we went on the ride and used the regular line the last time. During the last time through we had a pause with the "bench" at a funky angle once the ride had started so someone in a wheelchair who had been about 20 people behind us could get on. The very first time through there was a technical glitch or something. We were left standing about 15 from the front of the single rider line for almost 45 minutes. I don't know what was wrong but all the lights in the ride were up. Advice to Universal: If you have people waiting in line on the Forbidden Journey and the ride breaks down, turn off the audio for the Sorting Hat. 45 minutes of a 3 minute spiel gets very annoying.
(right: Hagrid's house outside Flight of the Hippogriff)
Next up: Flight of the Hippogriff.
Like I said before, I'm not a roller coaster person, but this is a short, child-friendly coaster. The ride is only about 30-45 seconds long and there are no loops or anything fancy. I think the required height for the ride is smaller too. They even have netting as part of the lap bar. The cars sit two, kind of. BISis and I aren't exactly dainty but we're not large either, and our hips were pressed hard against the sides of the car and each other. For a couple of the curves, it felt like she was wedged into my hip which caused me to laugh, loudly. In fact, what you could hear during that ride was a couple of small kids screaming and me laughing like a loon. We wanted to go back for a second ride later in the evening but it was closed by the time we got out of our third trip through the Forbidden Journey.
We never got on Dragon Challenge. It's one of those massive coasters with loops all over the place. I offered to hold BISis's bag while she rode it because she loves roller coasters but she turned me down.
We never got into any of the stores either which was disappointing. We both wanted to go through Ollivander's and buy a wand. The lines for the stores were even longer than the ones for the rides. They never seemed to get any shorter either. I think if you want to hit the stores, you should expect to not do anything other than the WWHP section of Islands of Adventure.
We, of course, had to hit one of the Butterbeer kiosks. The lines of which are very long as well. They've got two types. One (on the left) is more like a carbonated soda. It's smooth, rich, and very buttery. It's probably too rich for just one person to drink and I don't want to even think about how many calories it had. The other type (on the right) is a frozen, slushie like drink. It's not as rich as the first but it's still tasty. We never actually finished the frozen one. We kept getting brain freeze while drinking it, and in 20 minutes, it didn't seem to melt at all. I think if we go again, we'll just split one of the regular ones (in a regular glass). Those mugs, by the way, are extra.
Random other thoughts:
The WWHP staff seemed to enjoy calling park visitors muggles.
One of their staffers is a dead ringer for the Phelps twins who played Fred and George Wesley.
They've also got a magic demonstration with Beauxbatons and Durmstrang students.
Those Beauxbatons outfits are very flattering.
Yes, if you stop in Jurassic Park, River Adventure is a water ride. You will get soaked.
Wear comfortable, quick drying pants and underwear. Cotton underwear will stay wet all day long.
Other pictures from the day: (somewhere along the way I got water spots on my lens)
Hogsmeade pictures:
Hogwarts pictures:
If you want a good idea of what the Wizarding World of Harry Potter section entails, you can also visit their website: Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios Orlando.
