Today, we started our Great Theme Park Tour with Universal Studios.
It's divided into sections named for US cities. En route to our first ride, we walked through the streets of Hollywood and saw Marilyn Monroe and Lucille Ball!
Our first stop was in the World Expo. All of a sudden, we were in the middle of Springfield, home of the Simpsons. The day was already warm, so we hit the Kwik-E-Mart for bottled water - and Duff Beer for Larry!
Our first ride was the Simpsons virtual "ride". Interestingly, we sat in a roller coaster-style car, which followed a video, and "moved" along a virtual course. It felt like we were really moving - pretty cool concept.
Our next ride was one of my favorites: Men in Black Alien Attack. We got to shoot at aliens as part of our MIB agent training! Sadly, our score was not good enough to make the cut...
Because of our late arrival last night, we didn't get started as early as we'd like. It was lunchtime already, and where better to have lunch but in San Francisco?
We chose Lombard's (indoors and air-conditioned!), a waterfront restaurant with an authentic San Francisco feel.
Emily wanted to try her hand at an arcade game, and proved to be expert at popping balloons with darts. Thus, Wilburta the prize pig joined us for the rest of the day.
Even she thought the Jaws ride was corny, though the special effects were pretty cool. The fire was definitely real! They did a good job creating the ambiance of a real fishing village.
Our next stop was New York, where no lines allowed us to ride the Revenge of the Mummy twice. Pretty spooky, and, again, real fire! (It was so dark in that tomb, I thought I the curse of the mummy was causing me to lose my sight...)
Walking through the streets of NYC, we stopped to admire, among other things, a yellow cab, and the DeLorean from Back to the Future fame.
We finished our tour of New York with a front row view of the Twister "ride". On the way in, a little 6-ish-year-old boy warned us that it was "pwetty thcawy". Aww! Yes, all the videos and talk of the destruction that tornadoes can impart was pretty graphic. I can see where a young child would be frightened. Again, very impressive special effects: rain, lightning, and the expected tornadic destruction - right before our very eyes!
Back in Hollywood, heat was getting the most of us again, so we stopped for a frozen drink - and a water fight - at a lovely fountain. Very cooling, inside and out!
Emily was majorly bummed out that none of us wanted to risk riding on the Rip, Ride, Rockit. OMG, that roller coaster scared me just to look at it! It started out climbing a TALL vertical tower, then plunged nearly straight down before doing several loops and going completely upside down. No thank you! After much cajoling, I finally convinced her not to let the wimpiness of the rest of her family members destroy her chance to be a real risk-taker. Larry and Sarah attended the Horror Make-up show, and Emily and I headed to the Rip Ride Rockit. She rode and I gave her very distant moral support!
I know she was really disappointed that no one was brave enough to go with her, but I am very proud of her for going it alone and being able to say she did it. Guess we'll have to see what happens tomorrow... There are some biggies yet to come!
We ended our day at Terminator 2, a 3-D visit to the world of advanced technology. Fun, light, and excellent 3-D effects. Much to the amusement of my teenage daughters, I found myself actually flinching as objects "flew" toward me!
Back at the motel, the girls took a well-deserved swim while Larry and I hit the liquor store. An apropos way to end the day for all of us!
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