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Universal Orlando Resort (USO, IOA) Discussion Thread

p. 624 - New Epic Universe details, including Isle of Berk!

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Great TR! Great way to present it, too. I got everything you were captioning,

without having to go through all the "usual photos" of these things.

Which you didn't post. Which was fine by me.

 

Very nicely done.

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I've only ridden Dueling Dragons when it was actually dueling once, and I took it for granted. The ride isn't the same without the dueling aspect. I took my last ride on both about two weeks ago in the front row, and I'm sad to see it go. The thing is though is that I'm excited for whatever is replacing it. DD is a huge space that a good indoor roller coaster could take, but I also don't want another Gringotts. I would like something a bit more like a "roller-coaster" than Gringotts, and I just don't feel like DD had to go. It's whatever though.

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DD is a huge space that a good indoor roller coaster could take

 

I imagine that the entire area won't be taken up by the ride, looking at the size of the space, you could pretty much fit both Forbidden Journey and Gringotts in it, so I think they will have the new ride plus an extension to the Hogsmeade area, to bring in more food & retail outlets into the area and alleviate the crowding in the area. I guess they could also add in things like the Shrieking Shack to add further landmarks to the area.

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Cracking photos! Love the photoshopped ones of Dragon Challenge! But I also have to give a little shout-out to the picture of Rip Ride Rockit, I love pictures where you can see such a wide range of facial expressions!

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I completely forgot to add the part that prompted me to write a report in the first place! The Gringotts Money Exchange vouchers. I must have gotten the wrong idea as to what these were, I had gotten it in my head that you 'buy' a voucher as a souvenir and could cash them back in for real money at the exchange if you wanted to. So I had brought the $10 note I had purchased years ago with the intent to exchange it. The lady at the counter gave me a weird look and ultimately just gave me a new $10 voucher. What the?!? It turns out they are basically like gift certificates and you can spend them at any HP store (possibly the greater park as well). The nice touch of doing this is the cashiers will generally make some remark about 'drawing it from your Gringotts account' instead of the 'muggle plastic' nonsense.

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I completely forgot to add the part that prompted me to write a report in the first place! The Gringotts Money Exchange vouchers. I must have gotten the wrong idea as to what these were, I had gotten it in my head that you 'buy' a voucher as a souvenir and could cash them back in for real money at the exchange if you wanted to. So I had brought the $10 note I had purchased years ago with the intent to exchange it. The lady at the counter gave me a weird look and ultimately just gave me a new $10 voucher. What the?!? It turns out they are basically like gift certificates and you can spend them at any HP store (possibly the greater park as well). The nice touch of doing this is the cashiers will generally make some remark about 'drawing it from your Gringotts account' instead of the 'muggle plastic' nonsense.

Any HP store, eh?

 

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Wow, it looks like Volcano Bay removed 28 food choices! For me, that was the best thing the park had going for them! Some of those dishes looked amazing. That's too bad, but the way things have been going, and with their clientele, not shocking. Add that to the long lines and terrible reviews and I don't think I'll be visiting there for quite a while.

 

Universal’s Volcano Bay has removed roughly 28 menu items from the restaurants across the park, Orlando Informer has learned. Four new items have been introduced to replace the removed items.

When it opened in May, Volcano Bay featured far superior food offerings when compared to Universal Studios Florida and Islands of Adventure. This change begins to make the offerings more comparable to the other parks.

Items that were removed include a variety of tacos, Poke Poke Bowls, a large amount of specialty burgers, most barbecue options, glazed chicken, ribs, mahi sandwiches, and more. Hot dogs, corn dogs, loaded nachos, and a bacon cheeseburger have been added to fill the void of these 28 removals.

 

https://orlandoinformer.com/blog/volcano-bay-changes-menus/

 

That's a bummer to hear. I was actually looking forward to having a nice meal at Volcano Bay when I go there at the end of this month. It sounds like Donald Trump came in and personally changed the menu to his tastes.

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^Way to bring politics into everything... congrats. You're that guy.

 

Meanwhile, I didn't really see the menu lasting very long at Volcano Bay anyway. In my experience, no matter how well-themed a restaurant, the menu options are pretty much always the same basic junk food staples with maybe an extra thing or two.

 

There are exceptions obviously (see: Epcot).

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Thanks all for the kind words about my photos. I don't know when brakes were added but I do remember hearing about them (maybe in this thread) a few months ago. It may be to reduce G-forces on the first drop. I wont publish these photos but I also took a few shots at the bottom of the drop as the train went by and almost every single one had a kid or two who had passed out and was slumped over.

 

But I do like rider photos. I've got more on my Flickr. Here is a fun one from Everest last month:

35706290876_aaeb16c863_c.jpgFaces of Everest by Colin Chardavoyne, on Flickr

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^Way to bring politics into everything... congrats. You're that guy.

Spoken like a Trump supporter. Congrats. You're that guy.

 

--Robb "Please continue to make fun of Trump to get his supporters out of our forum." Alvey

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^Way to bring politics into everything... congrats. You're that guy.

Spoken like a Trump supporter. Congrats. You're that guy.

 

--Robb "Please continue to make fun of Trump to get his supporters out of our forum." Alvey

 

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Ok, now I don't feel as bad for my Trump joke a few pages back. Don't want to step on Robb's toes.

 

Anyways, the trims on Rocket really don't appear to be turned on. If you check youtube for any offride footage and sort by upload date you can see things are moving just as quickly through the non-inverting loop (or whatever they call it) as they used to. It's actually one of the weirder installations of trims I've ever seen given that they don't seem to be on even slightly.

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^Way to bring politics into everything... congrats. You're that guy.

Spoken like a Trump supporter. Congrats. You're that guy.

 

--Robb "Please continue to make fun of Trump to get his supporters out of our forum." Alvey

I would consider myself a moderate. Not trying to foster any particular someone.

 

Anyways, the trims on Rocket really don't appear to be turned on. If you check youtube for any offride footage and sort by upload date you can see things are moving just as quickly through the non-inverting loop (or whatever they call it) as they used to. It's actually one of the weirder installations of trims I've ever seen given that they don't seem to be on even slightly.

I never felt it during my visit in December. The airtime off the first drop was fantastic and seemed pretty devoid of any interference. Honestly, I didn't even notice they were physically there until it was pointed out on here a little while after my trips. So, definitely not trims, as Robb said.

 

Robb, any clue as to what they are?

 

Gotta say, HRR was probably one of the biggest surprises of my trip. Sure, it shuffles throughout the entire course, but the ride itself was great. I wouldn't call it "rough" by any means because the shufflingg wasn't painful, just annoying. I can live with the minor annoyance for an otherwise pretty exciting ride.

 

But before my visit, I read opinions that the shuffling had ruined the ride for some people.

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My only complaint about RRR is I wish the music was a bit louder. I don't know if I''ve just always had bad luck with seats but I can never hear much of the song I select over the noise of the ride, and that seems to defeat the purpose. Such problems I can live with, though.

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I just feel like HRRR looks amazing and it gives you an illusion that it should be a very nice and smooth experience with the added spice of music and some pops of great air. I mean it's such a quiet ride and the light package and color combination just look like a high-end product.

 

But nooo once you get on that thing you're just getting bounced around and the train just shuffles between the rails way too much. The disadvantage of the narrow track, wheel boxes, and high centerline is definitely showing on HRRR and the extreme heavy use of Universal isn't helping at all. To me it looks like a coaster that should track flawlessly but the ride experience gives you a sense that there's some kind of calculation error. I was unpleasantly surprised by the helix after the first MCBR, it just felt like a bad driver shifting from left to right violently inside of a lane trying his/her best not to fall off the side of the road. Maybe Maurer did it intentionally but to me that experience is like a Chinese-made mine train. Same with the tilted loop whatever towards the end of the ride.

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