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PTR: Grad Bash '06


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(sorry for some bad pics, I don't have that much practice at night and I took almost all of these pics while I was in motion walking around. My first PTR BTW)

 

 

So last night/this morning I was at Grad Bash at Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. It was basically a massive party that covered both parks. They had the parks lit up with crazy lighting packages and there was music and dance zones all over the parks. To my surprise, most of the lines were shorter than a normal day.

So here's how the night went:

 

It was a lockdown event, so they had to make sure everyone was in the park and stayed in the park. Instead of getting off at the normal parking areas, we got dropped off right in the park. They couldn't risk kids sneaking off between the garages and the park entrances, so the busses just drove straight through the backstage areas, which was really cool since we basically got a backstage tour from our schoolbus. We entered behind the Hulk and drove all the way around the backstage area of IOA. Our bus dropped us off at the Lost Continent entrance, which was in between Dueling Dragons and Sinbad. To keep crowds and chaos to a minimum, some schools got dropped off at a marvel gate, Toon Lagoon Gate, JP Gate, and Lost Continent gate. We got off the bus and went through metal detectors and then we were in!

 

We walked around a little to get a feel for the event, we went through JP and Toon Lagoon and ended up at Marvel Island. We decided it was Hulk time! We waited for about an hour, which wasn't bad since the line was basically one big party. Think about it: everyone there is the same age as you, everyone there came to party, and everybody there is ready to get on the Hulk! It was honestly the most fun I've had in line before, everybody was dancing and chanting '06, '06 and doing yells and whatnot. So we got to the front of the party and got in the second row. Wow! I have never gotten such a good ride on the Hulk! With the crazy dance parties and lighting packages that were going on throughout the parks, what I was when I shot out of that tube was different than I've ever seen. The view was amazing, the park was lit up specially for Grad Bash, and below people were just partying and having a good time. I don't think any ride on the Hulk will ever be able to top that for me.

 

So then we decided to get away from the crowds and go to Universal Studios. We got to the park through Suess Landing, since you can't leave the park. In between the parks they had a crazy lighting package fog tunnel thing that was crazy. Once inside Universal Stusios we went and watched Chris Brown's conert. There was also some group called the Click 5 who performed but we didn't want to see them. After the concert we went and rode The Mummy. We waited a little less than an hour for this, and since the line doesn't group people together as much it wasn't much of a party. Hey, the Mummy still rocked and it was funny to see kids fall for the booby traps.

 

After The Mummy we wandered around for a little bit soaking up the party. There was a huge party going on around the Jaws area so we danced a little bit. After that, we got hungry and went and got a hotdog. It was now about 11:45 and we decided to hit up the midnight showing of Fear Factor Live. It was a pretty good show, a lot of the stunts were very impressive for a live show with Grad Bash participants. When the show ended we went and rode Men in Black which had about a 10 minute wait. It was fun, I scored 164,000 points which was the highest in our group.

 

After this we wandered around some more and ran into about 10 more kids from our school. Some were going to ride Spiderman and some were going to ride The Mummy. It was about 1:00 in the morning at this point. I decided to go with the Mummy again since IOA seemed to be a lot more crowded. We waited a little less than 30 minutes for the Mummy this time, there were about 10 of who chose Mummy.

 

After The Mummy we just went and partied until 2:00 am when the park gates open to let people out. We walked through CityWalk to exit, they had CityWalk covered with barriers to direct traffic since everything was closed except The Groove. We got on the bus and got on the bus and rolled out of the parking lot at about 2:45. We got home at about 5:20 since our schoolbusses are slow and we had to stop to fill up 5 busses on the way back.

 

Went to bed at about 5:30 this morning and woke up at about 1:00!

 

BEST TIME AT UNIVERSAL EVER!!

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This was just one of the seas of busses that were outside. Finding our school among all these buses at 2:15 proved to be a bit hard. Luckily to find our bus you just had to find the crappiest yellow bus around!

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We left through the front gate of IOA since CityWalk was closed down at this point (dang, and I'd like to exit the same way I came in)

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After more partying and another ride on ROTM (20 min wait at 1:30 am) we headed back to IOA through this crazy connector tunnel

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After Fear Factor we went on MiB with about a 5 minute wait

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Here's a good idea of the crowds that were there that night.

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After Chris Brown, we went and rode ROTM. Then we hit up a dance party and ate. We ended up at the midnight showing of Fear Factor Live

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Just to give you an idea of some of the wait times (we saw a bunch of these). This is the first year they've opened both parks to Grad Bash, and it was awsome!

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More fun

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We then watched the Chris Brown concert. He did two shows that night, this being the first. Apparently he tripped and fell at the second one...

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We went through Suess Landing to get to Universal Studios

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Our first ride of the night was the Hulk, we waited about an hour which was our longest wait of the night.

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We walked around for a bit. The water rides were open, but we didn't want to get wet.

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We had to go through these to get in. This particular set was set up between Dueling Dragons and Sinbad since we entered through the backstage area.

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A look into what some kids bring to a theme park. Why? I don't know...

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We got to school at about 4:00 and left on schoolbusses at about 4:40

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Man, it sure looks like an amazing day to hit the parks. Maybe when I'm a senior my school will do IOA's Grad Bash - it'd be well worth it!

 

A bit off-topic, but did you happen to hear anything about DD's closure? I'm not the biggest fan of it, but it's a fairly fun ride and I'm going to IOA Friday, May 19.

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They had it open for Grad Bash, but my understanding is that it was closed for regular park hours for painting.

 

When you're a senior I'd definately try to get your school to sign up. Our school switched from Grad Night to Grad Bash a few years ago and everybody loves it. It's up to our senior steering committee to sign up, and they do it every year. I paid $40 for the entire thing! Both parks for $40 till 2am with concerts? Heck yes!

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Yeah, at one point I could see into the maintanance bay of Spiderman where they keep the ride vehicles. I also saw the JP, Hulk, Dudley, and Dragons maintanance area that had cars and pieces being inspected. The traffic was stop and go at that point so I had a while to see some of the details.

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Too bad you are not a Buchholz student .

 

Thank God! I don't think I could stand that many rich preppy kids (jk, sorta)

 

We have Fall Out Boy this year!

 

I wouldn't mind seeing Fall Out Boy, but having both Universal parks open beats MK hands down in terms of rides. Plus, Universal has more of a party atmosphere for teenagers. If my school went to Grad Nite next weekend when they have Simple Plan I'd be pissed, having Chris Brown was pretty good.

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There was also some group called the Click 5

My cousin likes them. I particularily don't enjoy thier music, though. Anyways, it sunds really interesting, better than any grad night Disneyland would pull off.

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