Day One – Hold my Butterbeer

Universal Epic Universe has a slightly more civilized opening time than Animal Kingdom. The park opens at 10:00. Since we were staying at a Universal property, we were able to enter early at 9:00. Sean also placed us in the Stella Nova hotel, which let us either take a roughly 10 minute walk to the park or take a short ride on a shuttle bus to get there. Since the bus was already waiting when we walked out of the hotel, we hopped on. By roughly 8:20, we were at the park, eagerly awaiting its opening.

There are five “worlds” at Epic Universe:

• The Wizarding World of Harry Potter – Ministry of Magic
• Dark Universe, which is a world featuring classic movie monsters (Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster, etc)
• Super Nintendo World
• How to Train your Dragon – Isle of Berk
• Celestial Park, which acts as a sort of hub, providing access to the other worlds

On Day 1, we planned to focus on the first two of these worlds. We didn’t want to pay the exorbitant fee for express passes for four people, so Sean did some research ahead of time and worked out what our day one “rope drop” strategy should be. While the attraction doesn’t technically open till 10:00, even waiting a full hour to ride the Harry Potter and the Battle at the Ministry ride is a relatively short wait, so that’s the first thing we headed toward when we were allowed in at 9:00.

Sean had told us ahead of time that the ride queue for this attraction was supposed to be next-level, and he was not wrong. We left the 1920s Paris of the Wizarding world (as seen in the Fantastic Beasts series) and dropped into the British Ministry of Magic. After entering the ride through the Floo network (a big stone fireplace, glowing green), we then wander the halls of the Ministry. Richly colored tiles cover the hallways. Doorways and “WANTED” posters, both with names fans will be familiar with, mark the path. Entering the main atrium of the Ministry nearly takes one’s breath away. The scale is incredible, and so, so detailed. I suspect it leaves even non-fans a bit awestruck.

Apparently the vehicle we’re in, a would-be elevator or lift (which at the Ministry is, of course, omnidirectional), is mounted on an “advanced motion base”, which enables smooth, multi-directional motion simulation. We’re meant to see Dolores Umbridge stand trial for her crimes, and naturally, she does not go quietly. The lift careens through several departments in various stages of destruction from the wizard battling that’s happening all around you. What was impressive to me was the near-seamless merging of digital imagery and animatronics. It was a very fun and completely immersive ride.

As we exited the ride, I glanced at the time. Sean had said sometimes they open the ride early if the queue builds up. It must have opened very early on that day, because it was well before 10:00 when we re-entered 1920s Paris.

After a quick stop to get the kids butterbeers, we headed over to the Stardust Racers pair of coasters. This is technically in the Celestial Park part of Epic, but the standby wait time was only 15 minutes, so we sprung for it.

On September 17th, a man died while riding this coaster, and of course, Universal shut the ride down immediately. After an “extensive” investigation, the ride was deemed to have not malfunctioned and that the attendants operated the ride correctly, and so it reopened in early October. We thought it over and surmised that a theme park doesn’t benefit in any way from continuing to operate an unsafe ride, and so we decided it would be acceptable for us to give this one a go.

I’m glad that we did. There are multiple launches and they are so much fun. Sean later called this an “air time monster,” and he is not wrong. The sensation of lifting up out of your seat is smooth and frequent. I didn’t get the sense that the ride was throwing me around, though with my back, I tend to wedge myself in pretty well and religiously keep my head against the headrest. Maya apparently banged her head some on this one though.

By this point, we thought we’d sneak in an early lunch at Cafe L’air de la Sirene back in the Wizarding world. This is meant to be a French wizarding cafe, and I was personally delighted with the lovely baguette sandwich I had.

Funny aside: baguette in French literally means something more like a wand or a conductor’s baton. Sean noticed this earlier in the year when he picked up a copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone in French during our France trip (we have one from England and one from Italy too), and he saw that they do a lot of talking about their baguettes (because they all have wands).

In keeping with the wizarding theme, Sean had some kind of dirigible plum drink and later on, a butterbeer crepe. While we did have to wait what seemed like a long time for our food and drinks to come out, we were seated almost immediately, which was very nice for energy and foot conservation.

Next, we went right to the Cosme Acajor Baguettes Magique store, so that Sean and Ian could shop for interactive wands to use in the land. The shop was very wizardy, and I wish we could have explored the upstairs level, but it was roped off. Sean and Ian seemed to have fun choosing just the right baguette for the job, and before too long, we were out the door.

We lined up for the 12:25p showing of Le Cirque Arcanus, one of the two big shows in Epic Universe. We managed to sneak into the shelter of the Cirque tent right as it was starting to sprinkle, so it felt like a tiny win after our super-drenched first night in Orlando. There’s a nice queue for the show featuring pleasant music emanating from a very magical looking multi-functional musical instrument. Once the show was ready to begin, we were dumped into a standing-only area for the pre-show. This was difficult on a couple fronts – 1, our daughter is a whiner and we had to hear about it the whole time we were standing, and 2 – we went from a nice orderly line to a big glut of people and it was from this crowd that we’d be pressing into the entry to the show once it did finally start, a system which I roundly dislike (apparently I’m a big whiner too).

The idea is that Ringmaster Skender is trying to restore his circus of magical curiosities, and to aid in this mission, he’s stolen Newt Scamander’s suitcase full of rescued creatures. Skender has an employee, Gwendolyn Jenkins, who, as she discovers them and learns more about them, becomes more interested in helping the magical creatures than exploiting them. There are really neat scenes with a giant cat-like creature called a zouwu, who ultimately saves her from Skender’s clutches. At the end, she got a job offer from Newt. I thought the show was lots of fun, and I always welcome the chance to sit for a moment on our park days.

We wandered for a while letting Sean and Ian perform various spells with their wands. They made kettles steam, exposed sneaky nifflers, and reanimated some unoccupied pants. I wandered back to them at one point to discover Ian interacting directly with a witch in a portrait in one of the shops. Her name was Cassandra Trelawney a famed seer who happens to be the great, great grandmother of Sybill Trelawney, who was Harry, Ron, and Hermione’s divination teacher. Sir Cadogan’s portrait is next to hers in the display (or portrait which will later find its way to Hogwarts Castle, as we learn in the books), and Ian used his magic to turn Sir Cadogan’s little pony into a mighty steed.

After our magical fun, we headed over to Dark Universe for a more sinister turn into the world of monsters. We started our journey with drinks and snacks at the Burning Blade Tavern. The namesake burning blade comes from the windmill that the townsfolk set aflame to kill Frankenstein’s monster. The windmill in the park is supposed to periodically burst into flame as well, in homage. Alas, the blade was not burning or even turning during our two day visit.

At the tavern, Sean and I ordered the Crossbow to drink – a “secret” menu item that combines Strongbow hard cider with the Dark Universe’s signature Darkthorne Mead. I was worried it would be too sweet for my tastes, but it wasn’t. It was tart and weirdly refreshing and I enjoyed it very much. We paired these with some Burning Cheddar Bites, which are nuggets of jalapeño-laced pimento cheese coated in blackness to make them look truly charred. They were served with a sriracha mayo and the whole combination was excellent. We couldn’t even get Maya and Ian to try them. The kids had unique mocktails called Monocanes that were served in plastic Erlenmeyer flasks and featured a swirling sparkling component that was sure to make an appearance later.

Next we lined up for Monsters Unchained: the Frankenstein Experiment. We had been seeing mysterious electrical glowing and pulsing from the castle windows, and it was finally time to find out what was going on in there. The ride queue was full of glowing electrical cables and ominous scenery. If I hadn’t been so damned tired, I think it would have been truly fun to try to mentally release and allow myself feel nervous dread.

Even as tired as I was, I think I liked this one more than the rest of the family. It’s a KUKA-arm mounted dark ride, though it relies more on some really excellent animatronics, with the digital effects being enhancers rather than half the show. The idea is that Victoria Frankenstein, who has continued in her family’s experimenting tradition, believes she has worked out a way to control Count Dracula. We see her hubris on full display of course as Dracula almost immediately escapes. Igor, delightfully chaotic neutral, ushers us through her experiment. Poor Maya was almost immediately presented with a ghostly organ that shoots actual fire out of its pipes, but that was over pretty quickly and then we were on to normal monsters.

As mentioned, the animatronics are amazing. We see Frankenstein’s monster in several scenes, my favorite being the one in which he’s battling Wolf Man. The creature from the black lagoon makes an appearance, along with a mummy, and of course, several iterations of Dracula. The ride culminates in Dracula swooping down to attack us just before we make it out the door. Silly Victoria seeks control. Igor simply seeks good ride reviews.

When we were done, Ian, our resident horror lover, pronounced it “meh” and I think Maya had written it off the moment a beloved musical instrument betrayed her with actual fire. Sean didn’t say a whole lot but I think the general feeling was that it was “fine.”

As we were loitering in the Darkmoor Village, we happened to spot Igor puttering around in the path, and Ian went over to meet him. Igor was fussing with his big leather case, alternately throwing his gloves to the ground and putting them on his hands again, searching for something he may have dropped or misplaced.

He and Ian chatted a bit. When asked his name, Ian responded with, “ahhhh, Ian.” And from then on, Igor referred to him as “Ah, Ian.” The two of them chose to poison Sean by pelting him with random little red berries they found in the bushes. The poison could take as long as three years to work, so Ah Ian has been instructed to call back to the castle in three years and let Igor know whether or not Dad had properly died.

The kids hadn’t wanted to eat anything at the Burning Blade, so we took them to a stand in Celestial Park where they could get something they might like – Star Sui Bao. Ian had some pork soup dumplings and Maya had some pretty purple steamed buns, both of which they enjoyed. We unintentionally ordered some chicken and kimchi bao, which I think Sean and I mostly ate.

We wandered around and looked at beautiful Celestial Park for a little while before finally giving up and getting into the 105 minute standby line for the Curse of the Werewolf ride back in the Dark Universe. This is a coaster where the ride vehicle spins on its y-axis as the car traverses the track. There’s a point where the car doesn’t quite make it to the top of one ride element and you head backwards for a second go. All told, the ride was fun, but it felt too short.

Our plan had been to have dinner in the Dark Universe at a restaurant called Das Stakehaus. We wanted to a refill on our beers and Monocanes, and so we headed back to The Burning Blade to get that taken care of. We swooped back over to Das Stakehaus only to discover that the restaurant had closed at 7! We only missed it by a few minutes. For a park that stayed open till 10p, that seemed like an awfully early closing time. Boo.

We walked back out into Celestial Park and sat on a nice tiered area around the fountains to figure out a new plan. After conferring with the kids about what they might like to eat, we wound up over at Meteor Astropub for dinner. The food was fine and it was all pretty quick, in my memory, but since the rest of our dining that day had been really nice, especially for a theme park, this meal was decidedly middling.

We wandered back to the Wizarding World to see it at night and to play around with casting spells some more, now that the crowds had died down a little. We dropped in at Bar Moonshine, an American bar tucked into Paris. I had a Philosopher’s Old-Fashioned, which is (you guessed it) an old-fashioned, albeit a very nice one, well balanced and not too sweet. Sean had something called a Lobe Blaster, and if I hadn’t been enjoying my own cocktail so much, I’d have been envious. It combines moonshine, lemon juice, limoncello, and absinthe along with soda water and the result is light and herbal but definitely potent. There’s also a deep green float of “emulsion verte” on top that makes the drink look very pretty. A rosemary sprig enhances the cocktail’s herbal notes and makes it a pure pleasure to drink.

After a quick stop in the candy shop to get the kids some treats, we Woodses decided that we were all very tired and took the brief 10-minute walk back to our hotel. I have a note that says we were back in our room by 9, which is a very early evening for this family when on vacation!

Day Two – We, my Friends, have Dragons!

We got a good early start on this day and had ourselves well-positioned to enter Super Nintendo World once things opened up at Epic Universe that morning. While all the other worlds’ portals were really just extended entry-ways with fun lighting, Super Nintendo World had you going up stairs on your path, maybe as if you were exiting sewer tunnels? The path for exiting the world was even more elaborate.

The “rope drop” strategy for today was to head directly to Mine-Cart Madness, which is a Donkey Kong themed roller coaster. And since we kind of hustled straight over to that ride, we only tangentially noticed the deeply eye-popping world we had just entered. I will say though, banana motifs aside, walking up to the temple you entered through to get to the ride did feel majestic.

By my notes, we only spent about 15 minutes in this ride queue, which is amazing for a ride that regularly sports a 90-120+ minute wait time. The idea is that you’re riding along track that’s sometimes torn up and missing. This is referred to as a “boom coaster,” which means it travels around above the fake track on a kind of boom arm, allowing the real track to stay mostly hidden underneath. This allows the visible track to be sort of decorative, and the kids seemed to get a real kick out of how it all looked.

I don’t remember the queue being particularly memorable, but the theming in the ride itself was very fun and the nonstop soundtrack helped give you the sense that you were stuck in a video game. We were “launched” over sections of missing track, jostled over chewed up portions of track, and at one point even skimmed over some water to get to the track on the other side. A lot of people seem to really love this ride. For my part, I thought it was fine. The aesthetics were on point but the ride experience was medium fun for me.

Since the wait time was so short and we likely wouldn’t bother with this one if the wait time grew, we next went and rode Yoshi’s Adventure. This is more of a young kid ride so there weren’t any thrills to be had. But we did ride through the Mushroom Kingdom on variously colored yoshis and collected eggs.

After this, we bought Power Bands so that Maya and Sean could go around playing games. The day before, Maya decided that she’d rather have a power band than a wand, and Ian decided he’d rather have a wand than a power band (we had agreed to purchase one overpriced piece of interactive theme park tech per kid). We should have known there’d be trouble.

The day before, Maya didn’t seem to have any issue with watching Ian and Dad do magic, waiting it out till the next day. Ian, however, on day 2, upon seeing the glory that was Super Nintendo World, seemed really sad about not having waited. (Keeping in mind, he had tons of fun using his wand to do spells the day before.)

Sean didn’t care that much, so he lent Ian his power band so he could play a little. And then somehow Ian won a whole pile of points. And then Maya felt sad. This was her thing. Ian had the wand thing. We had some drama and some tears and some stern talking-to but eventually settled into semi-contentment. Sort of. For my part, I don’t normally participate in this kind of stuff – it’s just not my thing – but even I got roped into helping Maya with one of her tasks since a couple people were required to get it done.

After that, we walked to Berk. We made our way over to the How to Train your Dragon – Isle of Berk part of the park. This is the one Maya had been most excited about, and I’ll be honest, it may be my favorite world in Epic. You enter to a view of a lake with big viking statues and boats surrounding it. This area is absolutely gorgeous at night too. The world is also delightfully colorful. This isn’t the Viking grey of dragon-fearful Berk. This is dragon-friendly Berk with colorful dragons, dragon houses, totems, and other structures.

We started our time in Berk with an early lunch at Spit Fyre Grill. Sean had a hit list of food items he might like to try, and what he wanted at Spit Fyre Grill was one of the cones. He had one called the PB&J cone, which in this case means pork, bacon, and jam. Maya had a mac and cheese cone which she liked except that they had the audacity to sully her mac and cheese with goldfish crackers. Ian and I had Stoick’s steak bowls, which were also really good. There’s a nice covered area to sit out of the sun and watch the boats of the Fyre Drill ride float around.

We next planned to walk over to Hiccup’s Wing Gliders, but on our way, we noticed that Astrid was out talking to people. The kids went and chatted with her, wondering how she managed to keep Hiccup in line. She agreed that it was hard work and did a superb impression of Hiccup, shrugging shoulders and all.

Hiccup’s Wing Gliders promised an 85-minute wait time. Thankfully, most (not all) of that wait was out of the hot sun (and it looks like we ultimately waited more like 70 minutes for our ride). The notion is that Hiccup has made a contraption, as he is wont to do, so that would-be dragon-riders would have a way to safely test their skills before mounting an actual dragon. As you make your way through the queue, you see signs telling you about various dragons, some providing flight instruction, and some maps and such as well. As you get closer, you see some work-shop looking areas, complete with Toothless’s prosthetic tail fin.

The ride itself is a roller coaster. Toward the beginning, you’re presented with a large animatronic Toothless with his arm poised over a giant button, and it’s as much warning as anyone could hope for ahead of a launch. You sort of slalom along the across the water, leaving you with the impression that you are on a simulated dragon flight. At one point, you slow down going through an area where gronckles are nesting. Hiccup warns that this is not a good place to stop because their eggs explode when they hatch. You don’t quite make it up the hill following the nesting area and wind up sliding right back into the explosion threat. Luckily Hiccup and Toothless quickly launch you forward and you zip away from potential disaster. All in all, I thought this one was a lot of fun. Maya was delighted – I think this ride was her favorite.

We went to the 1:25p showing of The Untrainable Dragon. The notion is that a new dragon has been welcomed to Berk and is proving to be a little unruly. This huge dragon puppet looks amazing onstage. And the stage looks incredible as well, with digital projections augmenting physical people, puppets, and settings beautifully. Story-wise, after some fits and starts, we find out that her egg is in the hatchery. Once she’s reunited with it, order is restored.

On Universal’s website, in looking recently, I was presented with this fun fact, “Toothless soars above the audience, weighing in at 1,157 pounds, with a wingspan of nearly 27 feet.” Alas, we got no Toothless flyover – it must not have been functioning on the day we were there. I had been looking forward to seeing that, and it would have made an already visually arresting show even more amazing. Oh well.

Next we had a little refreshment. Mom and Dad tried one of the specialty beers of the land, Stoick’s Ale – a wildflower honey white ale. Then we walked, beers in hand, back to Celestial Park to get the kids some soup dumplings. And then we bit the bullet and got into line for Dragon Racer’s Rally. It was maybe a 45-minute wait to ride, and then we were each loaded into our winged training dragon.

This is a standard lift-you-up-and-spin-you-in-a-circle ride, but with an added feature. The rider controls the tilt of each of their dragon wing separately, and if you maneuver it the right way, you can barrel-roll your dragon. I had no intention of doing so. I hung out and enjoyed the breeze and the view and mostly left my wings alone, other than some experimental puttering, just to see what they’d do. If anyone else in my party attempted the barrel roll, they only had maybe 3 or 4 revolutions of the ride’s central spin to figure it out. It was over so, so quickly. For me, this probably isn’t one I’d bother with again.

It was pretty hot by this point in the afternoon, so we went and got icees and a coke and sat and cooled down a little bit. Then, we got into line to meet Toothless. The line was long but moved pretty quickly. There was a point where Hiccup and Astrid were both there, but by the time it was our turn, Snotlout was helping people interact with Toothless. Toothless was adorable, of course, and Maya seemed very happy to meet him, which was fun. The kids were both astonished at how rubbery he felt.

We headed back over to Super Nintendo World after this so that the kids could try to earn the rest of their keys so they could go fight Bowser Junior. I don’t know. I was mostly along for the ride. They earned what was required to enter Bowser’s castle. I don’t remember the challenge particulars, but it was neat to walk through.

The Epic Universe enthusiast might notice that we haven’t yet gone on one of the more popular riders – Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge. Since we rope-dropped Mine-cart Madness, we didn’t get to Bowser’s Challenge before the line grew. I don’t think there was any point during this day that the terrible wait time worked for us. And as our second day wore on, we chose to do things we enjoyed rather than wait in that infernal line.

Having made that choice, we now had time to go back to Das Stakehaus and have the dinner we were too late for yesterday. I’m so glad that we did. The ambiance was menacing and the food was delicious. It was all good, but my favorite were the Darkmoor Black Wings. They were chicken wings, but however they were prepared, they were dark and ominous and so, so delicious.

Maya didn’t want anything at Das Stakehaus but she desperately wanted another mac n cheese cone sans goldfish crackers. After the rest of us were done, we hustled over to Hooligan’s Grog and Grill to order that for Maya’s dinner. Ian puttered around in the play area while the rest of us waited for her food. And she enjoyed it very much.

Then, we did one more ride on Hiccup’s Wing Gliders (Maya’s favorite), which was cool after dark because you could see the about-to-explode gronckle eggs cracking and glowing. And then we waited in line to ride Stardust Racers again (Ian’s favorite). The day before, we rode on the yellow track of the two racing coasters. This time, we lined up for green. The lights on this ride make it absolutely gorgeous at night, and it was kind of fun to watch it while we waited.

We ended our evening back in the Wizarding World at Bar Moonshine for one final round of Butterbeers for the kids and Lobe Blasters for the ‘rents. Then we stood and watched a little bit of the evening fountain show. It was an evening well-spent, and I feel good about our choice to skip the very long wait at Bowser’s Challenge to do these things instead.

The kids didn’t want to wait for the shuttle bus back to the hotel, so they walked back with me while Sean took the bus back. We got there first, but not by much.

Epic Universe is an incredible park. The lands are amazing and brilliantly detailed. Super Nintendo World isn’t really my jam, but I can appreciate how very much you felt as though you had entered the video game world of the Mushroom Kingdom.

I don’t think I would have enjoyed it nearly as much if we had tried to squish it into a single day. Being able to enjoy the food and soak in the ambiance and play with the interactive wands and power bands and not feel rushed was very pleasant (and admittedly indulgent).

I was frustrated with the length of the lines. Not that it impacted us, but at one point, the Ministry of Magic ride was showing a FOUR HOUR wait time. One thing that aggravated us a little was that if you mobile order meals (which is the standard way of ordering quick service food), you can’t make any adjustments to your food. I was disappointed at the things that weren’t functioning. A fiery windmill and a giant swooping Toothless are part of the magic that we missed out on. There were several challenges in Super Nintendo land that were closed and so we couldn’t use power bands on them. Luckily, the rides were more or less all functioning. Mild disappointments aside though, I think we all really enjoyed that trip. The new park may have some kinks to work out, but it will look brilliant while doing so, and will leave you well entertained and well fed.