Fall 2018 Theme Park Trip-Day 14

Last day at Universal?

Today is the day for Halloween Horror Nights (HHN) event so it's going to be a long day.

Up at 6am to get ready and walk over for early entry at 7am. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is really an amazing place. Something that I noticed is there are all these little mechanical flourishes all throughout and the are all still working, at least the ones that I remember. The one possible exception was the Whomping Willow on the Forbidden Journey ride. Don't know if that has done the Everest Yeti at Disney or if it was just not working when I rode it. But all the little animations in the stores and windows were still performing routinely.

Spending time just walking around and looking at the details is always a lot of fun.  Eventually I ended up in the area where lots of characters come out you can interact with them. Most of them engage slightly, get the picture and then onto the next guest. I really need to compliment the person playing Shaggy from Scooby Doo. He was pulling people in really getting engaged with them. For me he asked where I'm from and the response, as usual, got a big reaction. We got into the discussion and we eventually parted with one last question....Pineapple on pizza? I said no. He said anything would go on a pizza!

Something I've tried to do is monitor the amount of steps/mileage that I've been doing. Unfortunately, if you don't get the numbers before the end of the day, you don't get a summary, but individual sessions broken down and I've discovered that the numbers don't add up.  But I ended up walking back and forth twice to the hotel and all the attractions. But some steps aren't recorded as the cell phone gets locked up before all of the queue walking and steps in certain attractions. The queues for the mazes were crazy long and from the best I can figure I did about 13 very sweaty miles.

For the first time on the trip which I think was because the day was so long, the chaffing started about 10 pm during the horror event. Luckily, earlier in the evening I met up with another former co-host from In the Loop and the discussions helped keep my mind off of the pain. It was great to see Will again and grateful and thankful that he took time out of his schedule to meet up in the park.

This was my second HHN and some of the same issues I had the first time occurred again. Stayed in the park in a lock down zone and even with being in the first group going to the first house before the public was let it, the Stranger Things house was still a 45 minute wait. I saw the movie Killer Clowns from Outer Space about a month ago and really loved the scare zone. Unfortunately, Bill and Ted were no longer populating the stage and I head from several people that the Academy of Villains show was OK but wouldn't be missing anything if you didn't see it.  Overall an enjoyable event.

On the way out of the event, they were asking people to take a survey. I finished and they were asking for statistical information. I got to where they asked gender, they only listed male and female. I was thanked by a manager type when I finished and pointed out that in the city of New York, they officially have 31 genders and why were they not being inclusive by including all of them in their survey. He kinda looked at me and just said thank you for the feedback.

Once I got back to my room I was glad to get the sweat soaked clothing off and start to get comfortable. When I went to write down some more notes  about the resort, I discovered that my notes had disappeared and a new note was there saying "We are very sorry we are already on track to solve your problems." The iPad in the room has a chat feature and I reported that my notes were missing, they were incomplete and that I wanted them back. Within minutes, they chatted back that someone from housekeeping would be in touch in the morning. Finally was able to hit the sack about 2am. Again, it was a long day!

Tomorrow (actually later today) is another transition day, but more importantly, it's a night to go see Yehaa Bob over at the River Roost at Port Orleans Riverside.