I’m back to share more of our California family vacation!! If you didn’t see yesterday’s post, Part 1 of our family vacation, you can find it here: Our California Family Vacation, Part 1.
So, after Knott’s Berry Farms, we took a day off for relaxing, then headed out bright and early for Universal Studios. I had never been there before and couldn’t wait to check it out! Plus, I had heard all about the new Harry Potter World, and I knew my kids would LOVE that.
We tried to pick a day of the week to go, when it wouldn’t be too crowded. I believe we went on a Thursday, during the school year too. We thought we were safe! Ugh, we were wrong! It was super-duper crowded, we could barely walk and it was a little tricky to keep track of my 7 kiddos. BUT, what saved the whole experience is that for some reason, though the park was packed, people weren’t on the rides. There were so many rides that we could walk right on with little to no wait, it was great! I couldn’t figure out what the heck was going on, but it worked for us. We were definitely there for the rides…
… and the awesome characters walking around.
The special effects at this Water World show was pretty cool!
I just realized that I didn’t get any good pictures amongst all the Harry Potter stuff. That was definitely the most impressive part! The buildings looked EXACTLY like they came out of the movie and the shops were super cool. The kids loved the ride, we did that one several times (no wait!) The only thing we wouldn’t recommend was eating at the Harry Potter restaurant. We thought the extra money would be worth the experience of it, but really the experience just wasn’t there and the food was expensive and not that great. Oh, well. Everything else was pretty sweet though.
For as much fun as we had at Universal Studios, I’m pretty sure my kids would tell you that their favorite part was just playing at the hotel!
The pools at the resort were pretty amazing and my kids did NOT want to get out. EVER.
…except to hold Grace…
The resort was so huge that even Shane needed a little break from walking!
And, Benny ALWAYS needed a break from walking!
Ben developed a strange habit on this trip…
Our days were literally SO FILLED with fun that we all just crashed every night.
Check out Part 3 and I’ll tell you about our educational excursion and how we spent the final days of our California family vacation! If you’re interested in going on a similar family vacation, be sure to contact Get Away Today. They’re the BEST and know everything about everything!