USA 2019 - 5th April Day 14 - Hell-A A Day at Universal Studios

Today see’s us spend a day at Universal Studios, Hollywood.

Day 14

Today we started in – Santa Monica
We finished in – Santa Monica
Miles travelled today – 43
Miles so far this trip – 1469
Tonight we are staying at – Doubletree Hilton Santa Monica

We have an early start to Universal today.

We checked the maps yesterday, and we’re warned it could be tough. Traffic was brutal in some places and the 12 mile drive took us over an hour. It could have been worse.

If we thought we spent a lot of time getting there, it was nothing compared to what we could have spent in dollars when we got there.

Table of Contents

A Day at Universal Studios is a bit expensive!

A summary of what we could have spent, but didn’t.

$13 for a beer. That is not a typo.

THIRTEEN DOLLARS!!

$52 dollars for a plastic Harry Potter wand. A mere $46 if you don’t want it to do any “magic” in the village.

How about renting them. Five buck for 30 minutes, let the kids have their fun then take them back and use them again.

What we did have to spend was $33 on Hot Dog and fries, Burger and Fries and 1 coke. And $25 for parking.

This is after the plus $300 spent on tickets.

That’s the rant over. Now for the fun stuff.

And the important stuff. Max enjoyed it. He loved the Minions, though the Hippo Harry Potter rollercoaster was his favourite. The 3 rides, one after the other proved that.

He met Shrek and donkey, albeit reluctantly and at arms length. Transformers, our favourite, was a little grown up for him at 4 years old.

Lots of queues, during a day at Universal Studios

We spent about 6 hours in total there, and the queue for the more popular rides, Simpsons, Harry Potter etc were approaching 90 minutes. Not wanting to spend almost a third of our time queueing, we passed on these.

We did take the Universal Tour bus. informative and good fun, we all enjoyed the stories and the odd ride / attraction it took us through.

Max approved.

We left the park at tea time, and enjoyed a Hard Rock tea, before driving home.

As in 2013, we did decided to take a trip along Mulholland Drive. We were blessed with finding a parking space, which is no mean feat when you only have the chance of grabbing one of about five!

Beautiful Views

The views didn’t disappoint, and I managed to get some great photos, precariously balancing my camera on the wall for the 20 or so seconds it took to take some of these shots.

One more detour was required. Sunset Strip. For no other reason to say we did, and to check out some of the venues where lots of great rock groups cut their teeth. Whiskey A Go-Go and The Roxy were the main ones.

Heavy Traffic. $13 beers. Screaming kids and 90 minute queues.

Hell-A for sure