Beginning our day with an unhealthy dose of gamma radiation on The Hulk ride, a giant green rollercoaster which propels you up a long dark tunnel and out into the sunshine with the wind whistling in your hair as if you’d stepped out into a force 10 gale. The giant coaster loops around 360 loops, down some steep inclines, twists in a barrel roll and sprays you with water vapour as you dive towards the lake. A thrilling experience, but for some a questionable use of the word “thrilling”!    (In the image below you can see the rollercoaster on the first down slope.)

From there, we headed (virtually) to New York and immersed ourselves in the world of Spider-Man. A giant VR ride which entangles you in a battle to save the city from the clutches of the Green Goblin and Dr Octopus. With clever use of 3D images, the rider can interact with Spiderman as he lands on the front of the car to welcome you and then highlight the danger.  And when Dr Octopus blasts you with a ray gun, you drop like a stone only to be saved by Spiderman.  At one point we were sprayed with water, blasted with jets of very hot air and crash-landed as Spiderman saves the city. 

Jurassic Park water coaster toured us through a land of dinosaurs but the excitement created when the velociraptors escaped could only be satisfied by riding Universal’s new(ish) ride VelociCoaster, a breathtaking rollercoaster as opposed to a VR ride which is common for this park due to limited space.  A highspeed chase along the twisting, looping track as we attempt to escape the raptor enclosure. The ride starts at a pace and has a good pace but halfway around you dive into a tunnel which accelerates you to over 70mph seconds before you climb a Stealth request arch, barrel roll and descend into a pair of twisting loops (to cries of “get me off this” from the matriarch of our party). Overall a breathtakingly fast ride which lives up to all the hype.

After leaving Jurassic Park, we entered the magical world of Harry Potter and once again rode a VR attraction. This time you ride/fly through the Potter Universe on your broomstick guided by Harry as you encounter and evade fantastic beasts. Liz had her eye on Hagrid’s Motorbike ride, and after depositing our baggage in the free lockers, we braved the long ride queue and crept at snail’s pace along the ride queue to the front of the line. At times the wait was excruciating and seemed to go on for an eternity, overall we think we queued for about 90 minutes. 

The ride has a few hidden “surprises”, where it supercharges you along the tracks without warning, propels you backwards, or drops you downwards. It was really fun but made some of our party squeal quite a lot!

Once we completed the ride, the park had closed due to Universal closing the park at 6:30pm which is way earlier than Disney. To avoid the crowds we drove 3 miles down the road to Denny’s for our usual refillable drinks. This evening our weary travellers dined on cheeseburgers, a chicken and bourbon skillet with seasonal veg and Chicken strips with rice and seasonal veg.