Chapters
- Day 6: Word Of Advice Pt. 2
- Day 7: Stardust Racers CHANGED My Life.
- Day 8: And Back
- Photo(s) Of The Week (2/2)
Day 6: Word Of Advice Pt. 2
Do NOT go to Universal Studios Florida either.
Day 7: Stardust Racers CHANGED My Life.
After Universal Studios Flordia, my legs are LOCKED IN. On this trip, I kept asking my parents if we could just do a single rest day. They obviously said no, being the biggest ROI optimizers on Earth. I eventually realized that all we needed to do was go to one of the bad parks to get the rest we needed. It worked because the park was so bad that we always ended up leaving those bad parks really early.
Universal Studios Florida was SO BAD. The rides were just straight up terrible and were mostly screen rides. Screen rides are basically just a 4D movie theater that lasts for 2 minutes and for some reason has fifty minute long wait times. There was only one good ride there which was, “Revenge Of The Mummy. Fortunately, the line for that ride was really short. There was this “Harry Potter ride” that my mom repeatedly told us was really good. Turns out it must’ve been at a different Universal park because the Harry Potter ride in this park was just another screen ride.
When we went to Universal Studios Florida, it was raining a lot and also looked really gloomy. That probably explains why the lines were so short that day. Even though they were short, the rides were just straight garbage. We also bought a thirteen dollar caramelized apple which was a complete scam. I couldn’t even eat the apple itself because it would break my braces (and you know damn well I’m not risking my braces breaking when I’m so close to finishing). The buildings and aesthetics were also just terrible compared to Disney World.
After leaving, we went to eat at Costco for the second time this trip. Then… we fell asleep and prepared for Epic Universe.
Epic Universe was AMAZING. Apparently it was opened in 2025, which makes me wonder how terrible Universal must have been as a company before Epic Universe was a thing. Every ride was such a banger and the aesthetics were almost on par with Magic Kingdom. There were so many bathrooms everywhere just like Disney World which is surprisingly useful when you want to drink a lot of water. Orlando weather is no joke so it’s quite justified to drink at least a few bottles of water daily.
We decided to save the Super Nintendo Land for night time because we learned that theme parks have the best aesthetics at night time because of all the lights that turn on. Unfortunately, that might not have been the greatest decision because all of the meet n’ greet characters were leaving by the time we got there.
Super Nintendo Land was so immersive and cool that you just have to wonder how they managed to build it. I don’t really think there’s a point in my describing it because there’s so many viral videos of people reacting to it online. The rides were a little on the disappointing side since we didn’t go to the one that had a two hour line.
The rest was alright but not enough to excite me. I’m not sure why, but the only thing I’m looking for in theme parks are the extreme thrill rides. And the thrill ride that was finally able to scare me was the Stardust Racers. The line for this one was for some reason only ten minutes long, which I’m definitely not complaining about. The line was so short that we were considering running Stardust Racers back a couple more times. We didn’t end up going for a second or third time because we wouldn’t be able to check out everything and because my parents were waiting for us to finish the ride.
Stardust Racers was the first time I felt like I was going to fly out of my seat and be sent plummeting to my doom. I was pressed against my lap bar and on the ride, I had several times where I told myself, “That was enough, we can end it here.” It never ended. There were so many valleys and steep slopes that would catch me off guard every five seconds. It was enough to make me not want to go back on it. Apparently someone died on this rollercoaster, so that probably influenced my decision to not go for seconds.
That was basically it for the Epic Universe. I would definitely recommend checking it out if you’re in the Orlando area because it was the most unique theme park I’ve personally ever seen. There’s also so many good photos to take there. I managed to get my mom to buy me a souvenir from Epic: a silly Yoshi plush. It’s not really anything special but it just looked so silly that I HAD to cop it.
Islands of Adventure is NOT beating Epic Universe by the way.
Day 8: And Back
The final day.
I knocked out as soon as we got back to our motel room because of how good Epic Universe was. I did pack a little before I was out unconscious so I wasn’t stressed at all when I woke up 6 hours later. We had to pack all of our things before we headed out to Islands of Adventure since we were going to head straight for the airport as soon as we were done with the theme park.
This must be the least stressful trip in terms of packing for home. On almost every vacation that I’ve ever been on, I always suffered a tragic loss in some way. That could be losing a piece of clothing that I really liked or obliterating my glasses on the Go Kart track or even worse. The only loss I suffered on this trip was my power bank that took some negligible injuries. I was able to fit everything into my bags and even had extra space leftover somehow. I wasn’t nearly as anxious as I was when I was packing for the trip.
We went to McDonalds before making our way to Islands of Adventure. Tell me why the manager was so moody. We ordered a lot of large-sized smoothies and they were only filled to 60% of the entire cup. That pissed us off so much.
Islands of Adventure had a few really good thrill rides. It had The Incredible Hulk Coaster which launched us out of some tube and then it had the VelociCoaster. I forgot to mention how it rained so much every day during our trip. This was the only day where the rain interfered with us. It delayed the VelociCoaster for 2 hours right when we were about to board the dinosaur seats. We had to leave the theme park by 6:00 PM and I kept on pressing my family to leave since I wanted to get to the airport early so I could do some work (blog.). I gave them a final time of 5:30 PM before I was going to ditch them to go back to the car where my parents were already waiting. By some magic, there was a “good news” service announcement that told us that the ride would be clear to run again after some test launches. The VelociCoaster was a really good thrill ride and it was the fastest one that we went to. Unfortunately, since I was already in a pretty terrible mood from the 2 hour delay in line, it just didn’t hit the same level as StarDust Racers. Even though we were upside down and sideways for most of the ride, it didn’t give the same, “please end this” feeling that I wanted a thrill ride to have.
Going through the TSA at the Orlando airport wasn’t very stressful. Though, they took my backpack for inspection for no reason. The flight back was also very fast. I always thought every flight was a full-day adventure that you have to prepare a lot for but this one was so quick. My uncle drove my brother’s car so he could drive my family home while my aunt drove my cousin’s family and me to their house. I’m staying at their house while I attend college. But tell me why despite their house not being that good in quality, I felt such low cortisol in their house compared to my house. I definitely think the stressful meter of a house setting depends entirely on the parents of the house.
That’s it for the Orlando adventures! I hope those who read my journal entries liked them. If I have enough time, energy, and motivation, I might do a blog post separate from the journal entries describing whether or not a trip to the Disney and Universal theme parks are worth it. See you next week!
Photo(s) Of The Week (2/2)
Performative Frank 
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