I’m writing this on the morning of Day 4, we’re both shattered so this will be brief until I can complete it later.
We started the day by grabbing a pancake at the Ihop. Debora had some banana brioche and I had the New York Strawberry Cheesecake pancakes. Very tasty stuff. Breakfast have been the most expensive meals we’ve had so far though!
We decided to go see Universal Studios in the daylight this time. Again, it’s boiling hot, highs of 33 today, but thankfully the rides are mostly inside. Despicable Me had a long wait time so we decided to leave it until later, the line was still long later so we will go back to it next time we’re there. We are going back as we both saw some merch we liked.
The first ride we went on was Transformers. This happened to be the best of the day. In the world of motion simulators with 3D effects, this was by far the one that outshone the others – I hope Spidey can live up to it! We then went to Twister – very dated but still enjoyable. On the Disaster movie ride I was selected to be part of the volunteers who got filmed and spliced into a movie later. Much fun.
Men In Black was next, another rather dated ride but fun nonetheless. Then we were finally in Springfield. The time wasn’t on our side but the line for The Simpsons was short so we stopped there but will have to visit all the themed shops again later, like Moe’s, the Kwick-E-Mart and Krusty Burger. The Simpsons ride replaced the Back to the Future ride but it’s using exactly the same premise/machine and I didn’t think it did it as welll.
We saw some of Diagon Alley behind fences, it looks great and its a shame it’s not open! As the day drew to a close we went on Shrek 4D – yet another 3D in a dbox chair movie. Again, it’s probably had its day in the sun.
Then it was a quick trip to the hotel where we hopped in our cab and off to the middle of nowhere for NXT. Despite the tickets saying we could pick up at 5.30 they didn’t open the doors until 6.30. There was then no water other than a fountain and this really was like wrestling in a bingo hall.
Our taxi driver assured us we had to pay him in full, for both the outbound and return journey. I asked him how we knew he’d come back since he’d now been paid for both trips, but he promised he’d be back.
What added to the disappointment was the fact there was only two rows of chairs. When booking the tickets online it sounded so tempting to be sat front row in the “golden circle”, in reality, you could still be sitting in the second row, have exactly the same view, you just had a seat. There were more seats in rows around the entrance and on the opposite side of the ring but still.
The arena got quite packed, standing room only in fact and even that was probably over capacity. We were treated to a meet and greet before the show, but I didn’t recognise many people, hopefully they’ll be stars one day. I’m sure the Big Bambino will be, he has the look and the gimmick to succeed. The two people I did recognise were divas – Bailey and none other than the Divas Champion Paige. What a treat. We spoke to her and she said she thought we had to be British, we were so pale!
Aiden English was at the show – but he didn’t sing and was in tag action against The Ascension. What should have been a squash match was actually really long and English got some great offence on the go. The highlight however had to be Adam Rose! He came out, said his catchphrase, threw out some t-shirts and then left again, but still, fun!
About half way through the show some fans, dressed as bunnies entered. Everyone had a good laugh at them until they started misbehaving and were eventually thrown out – not sure what for. Adam Rose would then tweet that he hates it when bunnies turn bad.
After the show we waited outside for our ride back. We waited and waited…Eventually even the wrestlers were leaving – after being accosted by the groupies which we were now looking like we were! I tried calling but my phone wouldn’t work so we had to go to the general public. On our third attempt, we found someone willing to help us out and call a cab, but Siri appeared to be misbehaving and finding nothing but Mexican firms. Just as she found a local one, our driver turned up. Half an hour late. Thank you to the mystery helper, but damnit, had this been a bad night.
