Harry Potter World [proximity to Disney World]

[punkyv]

Does any one know the proximity of Harry Potter to WDW?
Thanks!
:o)

[The old man]

Google Maps (http://maps.google.com/)

[roosterroo]

20 to 30 mins drive depending where you are staying

[jengold29]

You need to factor in at least 30 minutes for the drive (there can be traffic) and then there's a hike from the Universal parking to the parks. There are people movers but once you get to CitiWalk there's still a walk.

[punkyv]

Can we do Harry Potter in a day or do we need 2 days? Anyone know?
Thanks for all the info thus far! :o)

[yellowrosedtxn]

It depends on your goals. You can do Harry Potter in half a day... depending on when you go. If you go first thing in the morning, you can get the Journey ride done. That is the major ride and a lot of fun. There are only three rides in the area, the shops are cool to visit but they fill up FAST because they are small, so you find yourself waiting in lines.

I only say this because when we went, the Harry Potter part had only been open two or three weeks. Again, a lot depends you go (during the year).

[roosterroo]

In november we have done both universal parks most rides in one day including forbidden journey, we dont have any kids with us though. Started at hulk and worked our way round getting to harry potter by lunch. Hippogriff ride had a huge wait so we gave it a miss as its only a tiny coaster. If you dont do the dragon rides still walk up the queue line to see whomping willow and rons parents car. The wait for the wand shop experience was twice as long as main ride!

[punkyv]

Thank you all...I feel better that we can fit it into our Disney trip. Did you use the deal mentioned to buy the pass for both parks w/ Meers transport tossed in or do you find your own way there?

[roosterroo]

we had a car last year as only 2 or us, we also got to buy a 14 day pass in the uk for both parks that was cheaper than a 2 day ticket bought at universal we knew we would do at least 2 trips there so it made sense. also is you do want to do everything fast you can purchase a sort of fast pass upgrade to your tickets so you can go to the front of lines. rip ride rockit and harry potter forbidden journey are not included though.

[punkyv]

Hello,
Does anyone know the best way to get to IoA (Harry Potter) for one day from WDW?
Thanks!!! :o)

[roosterroo]

you can get a lynx bus from downtown disney that runs up international drive, i think you have to change and is a bit of a faff, mears motor shuttles or taxis from hotels, or hire a car from dolphin hotel for a day its a 10 min walk from hollywood studios, but remember to add in the cost of parking for the day and petrol. someone on here is bound to know the rough price of a taxi which is probably the easiest option as its door to door so you don't waste any precious ride time.

[tappenfeat]

So, our Universal trip turned into a WDW trip with one day at Universal...LOL!!!

We want to get the two parks in one day tickets. This should be enough, right?

We did Sea World in one day. It was enjoyable, but it was enough for us.

Can't wait to see HP World!!!! ahhhhh!!!!!! :D:D:D

Does anyone recommend the Three Broomsticks to dine at?

[oregontraveler]

So, our Universal trip turned into a WDW trip with one day at Universal...LOL!!!

We want to get the two parks in one day tickets. This should be enough, right?

We did Sea World in one day. It was enjoyable, but it was enough for us.

Can't wait to see HP World!!!! ahhhhh!!!!!! :D:D:D

Does anyone recommend the Three Broomsticks to dine at?

The short answer for 2 parks in 1 day... depends on how much you want to see. From what I've read, its possible but doubtful you would accomplish
everything on your list. I also noticed you are going down in late August,
peak season. That'll only add to the crowd factor. You might be better off
with the Studios park first since they are open 9am-6pm. IOA is open 9am-8pm that week. I've read trip reports that said the Potter Lines were pretty light in late evening.

[tappenfeat]

We are more interested in HP World...and we all don't do the over the top roller coasters. I'm ok with not seeing "everything"...just enjoying whatever we take in.

But, thanks for the tips on the hours. That helps!

[rph13]

So, our Universal trip turned into a WDW trip with one day at Universal...LOL!!!

We want to get the two parks in one day tickets. This should be enough, right?

We did Sea World in one day. It was enjoyable, but it was enough for us.

Can't wait to see HP World!!!! ahhhhh!!!!!! :D:D:D

Does anyone recommend the Three Broomsticks to dine at?

We were at Universal last June (the orginial opening weekend of HP world) and it was crowded but really only in HP world the rest of the parks were pretty empty.

We had a breakfast package at Three Broomsticks and really did NOT like the food or the set up. We were very glad it was "free" with our package. I don't know if things have improved since we went but I would not chose this again. I would go in and look around get a butterbeer or drink in the bar (which is attached) because it is a cool place to check out. but the food was very subpar, even worse than most Universal places. (I'm not crazy about the food at Universal)

We spent 3 1/2 days at the HardRock Hotel and total park time was most likely 2 to 2 1/2 days, rest was at the Hotel pool (it was really, really hot). But we do all the rides and had to wait in some long lines at HP world the first afternoon, it was a Saturday and there were multiple tour groups in the park, waiting to get into HP world. The park was restricting how many people could be in HP world at any one time.

[tappenfeat]

Very helpful! Thank you!!! I wanted to wait for as long as I could to see HP world. I kept hearing how crowded it was...I will hope for the best while we visit.

As far as the Three Broomsticks...hmmm...I wouldn't want to spend the money if the food isn't good. Thanks for the tips. Can't wait to try a butterbeer!

[rph13]

ok, I reached out to a friend that has been to HP world more recently and she said that they have had lunch and dinner at the Three Broomsticks and the chicken dinners are good but the second time they went the portions seemed smaller. She has a 16 year old son so that was not a good thing.
She recommends it for the atmosphere but not really for the food and indicated that there isn't too many better choices food wise at that park.

[tappenfeat]

ok, I reached out to a friend that has been to HP world more recently and she said that they have had lunch and dinner at the Three Broomsticks and the chicken dinners are good but the second time they went the portions seemed smaller. She has a 16 year old son so that was not a good thing.
She recommends it for the atmosphere but not really for the food and indicated that there isn't too many better choices food wise at that park.

Thank you for the update on the Three Broomsticks. I'd really like to try it for the atmosphere as well. Maybe just order appy's and a dessert and skip the entrees! ;)

[Gretchen McVan]

I found an article that said Mears would pick up from WDW and transport to IOA w/ one day two park ticket for 114. Has anyone done this?

[aidensdaddy]

Can we do Harry Potter in a day or do we need 2 days? Anyone know?
Thanks for all the info thus far! :o)


It depends on your goals. You can do Harry Potter in half a day... depending on when you go. If you go first thing in the morning, you can get the Journey ride done. That is the major ride and a lot of fun. There are only three rides in the area, the shops are cool to visit but they fill up FAST because they are small, so you find yourself waiting in lines.

I only say this because when we went, the Harry Potter part had only been open two or three weeks. Again, a lot depends you go (during the year).

Yes, it really does depend on what you have planned. First off, its not that long of a drive from the freeway. Its only a few minutes drive if there is no traffic. If you're staying on the WDW resort, whether that be the GF or the Poly, it could take you a couple of minutes to leave the resort to get to the 4 freeway. Once you're on that, its only a few minutes drive, if there is no traffic. Just know this. The directions on the 4 are kind of weird. It says west to Tampa, east to Orlando. Which is really more like North to Orlando, and South to Tampa. But to head to Universal from Disney World, then go towards Orlando.

My family and I went to Universal a little over a week ago. I haven't posted a trip report about it because we were only there for half a day and I thought it would be a waste of time. But I'll take the time to put my brief review about it here. I'm a big Harry Potter fan and I've been wanting to go to the park for quite some time. But I'm also a bigger Disney fan, going to a lot of the Disney parks, mainly Disneyland, and my standards are based on that.

When you go to Universal, even if you get there at opening, there are always going to be a lot of people that get to the Potter area before you, for some reason. But the Harry Potter area is in the back corner of the park, and there is a LOT of walking. Like Yellow Rose or someone stated, there is a long walk from the parking structure alone. I would recommend Valet Parking, if you can afford it. It drops you off right near the entrance to City Walk. But then there is the 5 minute walk through City Walk to get to the park entrances. The way it is set up, if you walk towards the left, you get to the entrance to the Islands of Adventure Park, where Potter is. The long way around to the right, near the Hard Rock Cafe and the tall red colored Rock It Coaster, is the entrance to the main park where all the shows are. And in Islands, there is only one way into Potter, and one way out, which provides the people at Universal a good amount of crowd control. The entrance goes into what is supposed to be Hogsmeade outside of Hogwarts Castle on the grounds. The front of the Hogwarts Express is right there at the entrance. As for the rest of Hogsmeade, I'll cover my thoughts on the rest of that in a few moments.

Now, there are only three rides here in this themed area. The dragon coaster, all outside. The flight of the hippogriff, kind of a kiddy coaster, and the one that EVERYONE goes for, the Forbidden Journey ride which is inside the castle.

The thing about this ride, is one of a couple rides in the entire park that does not allow bags or personal belongings on it, you must leave them with someone at the gate or place them in lockers, which are provided just after you go inside within the line. Now here's the thing about the line. It is one of those interactive queues that from what I was told, is like a museum. By the time we got there last week, the line was already 30 minutes long. And it was also very dark inside. There are lights, but they are very dim. And we missed most of the line because after you get inside, they do offer a single riders line, which helped my friend and I to bypass at least 20 minutes of the wait. It was a shortcut to upstairs, to lead us to the "split" of the queue just around the corner from the loading area. We got to see a couple of the talking portraits and the Sorting Hat before getting to the loading area. This ride is a gondola ride, but its like a cross between Star Tours & the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland & the X2 ride at Magic Mountain in California. There are things that pop out at you from the walls, and images projected on the walls to give you the feeling of flying. But the gondola you're in, has you flying at all angles. It's a wicked ride, to which I had no expectations going into, and it exceeded all my expectations. It is not for the faint of heart, and there are seats outside the gate that allow you to see if you will fit inside the seat. We didn't go on the other 2 rides because the lines were too long.

As for the village. There is only one main path or road that goes from the entrance gate to the castle, and that's it. Besides the three rides, there are other attractions there. Two of which are small, streetside shows. The triwizard rally & the Frog choir, both which perform at this curved wall that you pass on your way to the castle. There are the two eateries there, the Hogs Head where you can buy the Butterbeer. And the Three Broomsticks which is a counter type service restaurant. The rest of the village are the shops, some of which you cannot actually enter, one of them being one outside the Broomsticks which has a screeching baby Mandrake in the window. There is the owlery, a covered seating area with owls among the rafters, all audio animatronic - not real. This is outside one of the few shops you can get into, if you're willing to wait in a long line. One shop outside the Hogs Head is Honeydukes, the candy shop. The one next to the Owlery I have forgotten the name, can only be entered from the back, but its a shop you can buy Potter souvenirs. Another one is Ollivanders, but you can't actually buy any wands there. When we got there, the line to get into his shop was over an hour long. Why? Because this is where they have the "wand chooses you." Basically the Harry Potter experience. I think there was a Zonko's shop as well, but I'm not sure. Now, there is a place you can buy wands, and it is at the end of the road between the castle and the hippogriff ride. It can tend to get kind of long, but there are plenty to choose from and its worth the buy. Its basically a cart towards the end of the road. There is a shop within the castle as you exit that ride, and I'll cover more on that in a moment.

Here's my take on the area, and this is where my standards fit in. When I walked in at first, being the Potter fan that I am, I was impressed. There was snow on the roofs and it felt like you were actually there. We went straight for the Forbidden Journey ride, just walking to the other end. Now, whether if it was the size of the crowds that morning, or if it was the way the area was designed & built, it was REALLY cramped to me. For example, the shop within the castle, I could barely walk in there. In my opinion, they either chose a poor place to have a shop right at the exit of a ride, or they simply didn't provide enough room. It was EXTREMELY cramped in there. They had the exit from the ride, the small shop with a few counters, and the photo viewing & purchasing counter from the ride all within this small room. The shop next to the Owlry, you have to enter from the back and they do have a line because its so cramped in there as well, they can only allow a certain number of people in. Now I can remember the shops in the books being described as small at Diagon Alley and at Hogsmeade and if Universal was intending to make them as such. Or if they just didn't anticipate the size of the crowds that would come to the park on a daily basis. But they certainly had the room to expand and allow for larger rooms and areas so they won't be cramped. I would hate to be there when a hurricane came through. I am used to Disney having room to walk, shops with breathing room even the ones that have a ride exit into them, but at least there was room to breathe and walk. Universal outdid Disney when it came to the ride in the castle. But as far as the rest of the corner of that park, it could use some rethinking.

We eventually left and went to the rest of the park. The Jurassic Park area looked nice and made me want to go home & watch the first movie, which I did a few days later. The Pteranodon Flyers, which looks like a fun ride, is mainly for kids and as an adult, you have to have kid go on with you. Mine is only 4 years old, not big enough, and wouldn't have liked it so we had to miss out. We got to the Super Hero Island which was nice, but I found it kind of weird. Knowing that Marvel is now owned by Disney and this was not a Disney park. We toured the shops before going to Dr Seuss land for a bit, before exiting that park to go to the other one for a bit. And left eventually after lunch.

Depending on what you want to see and what you want to do, you may be able to do just the Universal Studios park in half a day IF you don't want to see everything. That one mostly has shows and a couple of rides; Simpsons, Men In Black, Mummy, ET, Twister, and the Rockit Ride. The best place to eat is the International Food & Film Festival which has American, Asian, and Italian in a large comfortable eating area that tends to be less crowded than the 50's style diner known as Mel's Drive In. Islands has more of the rides, and if you do everything, it could take you all day. We got both done within half a day because we didn't do a whole lot. Good thing too, because what started as a sunny morning turned into nasty storms close to hurricane level by early evening.

And a small heads up. If you'd like to see a good amount of Potter merchandise, and don't want to be smooshed when doing so, go to the Studios park. Right near the entrance, across from the Rockit Ride, there is the Universal Studios store, their largest gift shop. They do have Potter merchandise here. But if you plan on buying the Hogwarts robes, bear in mind they are nearly $100 each.

[aidensdaddy]

In november we have done both universal parks most rides in one day including forbidden journey, we dont have any kids with us though. Started at hulk and worked our way round getting to harry potter by lunch. Hippogriff ride had a huge wait so we gave it a miss as its only a tiny coaster. If you dont do the dragon rides still walk up the queue line to see whomping willow and rons parents car. The wait for the wand shop experience was twice as long as main ride!

Dang, I guess we missed the Willow & the car. One thing I did notice that wasn't there, or at least I didn't see it, was the Shrieking Shack.

[aidensdaddy]

Hello,
Does anyone know the best way to get to IoA (Harry Potter) for one day from WDW?
Thanks!!! :o)


You're better off renting a car, I believe.

[punkyv]

Thank you Aidensdaddy for all the info! Very helpful, concise & I feel we can accomplish our goals in the time I have allotted.

[aidensdaddy]

You're always welcome. Good luck and have fun.

[mousecanuck]

I second Aidensdaddy on the International Food & Film Festival to eat in Universal; we all (including fussy 12 yr old) enjoyed what we got there, reasonable prices too. At Islands of Adventure, we liked Comic Strip Cafe - pretty much exactly the same stuff as at International so nothing fancy but good enough. I'd heard Three Broomsticks food wasn't great so we didn't even try; we did, however, go in for a butterbeer and had a good look around then, even seeing Dobby's shadow a couple of times.

As I understand it, JK Rowling insisted on complete control of the attraction (apparently Disney at one point was in talks with her to create it but as she wouldn't give this up, there was no deal made and she eventually went with Universal. She also insisted that it be as authentic as possible and though there are some details that are muddled (Ollivanders, for example, is not in Hogsmead, it's in Diagon Alley, but they only made one 'town' for the attraction), she wanted things small and tight, just like in the books and movies. It was crazy - the line up for Ollivanders was much longer much quicker to form than Forbidden Journey; it lead into Dervish and Banges, which also had a line formed pretty quickly in the am. Honeydukes was the same and it lead into Zonko's. All had team members at the exits to prevent people from going in these doors. Later, however, (in the early evening) the lines were down for the shops (they cut off the line to Ollivanders about 45 minutes before closing so they can get the last few groups through, though the line is already considerably shorter at that point) so we could walk in everywhere except Ollivanders; we did do the line and see someone's wand choose them, then went into the ridiculousely crowded area next to it where you could choose your own wand. It was nuts - people were pressed up against the walls trying to see the different wands; if you went in further (past the cash) you could purchase a character replica (ie. Harry Potter's wand, or Dumbledore's or other significant characters). This (as mentioned) leads into Dervish and Banges, and there was still more stuff. Most clothing (in all the stores) was Griffindor, then some Slytherin and very little Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff (there were pins and bookmarks and other things, too, but the latter two houses offered very limited selection; I was trying to get something for a friend's daughter who is a Ravenclaw fan and it wasn't easy!) Everything is quite pricey, more (I think) than most other areas and souvenirs in Universal (hats, mugs & T's were more in HPland).

There were virtually no line ups for Dragon Challenge or Flight of the Hippogriff (wait times never got above 25 minutes for the big coaster and I think 10 or 15 for the little one, which was very cool for a small coaster - really fast and loopy!) As mentioned by a previous poster, the line ups tend to die out a lot in the last few hours of the day, though Forbidden Journey's stayed long until quite close to the end. A couple of times when we went on the wait times were considerably shorter than posted (in all of Universal) but no guarantees; not sure if they add time so you're pleasantly surprised or just inaccurate the times we were there.

Anyhow, you could do Wizarding World easily in a few hours if you hit it at the right time of day. As we stayed on site, we had Express Pass for everything else (except Rip Ride Rocket) so we went on our favorites a few times and I can't say for certain how long it'd take you without this perk. We were there during potentially the second busiest season, spring break, but it didn't seem all that busy (but spring break is really spread out this year due to such a late Easter). We had three days and Express Pass perk - would have still liked one more day to do some of the shows we missed, and we skipped some of the kiddy rides as well. But I really loved it - HP was awesome!!!