The travel gods were looking out for us again (plus it was early Sunday morning) so we encountered no traffic or issues on our way. By 10:30am we were checked in, through security, and at our gate. One two-hour, uneventful flight later and we were back in sunny (warm!) Florida.

By 2pm we were back home and ready to relax. My daughter and I had a great time on our trip but tomorrow it’s back to work and school.

For lunch we hung out at the tailgate party (although I did have to snag a veggie sub from a nearby Subway for my daughter the vegetarian) and then it was time for the band concert, uh, I mean, football game. It was a perfect day for football: low 60s and sunny, but way too windy, which made it feel colder. I used my Gorillapod to create trumpet-cam (video here) as we played with the student band in the stands and for the halftime show. It wasn’t much of a football game, though, as Flyers beat Davidson 28-0. It was nice to catch up with old friends during the game, though.

For dinner, we met up with my family and more friends at Young’s Jersey Dairy where we let the kids run through the corn maze:

Before grabbing some ice cream (the only real reason for going to Young’s ).

It was another long, but fun day, as we got back to our hotel by 10:30pm. Tomorrow we have to get up early to catch our flight back home.

We had an 8am flight out of Tampa so we were up early and at the gate by 7:15am. Before boarding the plane my daughter realized she didn’t have any “new” reading material so we whipped out her Kindle and made a quick purchase over the 3G wireless. Very convenient!

Our flight into CVG was smooth and uneventful. Since all of our luggage was carry-on we were off the plane, on the shuttle bus, and in our rental car within 30 minutes of landing. We made a few stops in the Cincinnati area to see our old stomping grounds and made it to the Dayton area around lunch time. We weren’t able to get early check-in to the hotel so we grabbed lunch at Marian’s and then headed to campus to do a little shopping at the bookstore and walk around to see all the changes.

The computer labs sure have changed since I was in school!

Later that afternoon we were finally able to check into our hotel and rest (by now we had been up since before 6am). Refreshed, we met my brother and sister-in-law at the Rusty Bucket for dinner before heading back to campus for the evening alumni reception. I was a little disappointed that there was not a large showing from my class years, but I guess that’s to be expected as the years go by.

We have another early morning tomorrow, starting with band rehearsal, so it’s time to get some sleep.

At 10:30am, we drove over to the Peabody Hotel near the convention center to see the march of the ducks. It’s quite a sight to see a family of mallard ducks waddling down the red carpet from the elevators into the fountain in the hotel lobby.

Then it was back into the car and onto I-4 heading towards home. With only a brief stop for lunch (mmmm … Mellow Mushroom), we were back home by 3:00pm and began unpacking and getting ready to go back to school/work tomorrow. Another great Labor Day weekend mini-vacation is in the books.

For the past few years we’ve been Disney passholders and have spent a lot of time at the Disney parks. Now that I’ve spent a weekend at Universal, I noticed a lot of (obvious) similarities and a few other things I wanted to muse about.

Disney FastPass vs Universal ExpressPass Plus

Both parks have a different approach to “skipping” the long lines for their attractions. FastPass is included in your admission price to the Disney parks but Express Pass Plus is an (expensive) add-on, unless you’re staying at a Universal resort (which we did). I liked how with ExpressPass Plus you can get in line when you want (i.e., now) as opposed to FastPass which gives you a time window to return (and there’s also a limit on how many FastPasses will be distributed in a given day). Since it’s a paid add-on (and there are only a few Universal hotels), I think ExpressPass Plus definitely gets you through the lines faster than FastPass and the overall process seemed smoother.

Rides/Attractions

I also noticed similarities in the rides. I guess this should be no surprise as every “regular” amusement park has the same basic set of rides (ferris wheel, bumper cars, etc.) so why not these resorts? Disney has the teacups, Universal has the Storm Force Accelatron. Men in Black at Universal is a grown-up version of Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin. It seems obvious that the Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit roller coaster at Universal is targeted at fans of Aerosmith’s Rockin’ Roller Coaster at Hollywood Studios (I still prefer the latter). Like Disney, you can meet the different characters and get autographs at Universal, but you won’t find any princesses or fairies (well, except the Tinkerbell look-alike that gets slapped around in Shrek 4D).

Overall, I think there is less to do at Universal (discounting the fact there are only two parks instead of four). Before we left on Friday, I had noticed that the park hours were only 9am – 7pm, which seemed short to me (compared to Disney where some parks are open past 10pm, sometimes as late as 1am!). It turned out not to be an issue, though, since both days we had done everything we wanted to do by the late afternoon. Part of that was our use of ExpressPass Plus, part was that the parks didn’t seem to be that crowded for a holiday weekend, but a big part was definitely that there just wasn’t as much to do or see as there is over at Disney.

I’m not complaining (I’ll do that elsewhere): we actually had a nice relaxing weekend without feeling stressed, or rushed, or pressured … and that’s what a vacation should be. Universal was definitely fun, but I’m looking forward to getting back to Disney next spring so I can ride the new Star Tours.

My daughter and I immediately got in line for Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey. It seemed like our wait was shorter overall than our Easter visit but we had more time to see the cool stuff inside the various waiting rooms in Hogwarts Castle (it actually snowed in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom). Definitely a cool ride. After that we hit the two rollers coasters (no lines for those!). By now the park was open to the public and Hogsmeade was starting to get crowded so we moved on.

The plan was to hit all of the water rides at once, so we were dressed in our casual “get wet” clothing. From Hogsmeade we walked over to Jurassic Park and rode the River Ride. My daughter wasn’t thrilled about the scary dinosaurs but the drop and resulting splash at the end was worth it. Slightly damp, we walked over to Toon Lagoon and rode Dudley Do-Right’s Ripsaw Falls, one of our favorite log flume rides. We still weren’t wet enough after that so finally we went on Popeye and Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges … twice! Completely soaked, we walked back to our hotel to change (as planned) but first let my daughter spend some time in the pool.

Showered, dry, and refreshed we walked back to the park to spend the rest of the day riding the rest of the rides (the Hulk coaster, Doctor Doom’s Fearfall, etc.) and seeing some of the shows we hadn’t seen before (The 8th Voyage of Sinbad and Poseidon’s Fury).

By 5pm we were done (again) with everything we wanted to do. We had 7:00pm dinner reservations over at CityWalk so we started walking back to our hotel to relax before dinner. As we were walking on the path back to the Royal Pacific, some dark clouds rolled in and we actually got caught in a downpour! Wet again (this time unplanned) we got back to our hotel and had time to freshen up and get dried off. It was still sprinkling at 6:30pm when it came time to walk back over to CityWalk, but we had umbrellas so that wasn’t really a problem.

Dinner at the Latin Quarter was pretty good, and filling. After eating, we wandered around the neon-lit spectacle of CityWalk for a bit before grabbing a nightcap at Starbucks and then catching the water taxi back to the hotel.

As usual, the weekend went fast … tomorrow we have to head back home.

We walked over from our hotel and were in line before the park opened at 9am. Through the gates, we made a beeline for the Hollywood Rip, Ride, Rockit roller coaster. The line was pretty short, and just by luck my daughter and I ended up in the front car. It’s a sweet coaster: you get to pick your own music from a list of about 30 songs (and apparently there are hidden tracks too) via a touchscreen in your seat and, as you can see from the photo, the first hill pulls you straight up while you rock out. Instead of the traditional over-the-head restraint system, it’s just a large lap bar, which at first seemed a little scary but it holds you in pretty well and frees up your arms. Every row in the train has a camera that records your ride and at the end you can purchase your own “music video” (more on that later). My daughter loved it so we got right back in line and rode it a second time while the line was still short.

My wife and daughter had been to Universal a few times over the summer and there were quite a few rides my daughter didn’t want to go on again (even with me!). Since I hadn’t been on some of these rides ever, I ended up doing a few by myself utilizing the single-rider line or Universal’s Express Pass Plus option (which we got for “free” since we were staying at a Universal hotel). It worked pretty well so I was able to go on Disaster (formerly Earthquake), Jaws, Men in Black, The Mummy (another cool roller coaster), and Twister (what’s with the cheesy cow-on-cables that flies by?) in relatively short order.

The Simpsons ride was cool, although I would have preferred it if was still Back to the Future (at least I got to see the DeLorean). The first part of E.T. freaked my daughter out (the chase through the woods), but she got a kick out of E.T. saying her name at the end.

By late afternoon we had pretty much done everything at the park we wanted to do so we headed back to the hotel so my daughter could do a little homework. We also all ended up taking a short nap, which was nice (yay, vacation!).

For dinner we went down to the Orchid Court sushi bar in the hotel and had a great, leisurely meal. Overall, it was a very pleasant day. The park was not very crowded and we were able to do everything we wanted to without feeling rushed or stressed.

Tomorrow, we brave the early crowds at Harry Potter.

After my daughter got out of school we packed the car and hit the road. It was mid-afternoon so traffic was relatively light (no major problems like last time). We got to our hotel (the Royal Pacific) shortly before 6:00pm, unpacked, and settled in.

It was dinner time, and we were hungry, so we walked over to CityWalk and ate at Pastamore’ (mmm … gnocchi). After dinner we walked around CityWalk a bit before grabbing some drinks at Starbucks and heading back to our hotel. We did a little exploring, checked out the pool area and various restaurants at the Royal Pacific and then retired to our room for the evening. One small annoyance with the hotel: the wireless internet access costs $9.95/day in your room, but is free out in the lobby/public areas. Grrr.

Tomorrow, we hit the parks (hopefully well-rested).

We grabbed a quick breakfast, checked out of our last hotel, and were on the road by 8:30am. At 10:15 we crossed the border back into Florida. After going around Jacksonville to I-10, we took the back routes, cutting south and west to meet up with I-75 around Ocala just after 12:30pm. Two hours later (after a quick stop to pick up grocerie), we were pulling into the driveway. Whew, we made it!

After unpacking and putting everything away, I cooked dinner out on the grill (what’s the Fourth of July without a barbecue?) and we ate outside on the lanai. We ended up being too tired to drag ourselves out again to deal with the crowds and traffic for fireworks, so we just watched some “personal” displays in the neighborhood. Happy Independence Day!

What a trip … over the past 10 days we drove just under 3,700 miles (about 660 miles less than last year) through 17 states, spending about 68 hours in the car (almost 3 full days!). The weather was fantastic, and we had no major problems. It was another successful family vacation roadtrip.

The Gas Cubby statistics from my iPhone are in the photo gallery below. My best tank was Tuesday (Grantville to Boston, 27mpg) but an overall average of 25mpg (with the AC on the entire time) for my 2003 Highlander with (now) over 140k miles on it is pretty good! Gas was expensive, but not as bad as back in 2008 when my cheapest tank was $3.88/gal (this year I didn’t pay above $3.80).

Stuffed with Virginia ham, grits, biscuits, and Miss Melinda’s pancakes, we drove over to Colonial Williamsburg and spent a little time walking around and doing a little shopping on DoG Street. Before leaving, we popped into the Cheese Shop and picked up some cheeses, bread ends, and the original house dressing for lunch in the car.

Like the last time last we came through these parts, we took the Jamestown Ferry over the James River to Surry and then continued on back roads until we hooked back up with I-95 south of Richmond.

By 2pm we were in North Carolina and at 4:30pm we crossed the border into South Carolina, still on I-95 (which we’ll be on tomorrow all the way to Jacksonville). We stopped for gas at South of the Border, which was packed with people buying enormous fireworks for tomorrow’s celebrations.

We pulled  into our hotel just north of Savannah around 7:4pm and checked in. We hadn’t had dinner yet so we found a Ruby Tuesday’s a few miles away and went there for the salad bar.

Tomorrow, vacation ends, but we’ll be back home!

We bid farewell to my relatives at 12:30pm and hit the road once more. Based on their advice, we steered clear of New York City and took I-287 back over the Tappan Zee bridge and around and down into New Jersey like we had done on the way up. This time we hit a little more traffic around the toll plazas, but it wasn’t too bad (hopefully it was a better route than taking I-95 straight through).

At 4:15pm we were crossing into Delaware and about an hour later, in Maryland, we made a special side trip in Baltimore to drive past Charm City Cakes (much to the delight of my daughter who loves “Ace of Cakes“). The rest of the evening’s drive was uneventful (and unremarkable). About 30 minutes from our hotel in Glen Allen, VA, we called the local Red Robin and placed a takeout order for dinner. By 8:30pm we were checked into our hotel (the nicest room yet!) for the evening and enjoying dinner while watching “Minute to Win It” on television.

It’s hard to believe we’ll be back home in two more days.