As we’ve been planning a trip to an amusement park, I’ve been thinking about different wild rides that I have been on over the years. And there have been quite a few that have been fun, exhilarating and a little bit scary!
There is a ride at Universal Studios Islands of Adventure in Florida that we originally had no plans to ride. But, it quickly became one of the best rides of that day!
When we visited the park, the Harry Potter area of the park had just opened. Being huge fans of the books and movies, we thought it would be fun to see what this park had to offer.
That was really the main reason we had decided to go to this park. And we figured that since it was a new section and we had heard all these stories about amazingly long lines, we’d only be spending out time in this section of the park.
Surprisingly, though, the lines were not too bad and we found ourselves with some time in the afternoon and early evening to visit the rest of Islands of Adventure.
We ventured over to the Jurassic Park section of the park.
The kids were not familiar with this movie, but seemed to still enjoy the idea of a dinosaur themed area. There was the Pternondan Flyers, a swing type ride for kids to experience a birds’ eye view of the land, there was a playground area, and there was a hands-on science area with cool features such as the area where you can test your DNA to find out what kind of dinosaur you would be or the nursery where you can see a baby velociraptor hatching.
By far, the wildest ride in this part of the park was the Jurassic Park River Adventure. Much like Splash Mountain at Disney World, this water raft ride tells a story as you move down the river and ultimately make a big splash at the end.
For those of us familiar with the movie, it was a very realistic story based on the movie . The premise of the ride is that you are taking a tour of the newly built – and supposedly safe - Jurassic Park. And the ride starts off quite peacefully. You see different types of dinosaurs such as a baby Stegosaurus and its mother. But, then your raft is “accidentally” bumped off course and you end up in the restricted section of Jurassic Park. And suddenly, you find yourself trying to flee from the evil velociraptors who have broken loose. Chaos unfolds around you, until you find yourself plunging 85 feet in total darkness to escape a fate at the hands of a terrifying T-rex.
There’s no time for a sigh of relief, though, as you scream down that final plunge into a wall of water!
Pumpkin was not interested in going on this ride at all, so she and Grandma watched from the relative dryness of the viewing area. The rest of us decided to brave the ride, though. While Grandpa, Sweet Pea, My Chandler and I all managed to get extensively splashed, Peanut proved to be the genius of the group and strategically placed herself in the middle of the seat and conveniently ducked down in a way that helped her stay almost completely dry!
In reality, I think she was ducked way down with her eyes closed for most of the ride!
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