Who Needs Mickey Mouse?
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When we were in LA we had the choice of whether to go to Disney World or
Universal Studios. Never being big Disney fans we went to Universal. Of course I can't comment on how good Disney World is we definitely do not regret choosing Universal for our day.

The park opens at ten and we were in the relatively short queue at the entrance with our tickets, after our fingerprints were taken we were in. Being a weekday the park was reasonably quiet although it did pick up as the day progressed.

We decided to go on the studio tour first to leave us the rest of the day to explore the park. I can recommend doing this as when we looked later the queues were much longer. We were ferried into an open air bus and with out driver and guide were taken around the lots and sets. There are a number of stop and setups. For example you will find yourself in a San Francisco subway during an earthquake, fire sparks up and thing fall down, water rushes in. Excellent.

Now, the park is not really for thrill seekers, there are a few rides, the scariest
of them being the Mummy, although we didn't go on the new Simpson's ride as the queues were very long and there was a lot else to do.

The Mummy ride is a roller coaster in the dark that goes in both directions and is pretty fast with very fast acceleration. Jurassic Park is basically a kind of log flume with dinosaurs around, all very well done.

The heat can be very oppressive at times, luckily there are so called cool zones dotted around the park that are basically fans that push out a fine mist of water. They were a god send. There is also an area where you can shoot water canons at each other and generally get yourself soaked, it's no problem as you're dry in minutes.

There are a few attractions that run at specific times during the day. The Water world show is a live action show based on the film (the film was a big flop). The show is very good with stunt men on jet skis all over the place, flames and explosions and bodies dropping into the water from up above. Great stuff. The T2-3D attraction also runs at specific times and is a mix of live action and 3D cinema, it's very good despite the film being quite old now.

If I was running Universal I would start to update some of the attractions, sure they are very good and as a first time visitor it's no problem at all but surely they must have more recent films they can make attractions for. We thoroughly enjoyed out visit to Universal studios Hollywood and wouldn't hesitate recommending it to anyone visiting Los Angeles.

Entry price at time of writing is $64 for a day pass and $54 for children and if you book online you get two days for the price of one, although I think one day is enough to see everything.

Recommended.