Orlando Archives - Page 17 of 21

Universal Orlando Mardi Gras 2023 Guide

February 21, 2023 By Lindsay Leave a Comment

Universal Orlando Mardi Gras is one of my favorite events at the resort. I love the parade and chance to try different foods. So, here’s my review/guide to the 2023 event.

Universal Orlando Mardi Gras

You can experience Universal Orlando Mardi Gras in 2023 from February 4th to April 16th. It’s the perfect excuse to visit the resort during spring break or to head down during the cooler months. This year’s theme is International Flavors of Carnaval, which alludes to the fact that there are foods from all around the world to try. The parade theme is Mythical Creatures.

International Foods

New this year, UO announced that it was going to have an International Flavors of Carnaval spin the event. This means that they have food booths around the resort featuring food from several different countries! New this year is the addition of a few food booths in Islands of Adventure and City Walk. I think it’s great that the party is expanding out of Universal Studios Florida so that there is more to enjoy.

Unfortunately, with a jam-packed schedule including the Float Ride and Dine experience, I didn’t get to try many of the delicious foods. I was able to try the Fried Green Tomatoes Po’ Boy and Beignets though. The Po’ Boy was really good. The beignets were a little small, but also tasty. I would totally eat both of these things again. Last year, we tried to King Cake and enjoyed it. My mom is still kind of sad that we didn’t make time to get another one this year. Oh, well. Maybe next time.

Parade

As usual, the parade is amazing! I viewed the parade twice in 2023 and enjoyed it both times. I loved seeing the mythical creatures this year. From unicorns/pegasus to dragons and phoenix, the parade is a sight to behold. There are some old school, traditional UO floats too, like the gator I got to ride. The combination of the old and new makes for a memorable parade.

People start lining up to view the parade pretty early. I’d recommend lining up 45 minutes early if you want a good spot up front. The parade times can vary, so be sure to check the app for the time. Also, it helps to make eye contact with the bead throwers if you want to catch lots of beads!

Concerts

One of the major perks of visiting Universal Orlando Mardi Gras is the chance to attend a concert! These concerts are included with the price of admission! So, it’s a neat way to experience a concert without paying concert ticket prices or dealing with trying to get tickets. On the Saturday we attended we got to see Patti LaBelle in concert! My mom was excited to see someone she grew up listening to.

It appears that most of the concerts this year are on Saturdays in February. However, there is a random Friday and Sunday as well as two concerts the first weekend in March. So, if you are visiting on a weekend before March 6th, check out the concert schedule to see if you can catch someone interesting performing! Also, make note that the nights with concerts have different parade times.

Tribute Store

Universal is in the habit of making a new tribute store for every season. This year’s Mardi Gras Tribute Store is pretty cool! Each room has a different vibe and I love it! It’s so much fun to just walk around and look at everything. Plus, you can grab some cool merchandise or food! My mom purchased a zip-up hoodie this year. I may have also purchased a t-shirt. You can also buy some beads here if you didn’t catch enough free ones in the parade.

Daytime Entertainment

A neat daytime treat is that you can see the parade performers in the park! I saw the jazz band out performing last year. This year, I saw the gator people on stilts during the day. So, keep an eye out if you want a unique photo opportunity.

Mardi Gras Fun

As you can see, there’s lots to see, do, and eat if you visit Universal Orlando during Mardi Gras. So, have you ever attended? What were your favorite parts?

Mardi Gras Float Ride and Dine at Universal Orlando Review

February 16, 2023 By Lindsay 4 Comments

Last year, my mom and I visited Universal Orlando Resort during Mardi Gras and had a blast. This year, we decided to visit again, but we wanted the chance to be in the parade and throw beads! So, when Universal introduced their Mardi Gras Float Ride and Dine add-on experience, we signed up almost immediately! Keep reading to see if we think it’s worth it!

Float Ride and Dine

This Mardi Gras Ride and Dine experience is the only guaranteed way to ride in the parade. We paid $55.24 each (after AP discount) to eat at Lombard’s Seafood Grille and to ride in the parade. This experience booked up quickly as did some of the more popular restaurants for our dates. So, if you are interested in this experience, I recommend booking asap. We did this experience on Monday, February 6, 2023 as the two days prior had already booked up by the time my mom called to book it.

Lombard’s Seafood Grille

For our dinner, we were allowed to choose a non-alcoholic drink, appetizer, entrée, and dessert from the regular menu at Lombard’s. I got a frozen lemonade, which was a nice surprise as the server initially told me I couldn’t have it. However, he checked with management who said we could have any non-alcoholic beverage. With it being the third day of this offering, they were still learning everything, so it’s understandable that my initial request was denied. My mom was content with her diet drink.

I initially was going to publish my entire review of the meal in this post. However, the post grew to around 800 words! If you are interested in reading my Lombard’s Seafood Grille review, you can click that link. Otherwise, I will just tell you what we had here. We had calamari for the appetizer. I had the lobster roll and key lime pie. My mom went with the steak and chocolate cake. Overall, it was good meal, especially for a theme park restaurant. You can see our food in the Instagram post below.

Riding a Float

I will say we were disappointed with the lack of communication from Universal prior to and on the day of this experience. It was hard to plan the day not knowing what to expect. Unfortunately, we were never told how to retrieve the pictures that were taken before or during the parade. The code I was given to retrieve pictures never brought any pictures up and the UO Twitter account told me that we were supposed to purchase pictures in the park up to 24 hours afterwards! So, we missed out on getting any of our pictures! The chaos of the event reminded me a little bit of our experience doing the Universal Holiday Tour.

At dinner we were given our lanyards, which instructed us to meet at 4:55 to begin lining up. Everyone put on an apron-like thing and sat with their assigned float group after signing a waiver. Team members did a good job of getting everyone hyped up for the parade. Then, they led us backstage to our floats and went over some general guidance before the parade started.

Aside from the confusion, we absolutely loved riding the float! It was amazing to be able to look a stranger in the eyes, toss them some beads, and make them happy. My mom has already said that riding in the parade was the highlight of this trip for her! Pro tip: pack light for this event as we weren’t told we could store our stuff anywhere and had to just put it in the floor of the float.

Is it worth it?

While the Mardi Gras Float Ride and Dine is an expensive experience, it is worth it in my opinion. If they offer this experience next year, we will probably book it again. So, have you ever tossed beads in the Universal Orlando Mardi Gras parade?

Epcot Festival of the Arts 2023 Review

February 14, 2023 By Lindsay Leave a Comment

I have been fortunate to attend every seasonal event at Walt Disney World’s Epcot theme park over the years. Hands down though, my favorite is Festival of the Arts! I was lucky enough to be able to attend it again last week and I’d like to do a quick review of it and share why it’s my favorite one!

Festival of the Arts

Walt Disney World pretty much always has an event going on at Epcot these days. However, my personal favorite is the Festival of the Arts. It’s a short event celebrating art in all of its forms that takes place during the winter months of the year. In my opinion, this event could be lengthened as it only lasts for 5 weeks! This year’s festival ends on February 20th. So, if you are wanting to experience this year’s events, you better go now!

Festival Food

I actually really enjoy visiting Orlando during these cooler months as it’s more comfortable outside. That means I feel like actually trying some of the festival’s foods! My personal favorites from Festival of the Arts includes: Sushi Donut from Japan, Deconstructed Key Lime Pie (the first picture in my Instagram post below) from The Deconstructed Dish, and General Tso’s Chicken Shumai from China. I also enjoyed visiting Figment’s Imagination Station for the Pop’t Art, which was basically a tasty blueberry cookie and the Rainbow Cake was neat. My mom raved about all of the food we tried at the festival and even remarked how much better the food was here compared to some other theme parks’ festivals. I think there is something here for everyone to enjoy.

Festival Entertainment

I love how Disney is able to bring art to life during this festival. You can walk around and look at paintings. However, you can also participate in art by painting some squares in a huge paint by number mural too! You can also pose in large art re-enactment for photos! You can even catch some stars from Broadway performing during this festival! I love walking around and looking at the chalk art at this festival and doing the scavenger hunt! I just feel like there’s so much to see and do at this particular festival, that it makes it more fun than some others!

Conclusion

Between the beautiful foods, fun art entertainment, and great weather it’s easy to see why Festival of the Arts is my favorite Epcot festival. Also, I know that when I initially started blogging again, I stated that I would cover other things outside of Walt Disney World. However, I’ve come to accept how much joy Disney brings me and I hope anyone reading these posts is ok with me blogging about it too.

Universal’s Loews Royal Pacific Resort Review

February 2, 2023 By Lindsay Leave a Comment

Back in December, my mom and I spent a night at Universal’s Loews Royal Pacific Resort while visiting Universal Orlando Resort. It was our first time staying in a Signature Collection Hotel at UO and it did not disappoint.

Royal Pacific Resort

The last night of our stay at Universal Orlando Resort in December, we switched from Universal’s Endless Summer Resort – Surfside Inn and Suites to Loews Royal Pacific Resort. This was our first time staying at a “Signature Collection Hotel“. It was also our first time getting the Universal Express Unlimited pass since it’s included with a stay here! The price difference this trip was worth it for both of us to skip the lines!

One of the other perks of staying at Royal Pacific Resort is supposed to be the ability to ride the boat over to the theme parks. Unfortunately, the boat dock was being refurbished during our stay and we weren’t notified until we checked in. So, we were disappointed to discover that we couldn’t enjoy this amenity on our trip. We were pleased to discover that there was a walkway to the parks, which is a huge advantage over the values. It is a bit of a hike, but we were told it was quicker than waiting for a bus. So, we walked each time.

Upon entering this hotel, I realized that we were staying somewhere really nice. We loved the island theming as it’s very relaxing. I enjoyed the laid back vibes that counterbalanced the rush of visiting theme parks. We also appreciated that this hotel houses everything indoors, so we didn’t have to worry about walking with luggage in the weather!

Standard Room

Perhaps it’s because we had just spent 3 nights in the value hotels or perhaps this resort is just really nice! Either way, we had a very comfortable stay at the Royal Pacific Resort. The room was much quieter than at Surfside or Dockside. In fact, we both slept great! The beds were comfortable. The shower tile and bathroom vanity took the room up a notch. Even though it’s a standard room, there was more than enough room for the two of us.

Royal Pacific Food

One of my favorite things about traveling is trying new foods. So, I was happy to discover how good the food at Royal Pacific is! I enjoyed the Tuk Tarts from Tuk Tuk Market. I’ve also heard great things about the luau they host on Saturday nights. Unfortunately, we were staying here on a Monday night and didn’t get to experience it.

The standout dining experience of this trip was the Islands Dining Room. We had breakfast here both mornings and enjoyed it each time. The first morning, we got the buffet. The second day I got Hawaiian Pancakes while my mom got Tahitian French Toast. We were very pleased with our meals here! Everything tasted fresh and delicious! You can see the food in my Instagram post below.

Overall Review

I think you can probably tell that I enjoyed my stay at Royal Pacific Resort. In fact, it’s currently my favorite Universal Orlando Resort. I should be staying at two other UO hotels soon, so stay tuned to see if it remains that way. Have you ever stayed here? What did you think?

Sharks Underwater Grill at SeaWorld Orlando Review

January 25, 2023 By Lindsay 2 Comments

Last month, while visiting SeaWorld Orlando for the Christmas season, my mom and I ate lunch at Sharks Underwater Grill. Today I am going to give you a review of this experience.

Sharks Underwater Grill

Sharks Underwater Grill is the only full-service restaurant at SeaWorld Orlando. The park is filled with several quick food options, but this is your only option for a sit-down meal in the park. It’s odd to me though that you can’t make dining reservations in advance. In fact, I consider this the biggest downside of eating here. The only way you can get a table here is by joining the walk-up wait list in person. That means your wait can be short, but often it’s a long one. So, if you know you want to eat here, I recommend joining the list as soon as it opens at 11 AM.

My mom and I attempted to eat here back on September trip. However, the waitlist was too long. On our December trip, we headed over right at lunchtime and were surprisingly seated within 10 minutes! So, it pays to be there right when they open.

Eat with Sharks

When you enter the restaurant, you are immediately greeted by a huge aquarium filled with various fish and sharks! I don’t think there’s a bad seat in the restaurant as there are several windows and lots to see. It’s definitely a unique experience to be able to eat a meal while a hammerhead sharks swims by! I took lots of photos of the fish and sharks, which you can see in my Instagram post below.

The Food

My mom and I chose to order off of the special holiday menu while dining here. The last three pictures of my Instagram post above are of our food. I enjoyed the three cheese lobster mac and cheese, which was $19. Granted, it’s a little pricey here, but you are getting a unique meal experience, that’s more than just good food. I really liked my dish, although it was a small portion.

My mom got the bourbon vanilla glazed smoked ham with candied yams, green beans, and candied relish for $32. She enjoyed her ham and yams! She was happy to have ham as we had just had a bunch of turkey at Thanksgiving.

Then, we split the doughnut cinnamon sugar bread pudding for dessert at $13! I loved the presentation of this dessert with the sugar work on top! I know that it is difficult to make and would never attempt it. Ha! It also was a nice sweet flavor to contradict the cherry compote. We also enjoyed the combination of cinnamon sugar and caramel! It was a tasty treat for sure!

Conclusion

Sharks Underwater Grill makes for a fun and memorable dining experience. However, you do have to get on the waitlist in person. It can also be a little pricey. I’d say it’s a must do for any shark fan or if you want a more relaxing meal without leaving the park. If you are in a rush to get to the next show or ride, then I’d say just grab some food elsewhere. It may also be best to eat elsewhere if you are on a tight budget.