as well. As it happened the ride was not that bad, partly because I was
prepared for sharks to suddenly appear. It was cheesy rather than anything
else, but at least Emma came away from it having put a bad memory to rest.
We spent half our time in this film-based park, and half in Islands Of
Adventure (IOA). The latter was more children orientated and many of the
rides were themed around cartoons. IOA is also newer, and thus was more
crowded. The best area in this park was the Super Heroes Island - full of rides
featuring the likes of Spiderman and the Incredible Hulk. In keeping with the
cartoon-theme in this area a girl sitting next to me on a scary ride uttered 'holy
crap!' - very Batman.
Universal Studios also featured live shows and actors dressed as characters,
in common with Disney and in fact most theme parks these days. The
characters tended to be funnier and more mischievous than Mickey or Donald
however. For example, Scooby Doo whispered lascivious things to Emma,
and Lucille Ball struck up conversations as if we were old friends whenever
we saw her. The most eccentric character we met was Merlin. First he
threatened to turn a nearby kid into what I heard as a ‘turd’. When I checked if
he had said ‘turd’ or ‘toad’ he assumed that the kid was ours and tried to set
us up for a group photo. This was one of several times we almost ended up
adopting children in theme parks, possibly because staff find it hard to believe
that childless couples would visit.
The coolest characters we met were the Marvel Super Heroes, who all
drove up on quad bikes one lunchtime. This included the following photo
opportunities: Emma with Spiderman (Emma: ‘look at his package! These