Day 2 - Universal Studios

One of the tours I booked yesterday was for a shuttle and entry to the Universal Studios Themepark. I had been to this Themepark about 14 years ago on a family vacation so it was interesting to see what had and hadn't changed. The first thing I did was go watch the Waterworld show. This was one of my favorite and longest-lasting memories of my last visit so it was great to see it again and it seemed like nothing had changed.
Next I made my way to the Backlot Tour which is the main reason I wanted to go to Universal Studios in the first place. This is a tramcar that takes you around some of the working studios in the backlot and has some areas where they can demonstrate some of the magic including the King Kong 360 3D experience. It was pretty cool the team cart was on a moving platform and had a 3d screen right around it (the 3d was much better than what you see at the movies). I then made my way and saw the Special Effects Stage Show, Animal Actors show, and Shrek 4-D.
Since I had been to all the shows

I wanted to see I then moved on to the rides, I should have gone the other way around as the queues had blown out to about an hour, the transformers ride (which I think might be the latest ride) actually saw me lined up for about 90mins.

When I last went to Australia we went to Movieworld and I soon decided I wasn't a fan of roller coasters. So on that basis I decided I would go on the ride I wanted to go on most in case I wouldn't want to go on anymore. The ride I wanted to do most was of course the Simpsons ride. The cool thing about this ride is that it is actually a virtual rollercoaster. This means you are actually in a simulator that moves around with a screen in front of you, this was perfect for this ride because it meant we were in the Simpsons animated world and could do things that could never be done in real life like a break in the track causing the car to derail and hurtle to the ground. Through a combination of the hydraulics and the screen it really did feel like we were plummeting to the earth and I actually loved it.
The next and final ride I went on was the new Transformers The Ride 3D. This was another virtual rollercoaster but slightly different to the Simpsons ride because the car does actually move around a flat track inside the building but then stops in front of various screens which have 3D films that throw you around etc and also have you falling to the ground with things hurtling towards you.
The shuttle was picking us up at

6 so by the time I got through the transformers 90min queue and then the ride I had time to pick up a couple of souvenirs and then head to the shuttle. I did miss doing a couple of rides but a couple of them didn't sound like my kind of thing, I would have liked to do the Jurassic Park ride, but luckily I have done it before so I was better to fit the other things in first.
Once I got back to hotel I went for a walk to get a couple of supplies and some tea and happened to walk past The Jim Henson Studio it was locked up (not sure if it is ever open) but I did recognize it from the Muppets Movie.

Anyway another good tour tomorrow which I have been looking forward to since I decided to come to LA. Check in tomorrow.