Thursday, February 22, 2007
Universal Studios
Thanks to the very helpful lady in the tourist info we spent $3.50 on travel cards and had an interesting bus / train / bus journey to Universal studios rather than an organised tour with fixed times and a $48 each charge. With our discount vouchers getting us $10 off admission each - it was a bargain day.
Once inside we made our way to the much publised studio tour and sitting on board open coaches dragged behind a vehicle we made our way round the site. We passed countless large studios (large warehouse type buildings) some with work in progress, others used as sets for tv programs etc and passed the bungalows which were originally used by actors and actresses to get changed and are now offices and used by directors and writers. We passed by Alfred Hitchcocks bungalow and on further to see a demo of how the technical guys can rig up cars to do stunts and have bullet holes appear and fires etc. Further round we were attacked by King Kong shaking the bridge we were on, Jaws attacked us and set off explosions in fuel containers and cheaky small dinosaurs from Jurassic park did their worst. We saw an impressive flood, the scale model of the ship in King Kong, the crashed aeroplane scene from the Tom Cruise version of War of the Worlds and further on experienced an earthquake. All good fun.
After the tour we went into Shrek 4D - a 3D film with added effects (except some of mine didn't work!) and on to Water World a show involving jet skis, lots of pyrotechnics etc and stunts including a sea plane crash landing just feet from us. Despite the 'soaked seats' warning we actually remained dry. By the end of the performance you could see why it was only a twice daily show.
Next stop the rather rubbish "Fear Factor Live" - why would you want to drink that stuff (!) and the much better although still rather stupid "special effects" show during which we saw robots move, camera tricks and we added sound effects to a silent film. We went in "Back Draft" another excuse for loads more film tricks and pyrotechnics. Dave went on "The Mummy" ride alone and ended up on "Back to the Future" on his own too when I bottled out at the last minute as it all seemed to chlostrophobic.
That about wrapped it up for the Studios, so we took bus and train to China Town hoping for a nice restaurant with an eat as much as you like buffet. Dave has now come to the conclusion there are few cities with China Towns as nice as London and LA was no exception so we were back on the train and bus to Santa Monica having done an hours detour. It was rush hour and the traffic was slow, in fact it got very slow as it turned out they had shut one of the freeways due to an accident and the locals on the bus had never seen it so bad. It was just like the M25 on a typical Friday night.
Back in Santa Monica we went to the food hall and had a 3dishes plus rice option at the Chinese there and thoroughly enjoyed it although some of the dishes had a big kick to them. We did some late night shopping and went for a quick drink at the same pub as the previous night.
Once inside we made our way to the much publised studio tour and sitting on board open coaches dragged behind a vehicle we made our way round the site. We passed countless large studios (large warehouse type buildings) some with work in progress, others used as sets for tv programs etc and passed the bungalows which were originally used by actors and actresses to get changed and are now offices and used by directors and writers. We passed by Alfred Hitchcocks bungalow and on further to see a demo of how the technical guys can rig up cars to do stunts and have bullet holes appear and fires etc. Further round we were attacked by King Kong shaking the bridge we were on, Jaws attacked us and set off explosions in fuel containers and cheaky small dinosaurs from Jurassic park did their worst. We saw an impressive flood, the scale model of the ship in King Kong, the crashed aeroplane scene from the Tom Cruise version of War of the Worlds and further on experienced an earthquake. All good fun.
After the tour we went into Shrek 4D - a 3D film with added effects (except some of mine didn't work!) and on to Water World a show involving jet skis, lots of pyrotechnics etc and stunts including a sea plane crash landing just feet from us. Despite the 'soaked seats' warning we actually remained dry. By the end of the performance you could see why it was only a twice daily show.
Next stop the rather rubbish "Fear Factor Live" - why would you want to drink that stuff (!) and the much better although still rather stupid "special effects" show during which we saw robots move, camera tricks and we added sound effects to a silent film. We went in "Back Draft" another excuse for loads more film tricks and pyrotechnics. Dave went on "The Mummy" ride alone and ended up on "Back to the Future" on his own too when I bottled out at the last minute as it all seemed to chlostrophobic.
That about wrapped it up for the Studios, so we took bus and train to China Town hoping for a nice restaurant with an eat as much as you like buffet. Dave has now come to the conclusion there are few cities with China Towns as nice as London and LA was no exception so we were back on the train and bus to Santa Monica having done an hours detour. It was rush hour and the traffic was slow, in fact it got very slow as it turned out they had shut one of the freeways due to an accident and the locals on the bus had never seen it so bad. It was just like the M25 on a typical Friday night.
Back in Santa Monica we went to the food hall and had a 3dishes plus rice option at the Chinese there and thoroughly enjoyed it although some of the dishes had a big kick to them. We did some late night shopping and went for a quick drink at the same pub as the previous night.
# posted by D&M Travels @ 9:14 AM 
