California & Grand Canyon Adventures, Part 9, Day 8

If you need to catch up on our California & Grand Canyon Adventures this summer, check out Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, and Part 8!

Hopefully I'll finish this series up soon, cause there is so much more to cover in 2012 before it's 2013! Yikes!

Okay. So this day was pretty cool.  It just happened that our friends Nich & Des from back home (East Coast - Holla!) were visiting the fine city of Los Angeles at about the same time we were! This was especially exciting because we don't get to see them very much at all.  Aaron hadn't seen them since our wedding (2 years ago).  So anyway...I had not been to Universal Studios Hollywood ever, and Aaron hadn't been since he was young, and Nich and Des have this uncanny love for theme parks.  It was just a given that we should go.  So we did.

Military Discount Alert!  Do NOT go to Universal or other theme parks WITHOUT contacting your ITT department.  They have the most amazing discounts ever, but you typically have to order them ahead of time direct through your base (or another base).  This is the second theme park that we've gone to getting crazy deals through them (Disney 4-day park hopper for $138 each - hello?!?!).  In this instance, the 4 of us (military member plus a finite number of guests) got a Year Pass plus Front of Line pass for something like $80 each or so (I can't remember exactly how much).  Another awesome thing...you can order ITT tickets from ANY base.  Our base didn't carry Universal Hollywood tickets at the time, so I called Camp Pendleton (different branch) and they overnighted the tickets to me!

Onto our day....

Nich and Des are awesome to theme park with.  My first theme park as an adult was last year (Disney), before we moved from Florida, and I was so thankful that it was just my husband and I.  Asides from having goofy fun (get it...goofy?) together alone, we planned out our day to hit every ride/show we wanted with minimal lines.  We were so stealth running through the park, grabbing a fastpass, running to another ride, hitting up our fastpass ride.  We completed 2 entire parks in one day.  That's really amazing people.  And we couldn't have done it if we were in a group with dilly-dalliers going "uhh...do'r...what do you want to do next?". I couldn't handle that.  People would die.  But Nich and Des were clear and upfront with what they wanted to do in the park, and the 4 of us easily decided how to navigate the park.
 Please tell me you guys remember An American Tale.  If I were a mouse, Fievel would be my boyfriend.

 These things came in handy.  But you know what?  The park wasn't even too busy if we didn't have them.

 I loved how the park is built on a mountain and there are tons of different levels.  Props to Des and Aaron for walking up some  4,908,234 stairs. Give or take a few.

This is what I get for not getting permission for posting pictures of people on my blog.  I think it's kinda funny.  The next few shots are from the Studio Tour, which is something like a 30 minute tram town of, you guessed it, studio tours.

 How they reenact car explosions and crashes.

 I don't even know.

 We all liked the Animal Actors show.  It was pretty neat to see animals like guinea pigs, mice, cats, and others trained to go places on cue.  Afterwards, everyone with Front of Line passes got to stick around and pet some little creatures and take pictures with them.  Can we say STOKED!  Even Aaron bonded with one of them.

 Oh boy... (Made of Jelly Beans)

We had a blast, and it was so nice to do something like that with friends we rarely see.  We didn't want to say goodbye, but we parted ways and headed down to see my cousin Shannon in Orange County.  More on that next!

Hungry?  Check out my most recent post on Kacey's Kitchen, Mushroom & Beef Tacos with Avocado Salsa.

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