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Universal Orlando Resort: Where to Stay & Play for a Few Days

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My recent stay at Universal Orlando Resort was so much fun and I’m going to share and highlight my favorite moments with you. First and foremost, I stayed at the Cabana Bay Beach Resort on the property which allowed me early access (one hour) to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter™. It was my first time experiencing Diagon Alley™. I took advantage of the complimentary shuttle service to Universal Studios Florida and was able to … [Read More...]

Life & Style

Navigating Disney World During a Pandemic

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I recently had an opportunity to visit Walt Disney World as part of my Goofy Getaways FAM Training. It was exciting and I was a bit anxious because even though some restrictions are being lifted, guidelines are more relaxed, and travel is starting to … [Read More...]

Strike a pose at Pose Selfie Studio

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I recently had an opportunity to visit the NEW Pose Selfie Studio in Raleigh, NC with my daughter and it was so much fun. The great thing about this studio is that you have all the tools you need to capture your perfect photos alone or you can go … [Read More...]

Taste the Flavors of St. Thomas USVI

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I am excited to be collaborating with my fellow foodie lover Hannah Victoria on this listing of places to eat in St. Thomas USVI whether you are visiting or local to the island. We are giving you our personal opinions based on our dining experiences … [Read More...]

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Navigating Disney World During a Pandemic

By

I recently had an opportunity to visit Walt Disney World as part of my Goofy Getaways FAM Training. It was exciting and I was a bit anxious because even though some restrictions are being lifted, guidelines are more relaxed, and travel is starting to … [Read More...]

Taste the Flavors of St. Thomas USVI

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I am excited to be collaborating with my fellow foodie lover Hannah Victoria on this listing of places to eat in St. Thomas USVI whether you are visiting or local to the island. We are giving you our personal opinions based on our dining experiences … [Read More...]

Food

Rosé All Day at Seasons 52

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I recently had the opportunity to experience the Seasons 52 Summer Menu paired perfectly with Rose cocktails. The menu changes with the season and I can really appreciate that. My reservation was for 7:00pm and it … [Read More...]

Orlando Eye at Sunset: A Thunderstorm Ride I Won't Forget

I've always been the sort of traveller who makes weather a feature of the trip rather than a problem to dodge, so when the Florida forecast turned menacing on my third night in Orlando, I knew exactly where I wanted to be. The plan had been a relaxed dinner at ICON Park followed by a leisurely spin on the wheel, but the radar painted a different story. By 6 p.m. the sky over International Drive was bruising purple and gold, and the decision to ride the Orlando Eye at sunset during a thunderstorm suddenly felt less like a mistake and more like a dare.

I had flown in from Sydney via Los Angeles the previous afternoon, so my body was still operating on a confused blend of Pacific and Eastern time. The late summer humidity of Central Florida felt familiar in a way I did not quite expect — somewhere between a Brisbane summer evening and the thick air that rolls in before a southerly buster along the New South Wales coast. That recognition, oddly, made me more comfortable about being suspended 122 metres above the ground as the first distant rumbles of thunder began to drift across the rooftops.

Why I Chose to Board Anyway

The queue for the Orlando Eye was shorter than I expected, partly because a few families had peeled off when the first fat raindrops started spotting the pavement. The staff at the boarding platform were calm, checking tickets and ushering us into one of the glass capsules with the polite efficiency you tend to find at well-run attractions. I had already done the maths on my Australian dollars before leaving home, and the conversion made the ride a genuine splurge rather than an impulse, so I was determined to get my money's worth.

The thing about a Florida thunderstorm in late summer is that it announces itself slowly. The clouds stack up like cotton wool being pulled into long ribbons, then the light shifts from golden to amber to something almost bruised. I had watched similar skies roll in over the Twelve Apostles on the Great Ocean Road years earlier, but there the wind came in from the Southern Ocean; here, the breezes came off the Gulf and carried a heavier, sweeter smell of wet vegetation and warm asphalt. I stepped into the capsule and took a position by the window facing west, knowing that whatever happened next was going to happen right in front of me.

Watching the Storm Build Over International Drive

As the wheel began its slow rotation, the city below started to transform. The bright logos of the restaurants along ICON Park, the big wheel itself, the SEA LIFE sign and the theatre marquees looked almost deliberate against the gathering gloom. The oranges turned to greys and the greys turned to that strange pre-storm yellow that photographers chase and meteorologists take very seriously. I could see the anvil tops of the cell to the south, lit from within by silent flickers that I would later realise were cloud-to-cloud lightning rather than the dramatic ground strikes I had been hoping for.

A family from Brisbane travelling with two small children shared my capsule, and we traded the usual polite questions about where we were from and how long we had been in Orlando. They told me this was their last night before flying home via Los Angeles, and they were weighing up whether to bail on the ride. I encouraged them to stay, partly because I knew what a Florida sunset does to the lakes and partly because Australian travellers, by temperament, are usually up for a bit of weather. They stayed, and within minutes we were all crowded at the same window pointing at the same horizon.

Inside the Capsule When the Sky Broke Open

We reached the apex just as the first proper storm cell drifted directly overhead. The rain did not arrive gently — it swept across the glass in horizontal sheets, blurring the view of the Orlando skyline and turning International Drive into a river of red brake lights. The wind picked up enough that the capsule began to sway in a way I had not expected from a structure that size, and the kid in the red rain poncho laughed every time the wheel dipped and rose again. The crew, monitoring conditions from the ground, made a calm announcement over the speaker: the ride would pause briefly while the worst of the cell passed, and they asked everyone to stay seated.

I have ridden cable cars in the Swiss Alps, ferries in the Whitsundays and chairlifts at Thredbo in conditions arguably worse than this, but there was something particular about being suspended in a glass egg above a tourist district while the sky went dark at 7 p.m. The lightning came closer — bright enough to throw shadows inside the capsule, close enough that we all instinctively counted the gap between flash and rumble. I thought, oddly, of a trip I had made years earlier to Kyoto in autumn, where I had stood in the rain photographing the vermillion torii gates at Fushimi Inari and watched the colours pulse against the grey. There is a particular pleasure in seeing familiar weather behave somewhere entirely new.

After the Storm: ICON Park in the Pouring Rain

When the wheel resumed its rotation, the storm had not finished with us. It simply shifted east, dragging curtains of rain across the parking lots and turning the walkways into shallow streams. The Brisbane family decided to make a run for the Madame Tussauds entrance, while I lingered at the platform watching the lightning silhouette the wheel itself. I had brought a proper wet-weather jacket from home, a habit Australian travellers develop very quickly once they have been through a few east coast lows, and I was one of the few people out on the footpaths who was not soaked to the bone.

The attractions around ICON Park stayed open, which made sense after a few minutes of thought. Florida tourism infrastructure is built around the assumption that a thunderstorm is a daily interruption rather than a disaster. Workers squeegeed the floors, the outdoor bars covered their TV screens and within twenty minutes the sun was already beginning to claw its way back through a tear in the clouds. I grabbed a table under an awning at one of the casual restaurants, ordered something comforting, and watched the whole spectacle replay on the screens as a baseball game carried on a few channels over.

What I Learned From Riding the Orlando Eye in a Storm

Looking back, the ride was worth every cent and every anxious minute. The combination of glass, height and weather is genuinely cinematic, and the operators clearly know how to handle a storm safely. I would not recommend deliberately chasing a lightning cell — that is a good way to end up spending your trip in a hospital rather than a theme park — but I would absolutely encourage anyone with a few hours to spare in Orlando to keep an eye on the radar and consider a sunset ride if the forecast looks promising. Storm-chasing skies are not unique to Florida; Melbourne in spring, Darwin in the wet season and Sydney in February all put on spectacular displays, yet there is something uniquely American about doing it above a strip of tourist attractions.

For Australian travellers specifically, there are a few practical things worth knowing. Australians need a valid ESTA before entering the United States under the visa waiver programme, and it is worth sorting that out well before you fly. Travel insurance that covers weather-related delays is also a sensible idea, because summer storms in Orlando can ground flights out of Tullamarine or Kingsford Smith with very little notice. Finally, pack a proper rain jacket rather than trusting an afternoon shower to behave itself, and treat the ICON Park area as a wet-weather playground rather than somewhere to sprint through. You will get better photos, better food and a far better story.