Trip to the US - Sep/Oct 2023

This morning, I joined a guided bus tour around Salt Lake City. We first stopped by the Utah State Capitol, a very impressive building that looked much like the capitol building in Washington D.C.

The building is the home to the Utah state government - housing the Supreme Court and House of Representatives, among other things.

When driving around in the city, we also passed by several venues used in the 2002 Winter Olympics.

The tour ended at Temple Square, home of Salt Lake Temple, which is the largest temple in the world for the mormons, aka. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS)

Utah and Salt Lake City, in particular, are the world headquarters for the LDS church, and their presence in the city is huge. They own many businesses and buildings around town.

I have seen the massive temple in pictures, and it is very impressive, but currently, it is undergoing a major renovation, so it was completely covered in scaffolding.

It was interesting to visit this very religious city on a Sunday. Virtually everything was closed, and the downtown area was practically empty in the afternoon. Very surreal to be in a major US city in the middle of the day with almost no people around.

I did eventually find a place to get lunch and then checked out some exhibits at the planetarium, which was also open.

Since I had no other plans, I decided to drop by a local movie theater to see the latest Expendables movie with Sylvester Stallone. It was not as good as the first 3 movies - for sure!

The weather was lovely today, so after the movie, it was great to finish the day with a walk around the city. It is a really beautiful place, with the mountains in the background and many historical buildings.Read more

This morning, I took the train from Anaheim to Burbank and checked in at my hotel in the Toluca Lake area near Burbank.

After lunch, I went to Universal Studios , which is both a theme park and one of the biggest movie studios in the world. Many of the biggest movie classics, TV shows, and much more was filmed right here on the Universal lot.

Indeed, one of the rides in the theme park is the studio tour, where you ride on a tram around a portion of the backlot. Since it is a theme park, the ride is more focused on entertainment than movie history, but it's fun to be in the very location where many of my fav movies filmed, including Back To The Future.

I also visited Super Nintendo World, a new addition to Universal studios I hadn't seen before, focused on Super Mario and other characters from Nintendo. A new ride inside this area features new technology, allowing you to interact more than usual.

In the evening, the park transformed into Halloween Horror Nights, a special themed event taking place on select nights in September and October. Among other things, there are 8 haunted houses and horror movie characters roaming the park. So when you are walking around, it's not uncommon to be chased by a madman with a chainsaw!

The haunted houses each have a specific theme. One was focused on The Exorcist, for example, as a new Exorcist movie is coming out soon.

When I walked around The Exorcist house, there would be rooms where scenes from the movies come alive with actors in very scary outfits reenact terrifying scenes, in rooms dressed to look as creepy as possible.

It's all done in a very impressive way. The sets, costumes, makeup, and special effects - combined with skilled actors - really make it feel like you are inside a horror movie. This year, they also had houses themed on Stranger Things and The Last of Us.

Later, I visited a different "scare zone" where they had used the Bates Motel set to provide the backdrop. Usually, when doing the studio tour, you drive by the Bates Motel portion quickly, so it was fun to see it more up close - especially on foot.

Halloween Horror Nights is a very popular event and quickly becomes super crowded. One of the haunted houses had a line so long that the wait was 3 hours, just for one attraction!

So ultimately, I didn't try that many of the rides and the entertainment at Halloween Horror Nights, mostly because it was so crowded, but still a fun experience overall.

This also makes my sixth and final theme park in a week!Read more