What It’s Like to Go on Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure With a Face Mask

We’re LIVE from Universal Orlando! Nearly three months since the temporary closures began, we are back today at a special annual passholder sneak preview to experience the thrills, the food, and yes, the Butterbeer.

Frankly, we’re here today to answer one of the pressing theme park questions on many people’s minds: what is is like to go on a ride like Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure with a face mask? Let’s find out!

While at Universal Orlando, all guests are required to wear a face covering at all times, unless they are eating, drinking, posing for a photo, or visiting a U-Rest Area.

And we were curious to see what it’s like to wear a mask on several of Universal’s high-speed experiences.

Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure

We first put our masks to the test on Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure, because if we’re going to do it, we’re going to do it BIG.

Note: we were wearing masks with elastic ears straps, so if you are using one with a tie closure, make sure it’s securely fastened before you take flight!

Team members wiped down the bike/side cars between guests and we did one final mask safety check to make sure the party behind us didn’t get a flying mask to the face.

We soared, banked, flew, and dropped — but the masks stayed put! Whether it was the thrill of the ride or the wind seemingly gluing the mask to our faces, we honestly forgot we were even wearing a mask mid-ride.

This might not be the case for all makes and models of masks, but Hagrid helped us find the answer to one of our burning questions: “Does wearing a mask affect the ride experience?”…to which we say: “oh wait, we were wearing a mask that whole time??”

Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts

While it may not be quite as fast as Hagrid’s Motorbike Adventure, Harry Potter and the Escape from Gringotts can still pick up some speed!

And, you are equipped with 3-D glasses (or “cart goggles”) for the adventure.

We found that if you tuck your mask under the cart goggles, you won’t have as much of an issue with the lenses fogging.

But once again (and especially thanks to some help from the glasses) our masks stayed in place and we didn’t worry about losing them during the ride!

The Incredible Hulk Coaster

Now it’s time for the speed test! We will do anything for you readers, and we sat in the FRONT ROW to really put our masks to the test.

In short, our masks made it. Our hair…did not. We ended up paying a little bit more attention to our face coverings this time around, simply because the speed and wind that draws tears from your eyes was whipping against the fabric. But to our surprise, they didn’t come close to falling off!

This is definitely one you’ll want to make sure you have those tie-on masks securely fastened. Even if the wind doesn’t catch under the mask — with how the ride did a number on our hair swirling and twirling about — it might have the potential to shake a loosely-tied bow free!

Jurassic River Adventure

So far, it has been pretty smooth sailing riding Universal’s attractions with a mask on! But we haven’t taken to the “sea” yet, or should we say RIVER.

A little rain and some masks won’t keep the dinosaurs down, so Jurassic River Adventure is still open! And a lot of times, the worst part about a water ride is spending the rest of the day walking around chafing with soaked clothes. So…will the same thing happen with a mask?

After we boarded the boat, a team member let us know that we were allowed to take off our masks if we wanted. We decided to give our nose and ears a break and rested our masks on our laps. (Mistake #1)

We were so excited to see the dinos and we were anticipating the drop that we didn’t even notice our mask flying away. (Mistake #2)

We were already en route to grab a snack when a team member stopped us and asked where our mask was. NO! It had braved flips, turns, front row bracing winds, aaaaaand our mask flew away while it wasn’t even on our face.

We rushed to a nearby shop to buy a replacement, but we never would have predicted this would be the ride to throw us for a loop. So if we haven’t already said it enough: bring an extra mask!

Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit

We knew we had to go out on a bang, so our last stop of the mask gauntlet was Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit. And what a ride it was… .

This is the only other ride where guests must store ALL of their belongings (including phones) in the designated lockers. We checked our mask one last time before settling into the ride vehicle and we were off!

In our whole day of riding, this was the closest our masks came to showing any sign of weakness. In some of the more intense moments of the coaster, we felt our masks inching down our nose, but we were still never worried about them flying clean off.

What’s the Verdict?

We may have had a slight misstep in our day thanks to the epic drop on Jurassic River Adventure, but we are pretty shocked that on the fastest and most exciting rides Universal has to offer, our masks barely budged. We found that we were still able to fully enjoy our ride experiences without worrying and readjusting! If you ride Jurassic River Adventure on Friday, keep an eye out for a dinosaur wearing a mask — we’ll call it a gift from AllEars.

You can read more about about losing our mask here!

Are you looking forward to riding Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure in the coming weeks? Let us know in the comments!

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