Hagrid's Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure Now Zooming Through the Forests of Islands of Adventure

© Universal Orlando

Easily one of, if not the most anticipated attraction of 2019 is now in daily operation at Islands of Adventure, a part of the Universal Orlando Resort.  Hagrid's Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure is a new family roller coaster adventure that takes up the location of the former Dragon Challenge coasters within the Wizarding World of Harry Potter Hogsmeade, and takes passengers on a fast motorbike ride through the Forbidden Forest.

The ride had a massive grand opening ceremony, seen above complete with some magic, featuring stars of the Harry Potter movies including Tom Felton, Evanna Lynch, Warwick Davis and more.  The crew were some of the first to venture into the Forbidden Forest for a magical journey along with Hagrid.

© Universal Orlando

Riders enter Hagrid's Magic Creatures Motorbike Adventure through the same castle that Dragon Challenge used, however the similarities between the rides end there.  The queue has been totally renovated and now features different scenes depicting Hagrid's work area and classroom, along with some nifty special effects.

The coaster utilizes trains (click above to see larger) that have both a motorbike and side car seating arrangement, allowing riders to experience the attraction in two styles of seats.  Soon after leaving the station the adventure begins with one of seven different launch sections, the most on one coaster in the world according to the park.

© Universal Orlando

Naturally a ride about Hagrid, the Forbidden Forest and Magical Creatures should include all three items, and this one sure does.  Between blasting on all those launches (which hit a top speed of 50 miles per hour) there are plenty of characters and creatures, including a full sized animatronic of Hagrid, seen above.

Since many are looking to experience the ride for the first time with no spoilers I'd prefer not to document the entire experience, but it looks like a ton of fun filled with lots of twisty track segments (5,053 feet of track in total, quite long), a 17 foot freefall plunge indoors, a 65 foot tall, 70 degree vertical spike and a host of special effects.

From the reviews, its sounds like Islands of Adventure has a home run on their hands!

For those too curious to wait for their own trip into the Forbidden Forest, here is an on-ride point of view video of the attraction from The Potter Collector.