When we were at Universal over the summer, we set our touring plan around the no bags policy.
Day 1 - Went through Diagon Alley and took tons of pictures. Rode Hogwart's Express, had lunch, bought an interactive wand. Spent the afternoon doing all of the interactive wand experiences at both parks and doing a couple of other rides that allowed bags. Went back to our hotel (HRH) for dinner, dropped off the wand and bag. Returned to the parks after dinner for the last 3 hours of operation, doing Gringott's multiple times, as well as Forbidden Journey and King Kong. We took tons of pictures on this day, knowing that we would not have a camera the next day.
Day 2 - Did not take any bags or metal objects on this day. We rode all of the thrill rides, including Rip Ride Rockitt and the dragon's coaster. We would have done the Hulk too, had it been open. We also used EP to ride every other ride in both parks in which we were interested. No bags, no metal, no lockers for anything. I did (as mentioned earlier) hide a couple of emergency ponchos on my person, underneath my clothes, in a moneybelt around my waist, and we wore them on the water rides.
Day 3 - We only spent half a day at the parks, and we went bagless, but took the phone and camera. We redid all of the rides in which we were interested, except the ones that had metal detectors.
This worked really well for us, although it was annoying not being able to take pictures on Day 2. But knowing in advance helped a lot.
