Last year, on Christmas, literally, my sister and I hopped a plane to Florida. Why? For Harry Potter of course. The wonderful wizarding world of Harry Potter. Really. We flew there went to the park and flew home. Okay there was stress and adventure like not having a hotel room on Christmas Day, a $100 taxi, the park being at full capacity and Harry land needing specific tickets but hey it was spontaneous and an adventure.
So when I was planning the trip to London you better believe Harry Potter was top on my list.
If you don't like HP something is wrong with you. Because even if you don't like the books you should respect what they did to readers all over the world... It got them: kids, adults, teens, to read. One woman's brain and pen got millions to read. She created an empire.
Respect.
Do you know last year in my class a group of kids formed the Harry Potter club? Do you know that they have up their lunch and recess each week to... Write! Yes, to write! And read. And edit. And illustrate. A group of ten year olds. Some who were motivated by nothing else. I've never seen passion and dedication like that. Never. Not in 8 years.
They were writing a sequel to the last HP book. A sequel that was a unified google doc masterpiece and over 30 single spaces, size twelve font, pages. And they are not even done.
Respect.
Respect the Potter.
Back to London. So of course I felt out my group to see who would be interested in going and dedicating our precious travel time to exploring the set where magic happens. Luckily for me they were all in.
So right now I'm sitting on a plane, dead tired, but thinking how tomorrow I will be walking through the actual HP sets! And of course what I'm really thinking about is how I am going to double fist the butterbeer. I still have a lingering taste and need for it since last Christmas. It is so darn delicious.
Frozen of course.
Haven't tried the other one and am not interested.
12 hours butterbeer. 12 hours.
So last night we got into London so late AND we had to wait for 2 hours, TWO hours in a customs line. The line wasn't even that long but took FOREVER! When I finally got to the front the man looked at my paper and said glad you're not a head hunter. I was so confused. Then he proceeded to tell me that yesterday a woman who came through was a head hunter. Random. He asked me so many questions! Everyone from my group was done and waiting and then he made me show all my documents. It was nuts and three am. I was SO tired! Ok so then we finally get to our hotel. Our first hotel ever and it sucked bc it was three am and then we had to get up and leave with no time to enjoy.
But the shower was amazing and they had huge towels. Even though I had to share a bed and didn't have room to bring my pajamas bc I had to out everything into a bag the size of someone's purse. Good thing I can travel light.
Okay then this happen:
Yes, this is a Marks and Spencer's IN a gas station. IN a gas station. I freaked out. Freaked. It was amazing. I'm in love.
Next into a very expensive taxi to arrive at the train station to board this:
We went it and had a little lunch that we had bought earlier from M&S and jumped up and down in excitement like little children. Literally, we were so happy. And it was decorated like Christmas! Ah! Just so amazing!!! While waiting a lady who worked there helped us take some photos and then she gave us one of the little kid passports. Best souviener ever! And you get to go around and get embossments on each page.
After a short video we entered the Great Hall. Incredible! This whole place was incredible. Again our excitement level was through the roof! We were grabbing eachother and hugging and I swear like little kids.
This is the mirror from the first book. They had every prop and set and just so much to look at and see!
So much! And then came time to visit the outside sets, and of course butterbeer. I was SO excited for butterbeer. Ever since having it in Florida. So as soon as we were justice I ran there.
See, just so excited. BUT then disappointment. I started looking and only saw the regular kind. Where the heck is the frozen butterbeer. I was VERY. Mad. First world problems I know but do you know what kind of let down that is! It's like wanting chocolate chip oatmeal cookies and dreaming about them and then bitting into it and getting raisins! But we got it anyway.
Then mustaches were in order.
And finally the title of this post. See the double fisting action. Yeah.
After this break it was back inside to set two.
And more exploration. So you know how I told you about embossed stamps. I really, really, REALLY wanted to stick my real passport in there and emboss it. But decided it probably wasn't the best idea since I don't even know if that's legal. So instead I decided to deface the American dollar bill. I just wanted to emboss things and no one had any paper. If you ever go bring card stock or white postcards so you can emboss them.
See. Cool.
Diagon Alley was amazing! It was beautiful!
Then there was a giant model of the castle. Covered in snow which apparently doesn't always happen. We ended our trip in Olivanders.
Do you know in the movie when they show Olivanders they made 17,000 individual wand boxes. That's cray cray.
Our trip to HP world was everything I had dreamed - the Butterbeer.
Up next:
The $200 taxi ride, the almost missed flight and a hop, skip, and a jump to Amsterdam.
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