April 25th, 2014 (Friday)
Angelina (aka the birthday girl), Megan, Marisa, and I headed off to London Friday evening and arrived at our hostel around 8:00pm. After getting settled and eating a delicious meal at the bar/restaurant downstairs, we wanted to do a little bit of walking around. We walked along the boardwalk on the River Thames and looked at the Tower Bridge, which was gorgeous when it was all lit up. We were also able to walk across part of it, but it was really cold and windy and beginning to drizzle, so we didn't spend too much time. We also walked by the London Bridge, but it's nowhere near as spectacular as the Tower Bridge. We went back to the bar underneath our hostel and celebrated Angelina's birthday with music, drinks, and dancing. Even though we planned on waking up super early on Saturday to do most of our sightseeing, we didn't go to bed until pretty late, but it was worth it and we had a lot of fun.
April 26th, 2014 (Saturday)
This being our only full day in London, we wanted to make the most of it. Dressed and finished with breakfast by 8:15ish, we set out to see all the big touristy attractions London has to offer. We began by going to Big Ben and Westminster Abbey, and looking at the London Eye from afar on the bridge since none of us were too interested in going up. It was much more crowded in this area than last time I came, and it was hard to take pictures sometimes because there were so many people moving about. Once we had spent a little bit of time there, we headed up to Regent Street and did some shopping before grabbing lunch at Nando's, a really delicious chicken restaurant. Once we had finished there, we did some more walking around in the Picadelly Circus area and around Buckingham Palace before getting ready for the main event: the Warner Brother's Studio Tour! The tour is almost kind of a like a museum that takes you through two of the main sets used in the filming of the Harry Potter movies, and it was honestly one of the coolest things I've ever seen! With Tom Felton (aka Draco Malfoy) as our guide (more specifically, Tom Felton's voice), we got to see so many of the actual things used in the filming of the movies. We got saw props, such as wigs, articles of clothing (including Harry's invisibility cloak!!), jewelry, the Horcruxes, the Triwizard Cup, the Goblet of Fire, the "Magic is Might" monument in the Ministry, the Mirror of Erised, the Sorting Hat, and all kinds of random little knick knacks like newspaper articles, letters, and pictures. We also saw the sets for Dumbledore's office, Umbridge's office, the Great Hall, Gryffindor's common room and boy's dorm, Diagon Alley, and the potions classroom. We got to stand on the Knight Bus, sit in Hagrid's motorcycle, stand on the doorstep of Number 4 Privet Drive, and even get our picture taken with Elmo, the actual owl who was used to play Hedwig in the movies! As if that wasn't cool enough, the tour ended with a massive scaled-down model of Hogwarts that was all lit up and sparkling. It was so beautiful and I got the chills just looking at it, amazed by the detail and the accuracy that was put into it. Along the way, we learned some really interesting facts about filming the movie, my favorite being that Hagrid was actually played by a 6'10 man whose face was actually Robbie Coltrane's, and was computer-generated. We got home really late from the tour, so we went to bed absolutely exhausted.
April 27th, 2014 (Sunday)
We didn't have a whole lot of time to do things on Sunday, but we did what we could. We went to see Shakespeare's Globe, which actually kind of disappointed me. It looked like it had been made into some type of museum thing, and wasn't at all what I had always pictured it to be, but I was still glad I went to see it. Afterwards, we went to King's Cross where we got our pictures taken at Platform 9 3/4! We got tea and french toast afterward for a light lunch and then finished our trip at Harrod's, a super famous (and even more expensive) department store in London. Most things didn't even have prices on it, they were so expensive. We did find some cheap tea in the food area of the store, so we did end up getting to walk around with our Harrod's bags :) I felt kind of cool until I realized that I was also holding a bright red bag in the same hand that said "Platform 9 3/4" in huge gold letters.
Other than slightly panicking because we realized that our flight was actually almost an hour earlier than we thought it was, the trip went really smoothly and I was so happy I got to spend Angelina's birthday with her in London. It was neat that everything I did this time was different than the previous time I was in London, and I still felt like I could have spent another week there. It's a beautiful city full of great things to do, and I already can't wait to return for a third time!
Angelina (aka the birthday girl), Megan, Marisa, and I headed off to London Friday evening and arrived at our hostel around 8:00pm. After getting settled and eating a delicious meal at the bar/restaurant downstairs, we wanted to do a little bit of walking around. We walked along the boardwalk on the River Thames and looked at the Tower Bridge, which was gorgeous when it was all lit up. We were also able to walk across part of it, but it was really cold and windy and beginning to drizzle, so we didn't spend too much time. We also walked by the London Bridge, but it's nowhere near as spectacular as the Tower Bridge. We went back to the bar underneath our hostel and celebrated Angelina's birthday with music, drinks, and dancing. Even though we planned on waking up super early on Saturday to do most of our sightseeing, we didn't go to bed until pretty late, but it was worth it and we had a lot of fun.
April 26th, 2014 (Saturday)
This being our only full day in London, we wanted to make the most of it. Dressed and finished with breakfast by 8:15ish, we set out to see all the big touristy attractions London has to offer. We began by going to Big Ben and Westminster Abbey, and looking at the London Eye from afar on the bridge since none of us were too interested in going up. It was much more crowded in this area than last time I came, and it was hard to take pictures sometimes because there were so many people moving about. Once we had spent a little bit of time there, we headed up to Regent Street and did some shopping before grabbing lunch at Nando's, a really delicious chicken restaurant. Once we had finished there, we did some more walking around in the Picadelly Circus area and around Buckingham Palace before getting ready for the main event: the Warner Brother's Studio Tour! The tour is almost kind of a like a museum that takes you through two of the main sets used in the filming of the Harry Potter movies, and it was honestly one of the coolest things I've ever seen! With Tom Felton (aka Draco Malfoy) as our guide (more specifically, Tom Felton's voice), we got to see so many of the actual things used in the filming of the movies. We got saw props, such as wigs, articles of clothing (including Harry's invisibility cloak!!), jewelry, the Horcruxes, the Triwizard Cup, the Goblet of Fire, the "Magic is Might" monument in the Ministry, the Mirror of Erised, the Sorting Hat, and all kinds of random little knick knacks like newspaper articles, letters, and pictures. We also saw the sets for Dumbledore's office, Umbridge's office, the Great Hall, Gryffindor's common room and boy's dorm, Diagon Alley, and the potions classroom. We got to stand on the Knight Bus, sit in Hagrid's motorcycle, stand on the doorstep of Number 4 Privet Drive, and even get our picture taken with Elmo, the actual owl who was used to play Hedwig in the movies! As if that wasn't cool enough, the tour ended with a massive scaled-down model of Hogwarts that was all lit up and sparkling. It was so beautiful and I got the chills just looking at it, amazed by the detail and the accuracy that was put into it. Along the way, we learned some really interesting facts about filming the movie, my favorite being that Hagrid was actually played by a 6'10 man whose face was actually Robbie Coltrane's, and was computer-generated. We got home really late from the tour, so we went to bed absolutely exhausted.
April 27th, 2014 (Sunday)
We didn't have a whole lot of time to do things on Sunday, but we did what we could. We went to see Shakespeare's Globe, which actually kind of disappointed me. It looked like it had been made into some type of museum thing, and wasn't at all what I had always pictured it to be, but I was still glad I went to see it. Afterwards, we went to King's Cross where we got our pictures taken at Platform 9 3/4! We got tea and french toast afterward for a light lunch and then finished our trip at Harrod's, a super famous (and even more expensive) department store in London. Most things didn't even have prices on it, they were so expensive. We did find some cheap tea in the food area of the store, so we did end up getting to walk around with our Harrod's bags :) I felt kind of cool until I realized that I was also holding a bright red bag in the same hand that said "Platform 9 3/4" in huge gold letters.
Other than slightly panicking because we realized that our flight was actually almost an hour earlier than we thought it was, the trip went really smoothly and I was so happy I got to spend Angelina's birthday with her in London. It was neat that everything I did this time was different than the previous time I was in London, and I still felt like I could have spent another week there. It's a beautiful city full of great things to do, and I already can't wait to return for a third time!