Next time I'm in London, I'll remember to bring my stilettos

Free days are by far my favorite days! Today we slept in way later than we should have, and did a terrible job of managing our time, but it was still an awesome day. We ate breakfast in the hotel and left around 10:00 am. We bought tickets a while ago for the Warner Brothers Harry Potter tour but we never really figured out the details on HOW to get there. We tried to ask multiple people for help, like our hotel concierge and different waiters, but no one had a clear answer. You don't know how much you miss Google until it's gone! Not really concerned about this dilemma we decided to start our day and figure it out later. We dropped Janae off at the Tower of London; Katie, Liba, and myself were too broke to spend the 18£ it cost to get in. London is so expensive for Americans spending money hurts. While she was in the palace we got some Starbucks and saw the London bridge (it was not falling down). London looked very different than what I thought, it's much more modern and has lots of all glass buildings. There is also construction going on at every corner. Eventually we made it to some sections that looked more like Paris, but the majority of the city that we saw was the less historical part.

The London Tower 

After we met back up with Janae we headed to see Big Ben (he's not a person FYI, I know some people get confused) and the Eye. Liba has become a master pro at figuring out all the underground subway routes in various cities. She is the reason we make it where we need to go, thank goodness for Liba!! We didn't actually go on the London eye but we got some fun pics and walked around the area for a little bit. While we were walking along a bridge we saw about 5 guys scattered along the bridge getting people to place bets of 40£ at a time to guess which cup a ball was under. The game was similar to the ones they play at ball games where you just keep your eye on the ball. If you won you doubled your money, but if you lost you were out 40£. We were a astounded people had 40£ + to gamble away on a game! Then again we are broke college students, so what do we know. 

So now to the good part, Harry Potter. Turns out the studio is about 4 trains and a shuttle away from the city of London. We had to ride trains for an hour until we got to the stop where we got on a shuttle. Our tickets would only work for an entry between 4:00 and 4:30, we scanned our tickets at 4:25; it was a close call. We spent four hours in the studio and it was absolutely AMAZING! It's actually kind of depressing because Harry Potter and Hogwarts are so real and all the characters are real people, it's like another world at your fingertips... Until you think about how it's not real and you will never make it to Hogwarts and your dreams are crushed forever. Something I was really surprised at was how small everything was! The costumes, the beds, the rooms, the couches, everything was very small. The workers there are absolutely incredible, there was so much intricate detail put into the set and a lot of it you would never notice unless you saw it up close. I must have taken over 200 pictures. Everyone in the studio was overly nice and helpful which contributed to the overall experience. No one rushed you or told you not to take pictures, they encouraged you to stay as long as you wanted and ask questions. At the end there was a HUGE large scale model of the grounds at Hogwarts and I think this was my favorite part. Looking at it you could imagine where different scenes took place and it connected all the movies; it made Hogwarts seem like a real place and not just the school where they went to class. I just love Harry Potter and I'm jealous of everyone who hasn't read them because they still have the chance to experience it for the first time ❤️

(If anyone actually starts this journey, watch movies 1-3 and start reading the 4th book. That's the best way to do it) 

We may be muggles but we are determined!

They had a place where you could learn different wand fighting techniques .. Clearly we were naturals.

Us with our butter beer in front of the Hogwarts bridge!

 We got to take pictures on a green screen! We all got this picture printed out for only 6£, it's a big picture too!

The replica

Time for a joke. What do you call 4 American girls looking for a place to dance in London? Underdressed. After dinner we wanted to go to a dance club or something to continue our happy-high we had after leaving Harry Potter. We got directed by these girls we met to a club whose name I forgot. When we finally got there, two minutes before the cover charge started, we were told that no where would let us in with the shoes we were wearing! We all looked down at our white converse that had trekked through the dirt in Pompeii, and the mud in the Paris Gardens, and were highly offended. Clearly this bouncer did not understand these were "going out" shoes in Athens. We took this as a sign to head home and once more got on the tube to go back to King's Cross. Next time I'm in London, I'll remember to bring my stilettos. 

Tomorrow - Edinburgh! 

Excited to almost be home :)

~emily