Heyyyy guyzz,,
I know I'm slacking a bit on doing my post about my recent trip to London and the Harry Potter Studio's but I've literally had zero time since I've been back and I've had to sort through about 800+ photos.. no exaggeration :(!
Yeah,, so anyway,, on Monday which was August 20th, me and my friend Faye went to Sunderland for the night ready to go to London on the 21st from Sunderland Interchange (we didn't have a clue where this was). We arrived at our Travelodge which was situated right in the very centre of the city of Sunderland. Then we decided to have a little mooch round so we walked over to The Bridges shopping centre and naturally when we seen the Disney shop we were drawn to it like little children. Anyways,, less about that and more about trying to find our way round. In the end we asked a lovely woman at the information desk where the interchange was, so we knew where we were going the next morning.. It was literally 5 minutes away!! When Google Maps said we had a 15 minute walk -_-!! So we were happy!
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| Beer & Burger..... 5am Sunderland |
After this we went back to the Travelodge and went in the pub next door, it was a Wetherspoons, yey, my favourite pubs.. We got burgerss and beerss (well cider), as yer do :D!! Stuffed our faces and went back to our room ready for our 5am rise!!!!
We were all chilled and then at 8pm! the bloody bells started going mental in Sunderland Minster so we weren't impressed. This went on for a good hour so we didn't sleep, instead we people watched from out window, there were some right states walking the street.. including 2 very drunk chavs who were about 30 years old, hugging trees and random Chinese people. Anyway we hardly got any sleep and got up at 5am knackeredddd! but forced ourselves to get ready anyway purely on excitement! When we'd dragged ourselves out of the Travelodge it was about 6:50am and we decided to go on an early morning food scrounge because we were starving and had a massive coach trip ahead of us. We looked a right clip pulling our suitcases around the deserted morning streets, there was only the odd person waiting at bus stops and then us. We couldn't find a shop anywhere, then we spotted a little off licence and got some fooood,, random sandwich for brekky :').. not the best of early morning meals I've ever had but hey ho...
We got the coach at about 7:15am from the Interchange and set off for The Warner Bros Studios at about 7:30am so it was all good. We stopped off at Woodall on the way down at a service station at about 10am. We decided to go wild and Faye got a McFlurry,, the woman who served her was like,, it's only 10am you know.. she was like,, yeah and? ha,, woman was gutted. I was normal and just got a Mango & Passion Fruit Frap from Starbucks. Then we set off again about 10:30am. We arrived at the Studios at about 1:30pm. Our tour didn't start til 2:30pm so we had a mooch around the gift shop and sat outside in the sun for a while,, which was amazzzinngg after being sat on a coach for what felt like days.
I was so excited to go in and everything, there were soooooo many people there. Loadsa kids dressed up as Harry Potter with the proper full outfits on, glasses and wands,, the lot. I was soo surprised at how many American's that were there.. is was so strange hearing them all talking to eachother,, I got a bit too excited I think. There was also a lot of Australian people there,, some were mega hot too.. just thought I'd add in that little detail!
Yeah sooo, we went for our tour. I was sooo amazed that it was all actually the real set and props that were used in the films. It was actually unreal. I took sooooo many photos but I've narrowed it down a lot to put on here because I didn't want to clog up my page with millions of photos.
The first place in the tour was The Great Hall,, it was unbelievable, although it didn't look as big as it does on the films, it was enormous,, and all the detail that had been put into it was amazing, the tour guide pointed out loads of bits that can't even be seen on screen but were in the set anyway to make it so realistic, such as carvings in the back of the fireplace and the real flagstone floor. The props were absolutely fab as well! The real Triwizard Cup and The Moony Wormtail Padfoot and Prong Map were so detailed. Even 4 Privet Drive was really realistic, it was weird seeing the real house, it was just like a normal house even though it was just a set. The butterbeer was really weird too, it was nice, it tasted like cream soda but after a while it was just reallly sickly!
Next we went into Diagon Alley, which was soooooooo real! it was just like a real alley way with shops and everything. Seriously it was the most surreal thing ever.
Here are a few of my photos from the alley,,
Top Row - Quality Quidditch Supplies Shop, Eeylops Owl Emporium, Daniel Radcliffe's Wand in Ollivanders.
Middle Row - Gringotts Wizard Bank, Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes Shop, Scribbulus Writing Implements Shop.
Bottom Row - Ollivanders Wand Shop, Wand in Ollivanders, Wiseacre's Wizarding Equipment Shop.
As you can see it is all soooo realistic, I just can't express how unbelievable it all was, I bet I just sound like a right weirdo, but in all seriousness it was fantastic. I might put a few more photos on at the end of the post so if you wanna have a nosey that's where they'll be.
After we'd been to the studios we got back on the coach and headed to our hotel in Reading which was a Holiday Inn, and having never stayed in a Holiday Inn before I didn't really know what to expect. We literally just expected it to be nice and simple, like the Travelodge that we had stayed in the night before in Sunderland. Ohhhhh,, and how wrong we were! We walked in and it was sooooo posh. We went to our room and it was so lovely. The bed was massive and sooooo comfy. I was glad, considering I'd had the worst nights sleep ever the night before! We got changed and went down for tea.
After tea we had a little nosey around the hotel and then went up to our room and had a cuppa. We were exhausted! Ps. the bottom left photo is of a random as rave light that we were buzzing over in out bathroom haha.. random but very cool! Ignore the random one of me having a proper buzz on aswell ha.. just had to fill the space haha,, I look well happy.
Yeah sooo, the hotel was mintttt and I had the best sleep EVER that night only to be woken up by my alarm at 6am :(.. so we got ready, went down for breakfast, which was better than the sandwiches from the day before, we had sausages, bacon, egg and beans,, proper fatties, we literally couldn't move after but it was lush.
Then, once again we got back on the coach and set off for London this time,, yayyyyy...
It took us around an hour to get into London and we got dropped off on Park Lane outside the masssssive Grosvenor Hotel, which was soooo posh! Anyway we walked up to Marble Arch tube station and it all went from there really. Good job I actually took notice when I went to London with college so I knew what I was doing on the tube because Faye didn't have a clue, bless her. Just some random photos of tube stations and inside the underground,. nothing too exciting but I think I took a photo of literally everything...
First of all we bought our tube tickets for the day and got a tube map and planned where to go first... Which was Green Park and Buckingham Palace, which was typically fullll of tourists so I apologise for all the random people in my photos but it could not be helped, as soon as someone move and you thought you were going to get a perfect photo,, BAM some other random was stood there! Annoying! I can't remember what order we went to each place so I'll just guess and hope I'm right but I'll be sure to mention everywhere we went. Anyway we couldn't decide where to go so we just got on the tube at a random station and ended up on Oxford Street, which was PACKED as per... we had a little mooch about but it was sooooo warm and packed so we didn't stay there long,, plus we were on a tight schedule and we wanted to go to loads more places.
Then we headed to Piccadilly Circus which was equally packed with people. We had a walk around for a bit and took another lot of photos as well. There were sooo many ticket sales places trying to make us buy tickets,, I wish we could have,, I've wanted to see Wicked for agessss,, gutted I couldn't go! So we jumped back on the tube and went to Leicester Square and it was full of Olympic flags and we had a walk down to the Empire Theatre and nextdoor was M&M World so we obviously had to go in there. It was HUGE! 4 stories full to the brim of M&M memorabilia, it was crazy. Once again we planned our route and the last place we went to was The Thames Embankment, which is famously the home of Big Ben, The Houses Of Parliament and The London Eye. By this time we were absolutely boiling and also running out of time so we didn't stay for very long. We got a quick photos and then headed back to Marble Arch and McDonalds hah.. We hadn't eaten since we arrived and we were STARVINNNNGG! So it was Happy Meal time,.. (yes we are children)..
Just some quick snaps from the day.. Buckingham Palace, M&M World in Leicester Square, Ben & Jerry's in Leicester Square, Piccadilly Circus, Big Ben, The London Eye, M&M World Again.
We thought we were going to be late back to the coach so we rushed back only to be told we were half an hour early -_-.. typical us! So then it was the perfect time to go and chill out in Hyde Park for a while. It was about 2pm and it was sooooo warm! We were glad to have a break from all the walking so we sat there for a bit until it was time to go home! SAD TIMES!!! We set off home at about 3pm and we were gutted but alsoo sooooooo worn out! It felt like it took agessss to get to the service station, I just wanted to nap on the coach but Faye forced me to go for a walk about and it was probably for the best, my legs were so numb because I'd been sat down for so long! Then we headed home and arrived at about 9pm,, I was sooo happy to get home and a showered and into bed! I was absolutely exhausted... Although it was an amazing few days and I'm sooo glad I went!!
Here are some more random photos that I took as well, not all of them because I can't be chewwed putting them all on, sorrrrrrry...
I was going to do my outfits of the few days on this post but I think it's already wayyyyy too long,, and my outfits were pretty boring because I didn't really have time to be bothered to look nice haha.. but I'll do a little bit about them tomorrow as I'm sooo sleepy now and sick of looking at my laptop screen. And I'm pretty sure my laptop is going to burn through my legs at any minute so I'll say goodnight for now my little cherubs and I'll update tomorrowww..... hope you enjoyed my trip as much as I did,, although this has been very very condensed because I didn't want to go into every little detail.
Cyaaaaaa
Aly
xoxoxoxoxox
Hii Hiiii,,
