When we arrived back at our hotel after the Harry Potter tour, we were in for another adventure, but not in a good way.
We walked in & the man running the reception desk handed us a key & told us he found a key to our room. We were excited until we went downstairs to our room to find it completely empty. Remember how they told us to leave a few things in the room to "remind" them that it was still occupied? Yep, ALL GONE.
We went back upstairs & asked him where our things were & he said he didn't know. He said that he did us a courtesy by letting the maid in to clean the room for us as an apology for not having a key at check in. Well, the maid went in & "cleaned out" everything we had in there including our pillows, towels, toiletries, & more. I got upset & told him the maid should have never entered our room while it was occupied without our permission AND that he should have let her know that we were still staying there & not to touch our stuff. He proceeded to get up in my face & started screaming at me that I was ungrateful & that I never should have stayed in a room without a key in the first place!!! (I agree with that sentiment, but HE IS THE ONE THAT GAVE ME THAT ROOM WITHOUT A KEY IN THE FIRST PLACE & REFUSED TO GIVE US A REFUND IF WE LEFT THE HOTEL!)
I was SO angry. Trek happened to come upstairs just as he was screaming in my face (he was literally less than a foot away from my face). He went "papa bear" on the man & told him in the loudest voice I've ever heard Trek use (he's a calm & quiet soul. I've never heard him raise his voice before).
"Don't EVER talk to my wife like that!"
We talked through the situation again, & the worker asked us what we wanted to do. We asked to see the maid's closet to see if she put the items by the washing machine or in a closet in case someone came back to claim the $100 worth of stuff they "left" in the room. The laundry room was in shambles. I don't know how this place stays in business. There were bugs, there was dirty laundry everywhere (which made me cringe thinking about sleeping in that bed again.), but none of our personal items from our room. We asked the employee if he could call the maid to ask about it, but he told us the maid didn't speak English so he couldn't communicate with her.
Frustrated, we asked if we could look through the trash bins for the hotel. The guy was a total jerk about it. He did NOT want us rummaging through their trash, so I asked him if he was so concerned about it, that maybe he should be the one to rummage through the trash instead of us. He didn't like that idea either. In the end, all 3 of us wound up rummage through the trash bins. NOTHING. We found trash from the hotel rooms. . . empty shampoos & soaps, things like that, but none of our personalized towels, pillows, or toiletries. The man said he was sorry, but there was nothing he could do about it.
Trek looked at him & knew there was still something "off" about the whole situation. "There is something you can do. You can compensate us for what was taken from our room." He refused to even consider that so Trek told him he was going to call the police & let them know what happened. As soon as we mentioned the cops, the guy immediately asked how much money would be sufficient to cover what was stolen. We looked up each item on Amazon & figured out it was about $100 worth of items missing & he paid us 80 Pounds (which was about $100). We were even.
I was still mad. But we needed this hotel for two more nights & nothing else was available so we had to play nice & agree that everything was fine now. We were grateful we now had a key to our room, but we spent the rest of the stay without any soap, shampoos, towels, or pillows. It was such a random incident.
After eating sandwiches from a small grocery store, we hopped into the van (our dear friend's van) & headed to the Warner Brother Studio Tour - The Making of Harry Potter. It's about an hour outside of London so we made sure we had plenty of time to get there with traffic.
We arrived at 3:00 & our tour was set to start at 5:00. When we pulled in, we got a beautiful golden snitch sticker in our van window which allowed us to park in the VIP parking. We felt special.
When I saw the front of the building I literally started to cry. Places like this are too magical to contain my emotions. I've been wanting to do this tour for AGES. I felt like a kid again reading Harry Potter for the first time. I was SO excited to experience this magic with my kids.
The giant wizard's chess pieces were all lined up in front of the building. Just seeing them let me know that we were in for a magical time.
As we walked into the studio, the first thing we saw was the giant dragon from the 8th movie. It's the model/prop they used for the movie & it was incredible. The detail was amazing. Just seeing a dragon made my boys' eyes light up with excitement.
They had some costumes from the new Fantastic Beasts movie as well. I love costumes. I make costumes so I could look at costumes all day long. I love to see fabric & pattern choices, stitching, & assembly of each piece. It's magical to me.
The store located there in the studio is HUGE. It took us nearly an hour just to go from room to room to room exploring it all. The wand room was incredible. Floor to ceiling with wand boxes. It felt like we were in Ollivanders.
We shopped for a little bit, then joined the line to start the actual tour. Our tour was at 5:00, but they let us go in at 4:00. We were SO excited.
As we walked down the hallway, there were little things here & there that we remember seeing in the movies, like this stained glass window.
We started out with cardboard cutouts of our favorite characters. We thought that was pretty cool. We had no idea that our minds would be blown soon after that. This tour was so much more than silly old cardboard cutouts.
The famous "cupboard under the stairs."
The took us to a big room where we watched a 10 minute movie about the making of the Harry Potter movies. The actors that play Fred & George narrated it & the kids were LOVING it. It really got them excited for the rest of the museum.
Then they escorted us into a theater with seats. We sat down & watched a short movie with the 3 main actors where they "welcomed" us to the world of Harry Potter. The screen rose up, & there was the entrance to the great hall. We squealed in delight. The doors opened & the Harry Potter music started playing. . . & we were welcomed into the Great Hall.
Words cannot express how amazing it was. The feelings you feel when you walk into that magical place are indescribable. I might have had to wipe away a few tears. The kids were giddy with delight. They kept pointing & oohing & aahing at everything around them.
I especially loved how they had all the costumes of all the actors there in the tour. It was neat to see them up close.
The next part of the tour was costumes & wigs. Needless to say, I loved it.
This ceiling from "the great hall" was actually just a piece of flat cardboard on the ceiling. It looked so real, but totally wasn't real at all.
After this point, the real magic happened. We were suddenly standing in the sets from ALL the Harry Potter movies. Everywhere you turned there was something else to see. It was massive & FULL of stuff to look at.
We started with the magical staircase
and Umbridge's rules
We saw the wands of the entire main cast . . .
And then took some time to wander around the Gryffindor bed chambers, then the Slytherin & Gryffindor common rooms.
The Potions classroom was fun to see too.
Canyon got a kick out of seeing the Fat Lady.
And we were all interested in learning that the invisibility cloak had a literal "green screen" on it's inside to make it invisible on camera.
We all took turns looking into the Mirror of Erised.
And then went to find Dumbledore's Office.
Bladen found the Tri Wizard Cup
while Cadence & Craiger helped defend Hogwarts with the other statues.
All the boys enjoyed the Quidditch section of the tour. It was fun to see the different brooms, costumes, & Quidditch balls.
The boys each got a chance to stand by a broom & say "UP!" The brooms rose into their hands. It was cute.
After playing with the brooms here, we got to go into the green room where they let each of us ride a broom!!! They had brooms in green rooms where the kids got to get on the broom while they filmed them doing things. Then we got to watch a movie of them "flying" over the Quidditch pitch, Hogwarts, & London. They kids got a kick out of that.
After spending a good amount of time riding brooms, we found our way to Hagrid's Hut.
And the Burrow where the Weasley's lived.
We got to watch a demonstration of how the Whomping Willow attacked the Ford Angola in the 2nd movie.
Then we made our way into the Ministry of Magic.
The entrance to The Chamber of Secrets was there too. Canyon just finished the 2nd book so he was extra excited to see this.
We got to see Mad Eye Moody's trunk,
and then got to pet Norbert, Hagrid's dragon.
The next section was the "bad guy" section of the tour. We saw Draco's Vanishing Cabinet from the 6th movie, as well as other Death Eater props.
We got to see the scene from the 7th book where Voldemort is talking to his Death Eaters. (This one scared the boys a little bit. . . especially since they saw Snape there & they wanted to know why he was with the bad guys. . . . KEEP READING!)
There's a running joke that Malfoy is "hot" so the kids did their best impression of "Draco is HOT!"
The Ministry of Magic was cool too. We got to see the prophesy orbs. . .
And all of Umbridge's sets & costumes.
After that, we got to visit the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid.
We saw Centaurs, Buckbeak, & LOTS of spiders.
After the forest, we came out to find the Hogwart's Express. We couldn't help but feel happy seeing the magical train to Hogwarts.
And of course we had to visit Platform 9 3/4.
They even let us go inside the train & see where they filmed all the train scenes.
This was the half way point of the tour. We stopped at the bathrooms & the cafe here to buy some Butterbeer. Yum. Outside between the two studios, there were a few sets to see.
We first stopped at the Burrow.
with our Butterbeer.
Then we visited Privet Drive where the Dursley's live.
After that, we visited Madame Pomfrey's greenhouse & got to pot some madrakes.
We crossed the bridge the students always crossed in the movies which happened to be a lot smaller in person. . .
And then visited the Knight Bus
We took turns on Hagrid's motorcycle
and in the enchanted Ford Angola.
Inside the 2nd studio was all the special effects from the movies. There were several rooms showing the animatronics from the movies.
And the kids got to try out the motion capture animation as well.
One of my favorite places on the tour was Gringott's Bank. Pictures do NOT do this justice. It was a gorgeous set. It all felt SO real.
Then we came upon a 2nd Gringott's set. . . one that was destroyed.
We heard some sounds & then a dragon showed up. I think it scared the boys a little bit, but once we watched it once, they wanted to stay & watch it a few more times because they realized how cool these special effects were.
We got to explore some of the scenes filmed in Gringott's like the safe where the Sorcerer's Stone was kept. . .
as well as Bellatrix's vault where they find Hufflepuff's cup in Book 7.
Then we got to explore Diagon Alley. I loved Flourish & Blot's (with Lockhart's books in the window) & of course Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes store.
The last stop on this fabulous tour was the Hogwart's Model room. This model of the castle was used for all the castle views on film. It's beautiful & it's detail was incredible. The work that went into this castle was insane.
The whole tour was incredible. It ended in Ollivander's Shop.
We spent about 4 hours total in the tour & I swear we still didn't see everything. It was probably the best tour I've ever been on in my life. If you love Harry Potter, this is a must! I'll never forget our time here. It was the highlight of our entire trip.
