A Magical Weekend

So ever since Harry Potter World was a thing out in Florida, I've been dying to go. But I'm not the sort of person who wants to drop a thousand dollars or more to fly out there, get a hotel, and go to the park for a few days (because why spend all that money to go for one day?). I'd rather be the sort of person who rides horses, apparently. No regrets. Maybe regrets loving an industry that pays terribly, but no regrets with what I currently have leaving my bank account every month for the pony.

Then when Universal Studios in Hollywood came out with their Harry Potter theme park, well, I just haven't made time to go. Until my AMAZING siblings decided that it was high time that I go, so they dragged me down there this last weekend for my birthday (which was in July, we literally have not had a free weekend between the three of us since then). Bf flew into LAX to join us, which made me so so happy. And not just because four people at an amusement park is always better.

Magical place

I took the day off on Friday to give me a great start to an even better weekend: a leisurely ride on my horse after sleeping in a bit! But you heard about that yesterday. After my ride (and siblings' half days were over), we piled into my brother's car and began the trek down to LA.

The drive went by quickly, we only hit a bit of traffic right as we went into LA! Once we acquired bf (who flew in earlier so got to go eat a bunch of tacos), we made our way to our friends' place where we were staying. From there, we walked out to get some delicious ramen and then came home and played some board games before calling it a night.

The next morning, we made a quick Target run for some sunscreen and for my brother to get shorts. He's not the over-packer of the family. Then we headed out to the park!

Entrance

Hogsmeade Station

I love me some Harry Potter and I do really like amusement parks (though never seem to make time to go), so both combined was AMAZING! I know the Florida one is supposed to be a million times better, but let me tell you, this one is really well done. They very clearly put a LOT of effort into it. You get totally immersed in the experience. I forgot I was at an amusement park sometimes (except there were lines of people there).

The first thing we did was go get a wand, because with a wand, you could do a number of spells around the shops and stuff. Our friends had given us a wand, but I totally left it in the car. So the wand became one of my few souvenirs because I signed up for a show and texted my trainer for a lesson on Friday.

HONEYDUKES! 

Monster Book of Monsters! It spun around and
growled at us

Zonko's!

After finally deciding on a wand, my SIL and I ran outside to find a spell to do. They were fun, there were people around to help you, but we figured it out quickly.

We were all getting hungry, having skipped breakfast that morning, so we went to the Three Broomsticks and got some food and our first Butterbeer. We also tried Pumpkin Juice, which tastes exactly like it sounds. The Butterbeer was GREAT, our friends said to get the frozen Butterbeer, which I can confirm is much better than the iced version (You could also get it hot, but it was REALLY warm outside so no thanks). The food was surprisingly good for amusement park food, and bf is half English so he appreciated some Shepperds pie and fish & chips.

Frozen butterbeer :) :) :) 

From there we wandered through the shops. Everything obviously was expensive, I had to resist buying a time turner necklace (when would I wear it?), a few shirts (seriously when would I wear them?), and a scarf. I did break down and get a Chocolate Frog though, haven't eaten it yet (as of writing this), but I did check my card and found that it was Gilderoy Lockhart. Not too excited about that but the box is super cute.

There are only two rides in the HP park, so we rode both. The first one we rode was the tour through Hogwarts, which I thought was SUPER well done. I love rides where the line is an experience too. The line took us about an hour, but it wound us through the castle into various rooms (and it was cool in there).

We had a ton of fun looking at the moving portraits, including a room where the portraits of the four founders were talking about us. There was also Dumbledore's office with a pensieve, a Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, the Gryffindor common room, and the Great Hall with the sorting hat at the end. By the time we got on the ride, I was legitimately kind of sad that we were done wandering through the castle. But the ride was SUPER fun too.

Gryffindor in first place! Poor Ravenclaw, boo

Portraits, some of them moved and talked

Pensieve 

Sorting hat

Coming out of the ride, we were in another shop (typical) and as tempting as it was to buy a real Maurader's Map (one of them was interactive with your wand! But bf talked me out of it), I only grabbed a Ravenclaw patch. I have a bunch of saddle pads that are kind of boring and figured I could stick it on one. I also have two friesian sporthorse patches to put on saddle pads too. I'll be getting crafty soon.

The other ride wasn't as fun, it was more of a kid's ride and the line wasn't as exciting, just through Hagrid's hut and all that. But it was part of the experience so we did it!

Hagrid's hut, you could hear Fang barking behind one of the doors

When we were done with HP, we still had some time left in the park. SIL told me it was necessary to do the studio tour, so we did that. It was a little hokey but super fun, and honestly at that point, sitting for an hour was wonderful. From there we went down to the other half of the park for two rides- the Jurassic Park ride and the Mummy ride.

I hate hate hate getting wet on rides (unless I'm wearing like a bathing suit or something) so the Jurassic Park ride basically involved me complaining and saying "no no no no no" whenever we got sprayed with water. But the Mummy ride was super fun- again a line where it was an experience, though I've never seen The Mummy so I have no idea whether it was well done. Just being inside where it was cool was nice though.

After the whole day, we were exhausted but really happy. We came back to the apartment, grabbed our friends, and went out to an all you can eat Korean BBQ place. Any hope that I had of not being totally sick on Sunday went straight out the window. It was AMAZING.

Walking into the castle :) 

The weekend was over too quickly and we headed back on Sunday afternoon. The drive seemed to take longer going back than getting there, but soon we were home. Monday morning felt like getting hit by a truck (especially when TC saw me, squealed, and cantered around in his paddock, oh man). But it was totally worth it and I loved every second!