I can't believe that it has already been a year since I visited the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. I have to say that this amusement park experience was probably the coolest thing that I had ever seen!! I absolutely loved it, and I thought that it was very well put together. Universal did a great job. I was constantly amazed as I looked around the Wizarding World... I truely felt like I was going to run into Harry Potter at any moment. It was fantastic.
I was very lucky!! I booked my trip to Orlando back in December. And it turns out that I just so happened to book for openning week!! I got a super cheap hotel room deal too compared to what I would have paid had I waited until the openning day was announced. It was extremely crowded when I was there! People were waiting between 5-8 hours JUST to get into the park during the intial openning day. Luckily, I didn't have to wait that long. I only had to wait a couple hours to get in each day, and of course I was there right as the park openned! In order to get into the wizarding world section you had to get a ticket to show that you had waited in line. There is my golden ticket into the Wizarding World of Harry Potter!
Isn't the castle breath taking? I was completely in love with it. It looks just like the castle from the movies. And the inside of the castle is the coolest thing I've ever seen. I swear the wait in line was almost as good as the ride itself! But we'll get to that later!
I know that it is hard to tell but this is the inside of Olivander's Wand Shop. When I was there the lines to get into Olivander's were outrageous! We were lucky because I met up with some people from my Harry Potter website and they let us cut in line with them. Life saver! Or I might not have ever got to go into Olivanders. There is a quick show inside. The man that plays Olivander picks a person from the crowd to have a wand choose them, and things happen inside Olivanders as you try to test out your wand, and find the right one for you. It's pretty cool!!
Here is one of the stores that you can shop in to find all kinds of cool things from key chains to robes, and all kinds of other harry potter related merchandise! Very cool! But make sure that you don't wait in line to get into this shop and into Olivanders, because when you exit Olivanders you come into this shop. The only complaint that I had about the park was how small these shops were! They were not accommodating to large crowds of people at all, but I guess they wanted the feel to be right.
Here is the Three Broom Sticks. We waited a good hour or so to go into it. But it was neat to get to eat inside of it :) The food inside is actually reasonably priced for theme park food. I also got my first taste of butterbeer while standing in line.. and let me tell you it was DELICIOUS! I loved it! I had soooo many mugs of it!! I bought a mug originally that was $10 that I got to keep, and then the refills for it wasn't too bad. However, if you didn't know where to buy the butterbeer you could stand in line for it for a looong time, because everyone wanted to try it!
My recommendation is to buy it in the Hogs Head, because there is less of a line in there. I think that people don't realize you can buy the butterbeer in there.
Most people were standing outside in line at the butterbeer stands. These lines were quite long in the sun! I can imagine that people were not happy to be standing in the line, but I would say it is worth it, because it tastes yummy!!!
Here is the Hogwarts Express!
After years of talking, and being friends on Hogwarts Online I finally got to meet Chauncey!! I was really excited about meeting him, because we've talked so much over the years. I think that the Wizarding World of Harry Potter was an appropriate place for us to meet for the first time. He didn't get to go into the parks with us, but we did get to have lunch together which was really nice. We actually ate at the Hard Rock Cafe with a few other people from HO. :) That was definitely a highlight of the trip for me.
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| Here is the outside line to get in the ride. Notice how it is a like a greenery? That is because you are supposed to be waiting in the Green House or Herbology department at Hogwarts. If you looked up you could see all kinds of magical plants along with normal plants. I was pretty cool!! I didn't even notice it at first, but the girl I was with Rachel pointed it out to me! |
Here is the entrance into the castle!! I was sooooo excited about getting to go inside. I had nooo idea how amazing and detailed the inside of the castle would be. I almost feel that once you get to this point you are no longer just waiting in line. You are going through part of the experience. It was sooo amazing!! There were so many chambers and rooms inside that just seemed absolutely magical!
Once you walk into the castle there are a number of objects around you. I won't list every detail here, but I'll just show some highlights. Here are the house points area. Which I thought was really cool. The only part that I didn't like was that Ravenclaw was losing!! Boo on whoever made that decision!! Haha.
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| There are a few more rooms in between the entryway and this room, but this is the first significant room. Here there are numerous pictures on the wall. And the 4 founders of Hogwarts are here, and they are talking among themselves. I think everyone was a bit amazed to see this, and here were really excited about it. |
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| Here is Dumbledore's Office!! There is actually a hologram of him in this room, and he is talking to everyone. It's pretty neat!! I loved looking at all the different gadgets and what not that would be in his office!! And it was the first hologram that you see. Which leads us to the next room... |
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| Here is a Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom which has skeleton's of creatures inside of it, and the trio appear to talk to you. Originally they sneak into the classroom under the invisibility cloak. Basically this is where you learn the story behind the ride. The trio is surprised that muggles got into the castle, and originally you were supposed to come to attend a history of magic class. They tell you that class is dreadfully boring, and that they are going to sneak you out to quidditch match!! Very cool! Now each room in the castle has two different version's of the story they tell. In this case sometimes Ron will make the room snow or he will cause lightning to go off. I think they change the story up a little bit so that it's a bit different everytime you come in. You always hear different sinbits of the conversations. It is rare that you will stay in one room to listen to them talk all the way... unless of course you stayed there and let people pass you in line. Which is what I did when I figured this out!! :) |
After the DADA classroom you will past numerous other things. Among that is the portrait of the Fat Lady. She will talk to you a bit. But then you get to the sorting hat which tells you to hurry up and get onto the ride! Once you see the sorting hat you will QUICKLY get onto the ride. I mean you will almost have to run to get up there! I was shocked at how fast it moved. This ride continuously moves and loads so that the most amount of people can get on it. I think it is incredibly popular ride at Universal. I wouldn't be surprised if it was the single most popular attraction. While waiting in line for the ride was spectacular going on the ride was amaaaazing!!!! It was the most unique ride I have ever been on. I have to say that I was thoroughly impressed by it. It was a ride, but it was sooo much more! I really felt like I was in the world of Harry Potter. It was sooo well done. I couldn't believe it. Very creative, and very detailed. The ride itself must have cost a fortune to make. It had quidditch, giant spiders, dragons, dementors... everything in this ride! It truly put you into the scenarios. Half of it was flying into a screen, and the other half was 3D props. It's very hard to describe it properly. You will just have to ride it for yourself!! I would HIGHLY recommend it.
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| Here are some more props around the park! The Ford Angelina from the second book! |
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| Here is a view of Hogsmeade. The buildings are very detailed and quite impressive to see. They were bit a little bit too small for the park, but still... they looked very authentic. |
