London Calling!


Bellachan sitting on my chest XD


Today I'll be blogging about our trip to London last March! I was really excited to go since I hadn't been in London before or anywhere in the UK for that matter~ 
My friend since childhood has been living there for a few years now and I've also admired many UK gals and luckily there was a meet at the same time as my holiday!

Right now as I'm writing this I've been sick for the past few days with some sort of stomach flu x___x it has been awful but I'm positive I can get this post done~ 

Bye bye home!!


Obviously we went to Starbucks like every time we're travelling somewhere~ Usually to Japan so it was weird not to go to the same gate as always but to a different one that would take us to London! We had bought tickets to Finnair as always XD



On the first full day we had tickets to Harry Potter Studio Tour! I was amazing
You need to purchase your tickets in advance since they are not selling them at the venue.


Here is my coordinate for the Harry Potter Studio Tour!  
Delyle Noir dress that I got from the fukubukuroI had planned all of my coordinates beforehand since we only had our cabin luggage with us as we were travelling light. I didn't have any room for extra clothing




I was really worried if we would make it to Watford where a shuttle bus was going to the studios. It's difficult to estimate time even with all these online tools since they're not always right. So we took a train to Watford Junction pretty early and I want to thank the nice man helping us to get on the right train haha~ 



From the Watford Junction there was a non-stop shuttle bus going between the station and the studios, so from then on it was pretty easy to get to the studios~
Since the traffic is on the "wrong" side to me in London, I spent the whole ride to the studios watching where we were going XD It was interesting since we had been taking trains and subways so far and this was the first car-ride on this trip.



Yaay at the studios!
The ride from the Watford Junction wasn't long to the studios, but from London to Watford Junction via train took about 30 minutes. And it was the fast train and not a peak-hour. 
The shoes I chose were not the most flattering but they were comfortable since there was a lot of walking ahead

We got our already-paid tickets from the ticket offices, as I mentioned earlier they don't sell the tickets there you, just pick them up with the code you received when paying the tickets online in advance.



We arrived over an hour earlier than our scheduled time on the ticket XD Whoops!
Well better early than late right?
So we went to eat to the cafeteria that was inside the studios, and there even was a gluten-free chocolate cake for meSo happy about that! But on the other hand, no food was gluten-free except some salads that I ended up taking.


After eating and relaxing we went to the shop since we still had so much time to spend before our entrance time!


Tom Riddle's diary~ 



I really wanted a wand, the Elder wand but I didn't know what I would do with it XD It cost 24.99 pounds which is like 30€ so I left it at the shop..
But the wand collection was great! You could even buy Voldemort's wand! 


I wasn't sorted at the Great Hall but.. GRYFFINDOR!!

I bought a chocolate frog, Bertie Bott's every flavor beans, a time-turner keychain, Gryffindor keychain and Elder wand pen! XD 


Waiting to get inside the Great Hall!


Finally we could enter the tour! It was magical and I took like 200 pictures so I post here only the ones that have some meaning or I'm in them XD There were very few places where you couldn't take pictures and all the details of the items and classrooms and props just blew my mind
Next time I'm travelling I'm going to buy a videocamera so I can make a video of the whole thing XD



Mirror of Erised selfie


Dumbledore's office


The entrance to Dumbledore's office!


The door to the Chamber of Secrets was so detailed and bigger than it looked in the movies!



There was a cafeteria in about midway of the tour where you could buy Butterbeer!
One of only three places in the world where you can get Butterbeer! So we took a small break and sat down to drink Butterbeer which was way too sweet for me so Niina had to drink the rest of my Butterbeer XD



Wohoo the Knight Bus! It was great~ you couldn't get inside the bus except to the small part on the back
There was a queue when everyone wanted to take a picture there so I was a bit shy to pose since so many people were looking XD



After the bridge the tour changed more into the make-up artists and all the monsters and animals they had done. It was really incredible to think that someone has just pulled all that from their minds and brought to life! Makes me respect all the make-up artists so much more than I already do


Niina and BuckbeakIt was moving!


In front of Ollivanders at Diagon Alley
 

In front of the Weasley's shop at Diagon Alley



Haha~ the poor guy was puking and I'm just laughing..


The final part of the tour was the incredibly detailed and huge castle model of Hogwarts
It was just incredible and this was the only picture that wasn't completely blue since the lights there were really blue XD I had difficulties taking decent pictures.. But none of the pictures still can make justice to the magnificence of the castle and you really should go see it yourself~



That's all for the Harry Potter Studio Tour-day! It took us almost the whole day, so after we got back to our hotel we just went to eat and then sleep XD
But the next day was the meetup and afterwards we went to Madame Tussaud's so stay tuned!

Thank you for reading!