Diagon Alley! Gringotts! Hotwarts express!

Today was our first day of our Harry Potter vacation.  Mom and I made us fabulous matching outfits for each day and on our first day, we wore my favorite of the outfits.  We got so so so many compliments on our skirts and whole outfits, all throughout the day.  It was awesome!  We got early park admission with our hotel stay, so we were up bright and early and got to the gate 40 min before it opened for early admission!  We were some of the very first people in the park.  We stopped first to get our star card.  Mom paid about $60 for a picture pass called the star card.  This pass allowed us to keep every picture taken by the picture people in the park, and also all our ride photos.  It ended up being a FANTASTIC deal, we got tons of pictures and some great discounts on other services as well.  Once we had our card in hand we raced to "London" to get to Diagon alley.  We first stopped at the public phone box where I dialed the Ministry of Magic, unfortunately due to an Atmospheric spell gone wrong in the Atrium, the guest entrance was closed.  Then we stopped by the Knight bus for a chat with Paul the conductor and the shrunken head.  They liked our outfits and we discussed our favorite Quidditch teams.  After that, it was time to take a peak at #12 Grimwald place and catch Kreacher looking at us from the upstairs window.  Now it was finally time to enter Diagon Alley.  The entry way was as magical as they could make it, and once you are through the brick wall, you are completely immersed in the Harry Potter world.  We went straight to Gringotts and rode "Harry potter and the escape from Gringotts"  It is a 3/D roller coaster ride, and very. very cool.  After the ride, we went straight to Olivanders because there is often a very long line for the wand show.  We went though and Kristy, the only one without a wand, was not chosen, so we went through again in the hopes she might be, she wasn't again, but as we were about the walk out the wand wizzard called us over and asked us if we were there together (matching outfits ahoy!) and asked if we were there to get a wand.  We pushed Kristy forward, since she was, and he gave her a very short private wand finding show.  It was so neat!  Kristy got one of the new interactive wands which let you do spells around both Diagon Alley and Hogsmead!  Then we wandered around the Alley until it was time for our breakfast at the Leakey cauldron.  Breakfast was ok.  Kerri and Kristy had the traditional english breakfast, mom had a pastie and I had a oatmeal flan.  Mom had orange juice but the rest of us tried the pumpkin juice, it was ok, but none of us finished our glasses!  It was so neat to eat there!  After breakfast, we went back to london and to Kings Cross to catch the Hogwarts express.  The Que was awesome, they even have a place where there is an optical illusion where it actually looks like people are passing through the barrier into platform 9 3/4!  The train ride doubled as a little show, which was neat and then we disembarked in Hogsmead.  Our plan was to hit the Harry Potter and the Forbidden journey ride in the Hogwarts castle before lines got to long, and we timed it just right.  The first ride through was great, we all rode together and had a wonderful time, our second ride though might have been a bad idea, as both mom and I got sick from the spinning.  We wobbled our way out of the line and ran over to our last stop in Harry potter world for the morning, the Dueling Dragons.  Mom had promised Dad that she would ride the dragon loopty-loop roller coaster once, now that she can, but it didn't go well.  It left mom feeling sick for most of the rest of the day, but she soldiered on and we still had a fabulous day.  I don't remember the rest of the order of our events, but we went out and explored the rest of Universal, since HP world was super crowded once the early admission was over.  It was an amazing day exploring the rest of the park!  Late in the evening, Mom was just done, so she went home early while us girls went back for one more peek at Diagon Alley at night.  It was amazing and we tried a very strange drink called fishey green water which was milky, cinnamony, minty, and had blueberry bubbles at the bottom.  Very strange.  After the park closed, we headed back to our hotel to pick up mom.  We all went out to dinner at a Schwarma place, which was delicious before we collapsed into bed after an exhausting 12+ hours at the park!

Get ready for picture overload!!!!!