Veronica's Travels: Wizarding World of Harry Potter

Hello Everyone! As many of you know I went to Orlando this past November to visit the theme parks Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure to experience the new addition to WWoHP, Diagon Alley! If you recall, I went to Orlando with my mom and DeMarco to see the first part of WWoHP which consisted of Hogwarts and Hogsmeade back in 2011. Diagon Alley is actually at Universal Studios (the 2 parks are next to each other) and has 2 new rides, Escape from Gringott's and the Hogwart's Express. I'm not going to go day-by-day but I'll post pictures and tell you of my thoughts and experiences so maybe this will get you excited to visit one day.

Let me first tell you about the resort I stayed at. Universal has 4 resorts and this is the brand new one. It's only a few months old. It's called Cabana Bay Resort and has that 1950's/60's theme. Very Mad Men-esque. This was an amazing resort with open and bright spaces. The rooms are also a lot of fun. The resort is considered a "value" level which I paid around $75/night with an Annual Pass discount (if you are planning on going to the parks more than 4 days it makes sense to buy the AP as it's the same price and you get discounts). I really see no need in staying at a higher end resort when Cabana Bay has everything you need and it's the newest. They also offer bus transportation to and from the parks around the clock. The buses look old-school too. Sorry no pic. Google them!

Bayliner Diner (resort food court) had ample seating and large screens to watch old-school commercials and film clips. I watched an old black and white Pop Tars commercial that made the pastries look nasty!

Lobby of Cabana Bay

Outside pool and seating areas. The Castaway/Starlight/Thunderbird buildings are family suites and the Americana and Continental are standard rooms which have indoor corridors which was nice for me as a single gal. Also you can see on the map that there are 2 pool areas. The suites area had an awesome pool area but the standard rooms area had a lazy river. You can pool hop between the two.

My room. Sorry no picture of the beds. :( As you can see it's decked out in that 50's/60's motif. Bright and bold room and very comfortable.

WARNING! MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!

Diagon Alley is at the back of Universal Studios so after walking through all the other themed "lands" then you come upon this major London facade. You can see the home of Sirius Black and of course Kreacher poking his head out the window. He only appears every few minutes.

This is also where you see the Knight Bus and meet the driver. The shrunken head talked and moved and interacted with people. He told me my name sounded like royalty and then proceeded to tell me that he was of royalty too...a royal pain in the a**. It was super fun.

The entrance to Diagon Alley. It's very low-key until you round the corner. You can actually hear the bricks moving as you head into DA.

This is the view while inside DA looking towards the exit/entrance.

What you see when you first enter DA. So the dragon isn't always breathing fire but seriously as soon as I emerged from the moving bricks, this is exactly what greeted me. It totally started me because I wasn't expecting it and it was incredibly loud. What a welcome! Also Harry Potter theme music playing too adding to the ambiance.

Lots of pictures of Diagon Alley...

These next 3 pictures is the Mythical Creatures shop where you can buy your own Hedwig, Scabbers or Crookshanks. They even had dead ferrets which the employees were wearing around their necks. I got Liliana a Buckbeak plush. I'm told Liliana bows to Buckbeak before playing with him.

More randomness...

I had breakfast one morning at the Leaky Cauldron. The meal set me back about $15 but the atmosphere was nice and as you can see in the pictures it was fairly empty.

Weasley's Joke Shop. Here is where I bought Ryan a screamin' yo yo (it actually screamed every time it went up and down) and Andrew the Master Blaster which was a giant whoopee cushion. Needless to say we were hearing all kinds of strange noises for a few days after they received their gifts.

Ollivander's Wand shop. Wands started at $35. You can buy specific ones that mirror the characters from the movies or just some random ones. They did offer an "interactive" wand which was about $40. This wand is pretty cool. Once purchased, you are given a map of Diagon Alley and there are a dozens places that you go to and cast a specific spell and something happens. This can be something from an object moving in a shop window and etc. I saw a few of these. One was at an armory and when the "student" cast the spell pieces of armor joined together to make a full suit. There are employees at every spot to help out too.

There are 3 shows in Diagon Alley. Two of them are storytellers using puppets to recite the Tales of Beetle the Bard. I saw one of these shows and they did the Tale of the Three Brothers. It only lasted maybe 10 minutes but still cool to see them maneuver the puppets while telling the story. The last few minutes of it the storytellers play the parts and as you can see Death comes to the last brother. The other tale is the Fountain of Fair Fortune which I did not see.

The third show is a singer and her backup. Her name was Celeste and she sang 1940's type music about various magic and love themes. This was so entertaining as she had an amazing voice and the songs were very clever.

Now onto the rides! The most exciting one is Escape From Gringott's. This ride was amazing! First of all, you enter through the main entrance of Gringott's to be greeted right away with an impressive lobby complete with animatronic goblins. Then lower into the depths of the bank passing office doors to get a quick picture taken for an ID (which you purchase at the end of the ride) and then into a room where there is a large screen to make it seem like you are looking into a large office. The story then unfolds and then to the elevators that will take you down to the vaults. The ride vehicles are on a track but during the ride, they can turn and face various directions. For instance you can be soaring forward on the track and then your ride vehicle will turn while still in motion and now you are riding backwards. Each turn is significant to the story though. It's not just complete randomness. Also you stop a few times during the ride and watch as things happen around you. It is extremely interactive and intense and fun. A definite must-do for any Harry Potter fan.

Hogwart's Express. To the left of the entrance to Diagon Alley is the entrance of King's Cross Station. I've read that it looks very authentic to the real station in London (although cleaner). I know there is a part of the line where you can see people further ahead look like they are disappearing into a wall but because there was no crowds I bypassed this and didn't really look for it. Anyway, here is where the Hogwart's Express pulls in to pick up students to take to Hogwarts. The train cars are very real to the movies. I was placed in a car with a couple of girls and an older couple. Plenty of room for everyone. The teens offered to get a picture of me. The "window" is a screen and as you start to move you see the city and English countryside and even have an experience with the Dementors. You even go through the Forbidden Forest and encounter some creatures there as well as the little blue car from Chamber of Secrets. The panels of the doors show shadow figures of Harry, Ron and Hermione talking at some point too.

Hogwart's Express travels over to Hogsmeade at Islands of Adventure. This was a smart move by Universal because to ride HE you have to purchase a park-to-park ticket to experience the train. And of course that ticket is more money than the single park one. Here is the entrance to the station from Hogsmeade side. There is a different set of scenes you pass when you return to London. My favorite is seeing the Knight Bus zip around the city.

Overall, an amazing trip and because of low crowds and that I was there for a few days, I was able to experience Diagon Alley and the other fun stuff of Universal several times during the week. This was also a great solo experience for me, some good experiences and some not-so-good but it definitely didn't deter me from traveling solo again and look forward to some Disney fun for my upcoming birthday.

To conclude, here are a few pictures of me and some interesting people I got to meet during my trip.