Bill and Jen's Adventures: OMG - It's Hogwarts!!! (Part Three)

The last part of the Harry Potter studio tour included outside set pieces, the special effects, Diagon Alley, and Hogwarts itself. Sit back and enjoy, HP nerds!

The famous platform sign

It was a cold day in the London suburb of Watford, but that didn't deter us from going outside to see some more of the iconic set pieces from the movies. Such as the Hogwarts Express and the Knight Bus.

All aboard!

The Hogwarts Express

The Knight Bus was truly massive. They actually took two de-commisioned double-decker buses, cut them apart before welding them back together again. Then painted the whole thing purple! It was awesome.

The triple decker bus

The Knight Bus was massive

Unfortunately, everyone was lined up to take pictures of themselves on the doorstep of #10 Privet Drive, and I didn't want to wait. Therefore, a picture of some random couple and their stroller in front of the Dursley's home.

One family was at the studio with their 8(ish) year old daughter who arrived wearing her own homemade wizard robe. She was adorable, posing in front of so many of these sets. Priceless!

No. 10 Privet Drive

If you look closely at Godrick's Hollow (Harry Potter's parent's home), you can see where the roof is caved in from the attempted killing of baby Harry by Voldemort.

Godrick's Hollow

I didn't get a very good picture of Hogwarts's bridge, but this featured prominently in the last movie when Nevill (the unsung hero and my favorite characters from the books) stares down the death eaters during Hogwart's Last Stand.

Bridge to Hogwart's castle

And then we moved to the special effects portion of the tour and got to see a lot of the prosthetics and models used throughout the eight movies.

Special effects models - Nearly Headless Nick!!

More special effects heads

Doesn't this mask (below) look realistic? Well, if goblins were real, that is...

A Gringott employee

The blown-up version of Aunt Marge was a bit of a hoot!

Harry's mean, blown-up Aunt Marge

But I think my favorite head by far was that of the mermaid (merman?). How simply terrifying!

Mer-person head

Dying Voldemort was also super creepy. There was a button you could push and he'd wriggle around as if he was trying to get up. Gave me the heebie-jeebies!

Lord Voldemort's not doing so well...

After the section on special effects, we moved into a fully realized Diagon Alley. The street of wizarding shops was hard to photograph as it was so big. I attempted a selfie, but either I am too old for selfies or my arm is too short as I always come out with eight chins or generally look rather dopey. This photo is no exception, but it's the best one I have that encompasses most of Diagon Alley.

Diagon Alley, diagonally

The window in front of Fred & George's joke shop was pretty popular. Probably because of the life-size display promoting their puking pastilles :-)

Weasleys Wizarding Wheezes

Puking Pastilles display

I personally liked the front of the owl shop, myself.

Owl shop

I was sad there wasn't a model of Dobby, but I did get to see some conceptual art of the sweet house elf.

Conceptual art for Dobby, the house elf

And last, but not least, we made our way to the large model of Hogwarts. Again, it was all dusted in snow for the season, and the castle was lit with regular lights for a few minutes and then the lighting slowly shifted to cool, blue lights to make it look like night time. Visitors could walk all around the model, so I've included several pictures from different angles.