Every day is Harry Potter day and Rabbie's one day tour from London

Halloooo!!

A mini holiday after my holiday. That is the only way I can describe it. Upon my return to London and first day back at the office I just knew that I had to arrange something for the weekend after or I would go mad. So, Tuesday during lunch time I went online and booked myself a nice one day trip to Stonehenge and Windsor Castle with Rabbie's for Saturday 9th July. Sunday afternoon was spent walking around town with a group of Harry Potter fans.

How? When? Why?
Saturday morning started bright and early at Victoria station where the mini bus would pick us up to drive us around all day to Windsor Castle and Stonehenge.  If you don't know Rabbie's, here the quick introduction: Rabbie's is a traveling agency who offer 1 day tours or multiple day tours around England, Ireland, Scotland and France in a mini bus with the maximum capacity of 16 people. So Saturday morning 9am, me, 14 other tourists and the driver set off.

One tip I'd like to say to everyone who is considering to go visit Windsor Castle or Stonehenge: do not visit on a Saturday in July. It was so crowded! I got lucky with the ticket line at Windsor Castle and because I am member of the National Trust I could skip the line at Stonehenge, but if you're not lucky or a member, you can wait for quite a while...

So yeah, Winsdor Castle is Lizzie's favourite castle out of all the castle that the Royal family owns. Unfortunately she wasn't around as she was still staying in Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh at the time. Entrance to the castle is quite expensive (£20 oO) but it includes an audioguide which garantuees to fill the next 2 hours AND you have the option to turn your entrance ticket into a 1-year-pass so anything within 12 month and you feel the urge to visit Windsor castle, you can at no additional cost!

Not going to lie, Windsor isn't one of my favourite castles. A bit too big for my tast. But, I did see the 'tomb' stone of king Henry VIII which was pretty cool x)

After Windsor Castle we headed to Stonehenge. On the way there I had a lovely little nap x) Right before we arrived at Stonehenge, the guide gave us some information about the how, why and when. The only question that he was able to answer, a bit, was the when, about 4000 years ago - ish. Give or take a few. But as to the how and why, it remains a complete mistery. Unfortunately I completely missed the audioguide point when I walked in (it's at the back of the ticket booth, who on earth would look there when they are walking towards the shuttle busses!?) so I had to satisfy with the explanation board surrounding the henge and the little map I was given upon entering.

The amount of people walking around the henge was baffling and completely takes away the mistery of the stones. Ah well, that is what happens when you're dealing with a tourist attraction in July I guess?

Instead of taking the shuttle bus back to the visitor centre I decided to walk, which meant I didn't have enough time to visit the museum as well. Slight downside towards the 'guided' tours is that you have a time limit. If I was there on my own I might have taken an hour or 3, walking around the area and visiting the others parts of the 'park' as well. We only had about an hour and 45 minutes...

Around 5pm we set of from Stonehenge towards London, about 2hours drive, and I ended up having a 2 hour chat with the driver. That is what happens when you're a tourist, but not really a tourist x)

It was a long day, but worth it. Stonehenge and Windsor Castle were still on my to do list and thanks to Rabbie's I just did it :) If anyone is interested, here's the link to the Rabbie's website: here.

Every day is Harry Potter day
Sunday afternoon was intersting. I did a Harry Potter walking tour from Brits Movie Tours (link to website here). Besides the Harry Potter film location tours, they also organise film locations tours for James Bond, Rom Coms  in London, Downton Abbey, Pride and Prejudice, Docter Who, etc etc. The majority of the film locations where already familiar to me, but I did learn a new thing or two. Which I think is really cool. It keeps it interesting for the die hard Potter fans ;)

Because the weather was so nice for the first time this summer, it was more then natural for me to get my first bubble tea of the season! And what better place to sip that goodness away than on a bench on Trafalgar Square? ^^

During the week I had a 3 hour Skype call with one of my oldest friends from Belgium on Wednesday and then another call on Thursday with my parents. I also had to squeez in some shopping as it was time for me to replace some items in my wardrobe. I have reach the age where I think it is unacceptable to walk around in cloths with holes in them. That only took 24years x) Sorry mum.

And that is it for this very delayed weekly update!

Thanks for reading, as always ;)
xo - Sara