On our second to last day in Florida we hit the kids with another major surprise. This one was courtesy of Mimi and Dano. They took all of us to Universal Studios Orlando to explore the Wizarding world of Harry Potter. This is a dream come true place for Eva. Both she and Andrew were blown away with the park and being in the Wizarding World was so much fun.

We got to the park right around the opening and headed right for the Wizarding World. However, along the way we passed through a couple of other locations including Springfield from The Simpsons. I loved seeing Moe’s as well as the Lard Lad. These were some fun areas that I would have spent more time exploring had I still been a big fan of The Simpsons. I don’t think I’ve watched it in ten years or so. There were also some other attractions like the Back to the Future Delorean and Doc Brown’s time traveling train.

There was also Mel’s Diner from American Graffiti. Andrew saw all the great cars and went over to pose by them, one at a time. He really liked the cars and so did I.

We made our way to Diagon Alley and when we went inside the kids were blown away by the place. I was a little as well. This really felt like walking into the Harry Potter books. The look and details of everything were fantastic.

As we looked up the street a gigantic white dragon perched atop Gringotts was breathing fire. The entire street felt hot as the fire bellowed from the enormous beast. Wow!

We walked right onto the ride within Gringotts. There was no line at all and the ride was a lot of fun. It was part ride, part movie and in 3D. Everyone got fun glasses to use on the ride. The kids enjoyed the ride but didn’t want to go a second time. I would have thought that Eva would have wanted to ride it over and over. I could have done a second ride immediately. It was no Flight of Passage but it was a fun ride.

We walked around Diagon Alley for a while and the kids got their wands. Eva picked Luna Lovegood’s wand and Andrew chose Ron’s wand. These were the special wands that the kids could use at various locations around the area. We went from place to place so they could practice their spells.

One of the fun places to visit was Sweet Shoppe. Inside there were all sorts of candies from the Harry Potter Books. There were also some baked goods like witch hat cupcakes. The shops were interconnected with the Quidditch supply shop and the joke shop. We had fun exploring and seeing everything that was offered in these stores.

In one of the shops there were some cool things on suspended from the ceiling. My friend Tim told me that many of the things were reclaimed from previous rides in the park.

No stop to Diagon Alley would be complete without lunch at the Leaky Cauldron. The food was pretty decent overall. I got the fish and chips, of course. That was perfect for the location.

While we were at the Leaky Cauldron we also tried Butterbeer. Eva and I played around with taking some photos of the butterbeer and her wand. We also got some butterbeer ice cream later on which you cannot mix with anything else. They don’t allow it. Seems a bit controlling.

We didn’t spend the whole day just int he Wizarding World. We went out later to the younger kids play area which had a Curious George theme to it and there was also a Woody Woodpecker roller coaster. The kids liked the Woody Woodpecker movie and so they enjoyed seeing that there was something to see that was themed for Woody. The Curious George area had a room where you could suck up foam balls into cannons all around and then fire them around or send them into a giant basket that would dump them all out onto people. There was also a water play area and the kids both got drenched. They got some new clothes after that. Andrew got a Quidditch uniform and Eva got a Transformers t-shirt at the Transformers ride.

I enjoyed the Transformers ride and then was so surprised to see that in the gift shop they had some Transformers themed Modarri cars. There was one for Optimus and one for Bumblebee.

On the way out of the park we went to two more attractions. There was a Minions ride which was funny and also a Shrek attraction which was like a movie but there were seat buzzers (Eva hates those) and other things that popped out at you including some water. We had a super fun day and the kids will be talking about the Wizarding World for years to come.