Virginia Water

We took a short drive to Virginia Water, which has the largest man-made lake in England and is part of the Windsor Great Park. 

Harry Potter Studio Tour

I had no idea it even existed, but Maija let me know this was what she wanted to do while in England, so we spent the day taking a behind the scenes tour at the Warner Brothers lot in Leavesden.  Tons of photos taken, here's quite a few. 

We started in the great hall. 

Boys dorm room

Gryffindor common room

Professor Dumbledor's office

Potions

Maija in front of Hagrid's hut 

A little wand training. 

Some butterbeer for the kids

Diagon alley

Kids with some quidditch players 

Paper model of the castle

Actual model used in filming 

The kids also got to ride broomsticks in front of green screens, but we weren't able to photograph that. What fun!

Moving day

Goodbye Newbold College housing.

Hello Norfolk Chase. 

The kids are thrilled. 

My kitchen for a while. 

Girls are excited about their room. 

Kai's room

Bath- The Roman Ruins and Baths

After climbing the Abbey tower we had "the best lunch ever" according to Anni. 

Then it was off to learn about the Roman baths in England from 2000 years ago. And yes, another audio tour. We are getting quite good at them. 

Anni enjoyed chatting with this centurion, he even let her touch his sword edge. 

8 bags of old coins (circa 23AD) were found a few blocks away in the year 2002 when they were preparing a site for a new hotel. The kids were able to hold a few of those coins. 

They found a section of the original roof which has allowed them to figure out how tall the roof was and what the main bath building probably looked like. 

And at the end, we got to taste a bit of Bath water. I think most of our reactions mimicked Maija's.