18th Wedding Anniversary in London | Artist Travel Blog + Harry Potter Studio Tour

Click the image to watch the vlog version of this blog over on my YouTube channel.

Hey everyone! Welcome back to my blog. If you are new here my name is Carla and I’m the artist behind Arie Debren Art. Today is not an art blog but a travel blog. My husband, Dwaynmon, and I just got back from a week and a half long trip to Europe for our 18th wedding anniversary.  I’ve posted a travel vlog series on my Youtube channel in the past when we went to Miami for our anniversary a couple of years ago. You can go check out that playlist if you are interested.

We have never travelled internationally before. We got our passports a few years ago and have been itching to get some stamps in them. And since we usually travel somewhere for our anniversary, we thought crossing the pond would be a great way to break into travelling internationally.

Dwaynmon was very excited. He had his bags packed months in advance for this trip. Me on the other hand – I’m a procrastinator by nature anyway so I was still packing the day we were leaving. I was nervous about traveling to a different country. As you’ll see later in this series we are going to a few other countries on this trip. I was cool with London but kind of nervous about going to the other countries where the primary language wasn’t English. But fortunately, we were with a tour group and had a tour guide for much of the trip. So, that helped me be more at ease exploring in unfamiliar territory.

My husband’s co-worker told him about a company called CostSavers that offers guided tours around Europe. They organize all the hotel accommodations, tickets for the site seeing activities, and the coach bus to shuttle you around from city to city. Plus, a well-informed travel director that’s there each step of the way to provide you with all the information you need to know about the city including restaurant suggestions and other things to see and do if you decide to explore on your own.

London was the initial meeting spot for the tour. Dwaynmon wanted to check out the Warner Brother’s Harry Potter Studio Tour, so we arrived a few days early to go there and explore London a little before hopping on the tour bus to head to the next country.  On our first day in London, we found a walking tour on the app Viator. This tour guide walked us through Westminster Abbey and showed us where the Royal Family lived. Spoiler alert - it’s not at Buckingham Palace. But we did get a chance to see that as well.

After the tour we headed back to our hotel to freshen up as we had dinner cruise reservations. The dinner cruise was a whole vibe! Dwaynmon splurge for the VIP seats so our table was right at the front of the boat in front of this big window, so we had a perfect view of all the sites. Big Ben, London Bridge, The London Eye. It was so romantic, especially when the sun started setting.  The food was pretty good. To be honest I’ve never heard anyone rave about the food in London, so I didn’t know what to expect. I kind of went into it with low expectations so I was pleasantly surprised that the food was tasty.

I feel very blessed and lucky to have a husband who wanted to celebrate our marriage in this way. I’m so thankful to him for organizing this whole trip. All I had to do was pack my bags and show up at the airport with him. So, I feel so fortunate to have a life partner that cares enough about celebrating the day we committed ourselves to each other to plan such a momentous trip.

On Day 2, we got up, checked out of the hotel, hopped in an Uber and headed to Harry Potter. The studio was a little ways outside of the city so we got to see what the London suburbs look like.

The studio consists of seeing the actual sets the movie was filmed on as well as many of the iconic props and special effects which were cool. Dwaynmon was totally in his element! There were several interactive exhibits on the tour. There was an activity book that you could grab at the beginning of the tour and stations to add stamps to your book. The stamps were kind of hard to see since they weren’t ink stamps. More like an embossed type of effect. It was fun finding the different stations throughout the tour though and stamping our book. We also got the opportunity to “act” out some scenes which was also fun.

Dwaynmon scheduled for us to have afternoon tea during the tour. This was a cool experience. Again, the food was yummy, and it was surprisingly a lot for the two of us. I was not expecting each of us to get a whole pot of tea to ourselves. We couldn’t even finish it all.

And of course, my favorite part of the tour was seeing the concept art! I wish I had more time to really study the pieces that interested me. But this place was packed, and you couldn’t really linger at each exhibit too long because there was always a crowd of people behind you waiting to see what you’re seeing.

All and all, the first 2 days of this European tour were exciting. I’m so happy I got to see a different part of the world and experience it with my person. I can’t wait to share the rest of our European adventures with you. This will be a series so make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss what we get into in France. If you enjoyed this blog, please like it and share it. And if you’ve read this far please comment “9 ¾” to let me know. Until next time, go out and see the world and let it inspire you. Bye, guys.