london | august 2018

For the last three years, all I have wanted to do is return to one of the most amazing cities I have ever visited: London. This summer my mother and I traveled across the pond to do just that and this is what we got up to!

camden town

Our first stop was Camden Town. This was at the top of our list of things to do as I had been there previously and was dying to share the place with my mum. We browsed the stalls of Camden Lock, ate a delicious wrap from one of the many food stands. And just wandered the little streets while admiring the atmosphere.

The rest of the first day was mainly spent browsing bookshops. We visited Foyles on Charing Cross Road and Daunt Books. Both of which certainly did not disappoint. Besides that, we just walked around the streets of London and took in the beauty of it all.

platform 9 3/4 | baker street | notting hill

If you know anything about me, you will know that I am the BIGGEST Harry Potter nerd ever. So I could obviously not pass up the opportunity to visit platform 9 3/4 at King’s Cross (this picture is not from King’s Cross but the Warner Bros Studios, in case you were wondering). It was the most wonderful experience and I, of course, had to spend a bunch of money at the gift shop… 

Both my mum and I really wanted to visit 221b Baker Street. The desire to do so may or may not be due to the BBC series Sherlock. I cannot confirm nor deny that… However, we didn’t end up going to the actual museum as it would take absolutely ages to get in and we had a bunch more fun stuff planned for our second day. So we opted for the gift shop instead, which very much satisfied our needs. The atmosphere in the shop was great and it kind of made me want to buy a deerstalker hat and pipe to fit in (I didn’t, don’t worry). 

Another dream came true on our second day in London. As I finally got to see The Notting Hill Bookshop! I love me a good 90s Hugh Grant movie and Notting Hill is by far my favourite. There is just something to fascinating about the story of a movie star falling in love with a British bookseller. I was, however, glad that the bookshop did not in fact just sell travel books. Because even though I love travel as much as the next person, I am not about to sit down with a nice cup of tea and a book on sightseeing in Amsterdam. It was great to see the shop in real life, if I were a Londoner I would 100% go there all the time to browse the shelves.

harry potter studio tour

By far the most exciting part of this trip, in my opinion, was the last day. Because this is when we visited the Warner Bros Studios in Leavesden! If you paid attention earlier in this post (or ever really cause I never shut up about this topic) you will know I am Harry Potter obsessed™. So for me, it was huge to visit the actual sets the movies were shot. My favourite parts of the tour were platform 9 3/4, the potions classroom, privet drive and the knight bus. Seeing everything in the flesh and gaining a slightly better understanding of how the movies were made was unreal. I would recommend it to every single Harry Potter fan if you have the resources to go. 

These few days in London were truly magnificent and I would do it all over again if I could. And to remember all the amazing stuff we did I made a little video of the trip. So if you are interested you can give that a look as well.

What I would love to know now is if you did anything exciting this summer? Did you travel somewhere? Did you have a staycation? Let me know in the comments.

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