All Aboard the Hogwarts Express

Hehehehe... Today was great! With an abrupt 7:15 wake up from me, mom and dad scrambled out of bed and we were off by 7:40.  We drove to Fort William where we boarded the Jacobite train to Mallaig.  The engines they use for the train are the big steam engines that are in Harry Potter (minus the Hogwarts Express emblem on front, but that is what Photoshop is for).  The train pulled out of the station at 10:15.  Since we waited too long to get our tickets, we didn't sit together on the way to Mallaig.  I sat with a mom, dad and daughter from Glasgow and mom sat with a rowdy, but very fun, bunch from England.  Dad walked up and down the aisles and made friends with people taking pictures.  

We had a short stop in Glenfinnan, which is where you find the cool viaduct that you see on the Harry Potter movies.  It was amazing! We reached the end of the line, Mallaig, at around 12:20.  After a short walk around the village, we went and ate at the train depot.  Dad had scampi and chips, mom & I had just chips.  At 2:10 we rolled out of Mallaig back to Fort William.  On the return trip we were able to sit together and had great views of the scenery and viaducts.

You could not believe how awesome the experience was.  The sound of the engine chugging up the hill, the beautiful and haunting sound of the train whistle, and the amazing scenery.  It is a trip I will remember forever...plus I got to pretend I was on my way to Hogwarts...life is grand!!!

All Aboard!!!!  This is the train depot.

Here is our train engine.  Pretty cool, huh?

The Front of the engine

Ohhhh yeah!  Hogwarts here I come!!

Mom & I at the Fort William station.

Dad and I getting ready to board.

I think this was Harry, Ron and Hermione's compartment...I could feel great magic emanating from it!!  (And no, we didn't get to ride in here, but when no one was looking I snuck in and pretended...and I didn't even need to use my reducto spell to blow the locks.  Silly muggles!)

Here we are going over the Glenfinnan Viaduct.

One of my energetic companions...

And my other energetic companion.  Hahahaha....that will teach them to fall asleep on me!