For an overview of our entire trip, click here.
For each individual day, click Day 1, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 6, Day 7
Day 2 began with a tour of
Warner Bros Studio. This was one of the highlights of our trip! It was seriously so much fun. You can order tickets online (be sure to Google for coupons!) and schedule a date and time for your tour.
When we arrived, we traded our "printed-at-home" tickets for "real" tickets at the front desk. On this ticket, we were assigned to a group.
The tour began with everyone going into a theater to see a short video. The video tells you the history of Warner Bros. and shows clips from many of the movies they were responsible for over the years. Most videos like this are super boring, but we really enjoyed this one. It also is kind of like cheating for the tour, since the first thing your guide asks is what your favorite WB film or show is.
After the video, each group is called individually to begin the real tour. Our group consisted of 3 other couples and our guide, which was the perfect size. We boarded our golf cart and set out to see where the magic happens.
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| George Clooney's apartment from ER |
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| Our guide showed us that not all the buildings are false fronts; you can actually walk into some. |
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| This is where the gremlins were purchased |
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| This is the alleyway where Toby Maguire did the upside down Spiderman kiss with Kirsten Dunst. Apparently the rain-soaked mask was drowning him, so they had to stuff his nose with Vaseline-coated cotton balls. This also made him sound nasal so the sound engineer had to add his voice later. |
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| This area was transformed to look like a rooftop landing pad for one of the "Ocean's" movies |
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| Merlotte's from True Blood |
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| A background wall of foliage that they spray paint to match the needed season |
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| It's hard to see, but there is an empty pool back there |
Like I said, the first thing our guide asked was what are favorites WB productions were. One girl was a "Friends" fanatic, so he made sure to point out where a lot of the scenes were filmed. No one had ever seen "ER" so he glossed over those backdrops. He also pointed out several iconic areas as we passed.
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| Home of one of the charters on Pretty Little Liars. Notice the rolled up lawn. |
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| Dexter's kill room from one episode |
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| Drew was pretty excited about seeing this |
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| Anytown USA |
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| The last episode of Seinfeld and Hart of Dixie was filmed here |
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| Our guide told us that if it's supposed to be winter, the landscapers will have to pick each leaf off the tree. If it's supposed to be spring, they may have to zip tie the leaves back on. |
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| On this side, City Hall. Each side of this building is designed to look like the front of another building. This was slo where the last episode of Seinfeld was filmed, except it was a courthouse then. |
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| This City Hall was used as a jail in a Dukes of Hazard episode. You can still the grate where they escaped. |
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| The high school from Pretty Little Liars |
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| This is the library from Batman Returns that the Penguin goes to |
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| The Daily Plant from Superman. Since it was too expensive to have him "fly" to work, he had to take the subway. :) |
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| "Central Park" - It really does look bigger on TV |
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| Jamie Foxx's mansion in the new Annie movie |
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| The iconic WB water tower |
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| The sound stage where Friends was filmed was renamed after the show wrapped. Full House was also filmed here. Our guide said John Stamos was visiting and taped a piece of paper over the sign, renaming the stage "The Full House Stage" |
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| WB even has it's own working gas station. If it's needed for filming, they just cover up the WB logo. |
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| And of course they have their own fire station too |
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| Our guide said this is the tallest sound stage in existence and the Universal offices face it; so of course they had to add a WB logo to it to enhance their view :) |
One things that I really loved about this tour is that we weren't confined to our carts. We stopped a lot and walked around. We also got to go inside several areas, including the sets of "The Mentalist" and "Friends." (The "Friends" set has been moved to the prop shop, but it's still there in all of it's original glory, and it was awesome.) Cameras were allowed everywhere, except for inside "The Mentalist" set.
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| Central Perk was actually super small |
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| Yep, that's the couch! |
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| Christmas card photo? :) |
Basically, the entire area was built "production ready." That means everything has the potential to be filmed, even the offices.
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| This "motel" actually houses offices |
We also got to go to the Warner Bros Museum and see a lot of Batman and Harry Potter Memorabilia. We were given plenty of time to look at things, but I still felt a little rushed. There were so many things to see. We could have spent hours in here.
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| The only picture I'll ever get with Heath Ledger (swoon, I cried when he died.) |
The Batman vehicles were actually in a different building.
The Harry Potter stuff was in the Museum.
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| Dobby! |
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| The most hated character in all of literary history |
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| The camera makes her look a little fake, but it seriously looked like Hermonie lying there |
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| This looked super cool |
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| Godric Gryffindor's sword |
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| Yep, it was frightening in real life too |
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| This dementor was actually really small, so it kind of made it not as scary |
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| But I would not want this hand reaching out to me |
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| The hat had it's own guard. Haha. We weren't allowed to touch it, but we were allowed to sit and get sorted. I got Gryffindor. |
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| Cedric Diggory's costume |
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| The guy upstairs says almost no one spots the snitch. We spent a good two minutes searching for it before he finally told us where it was. |
If it wasn't obvious, we really enjoyed the tour. :)
Afterwards, we drove back to Hollywood to the Guitar Center on Sunset Boulevard to check out the
Rock Walk. It's like the Chinese Theater of musicians. They have the handprints of several successful artists and groups. Below are some snaps of just a few of the ones we saw.
After visiting the Rock Walk, we headed back over to Hollywood to
Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum. Make sure to order your tickets online. It's so much cheaper! And if you know you'll be visiting after 6pm, it's even cheaper.
The wax museum was a blast. It was very well done. Here's a couple of the celebrities we "met."
We also drove my Kat Von D's tattoo shop. It's really close to Hollywood.
We also drove my Rob Dyrdek's Fantasy Factory. You can't see anything except the top of the building since it's surrounded by a fence. This area of town also looked a little shady to us, but I'm not sure it actually was.
We also took a drive to Beverly Hills to see Rodeo Drive. Even on a Sunday afternoon, it was pretty busy. We just drove through the area. (Shopping is the last thing on our agenda when we're on vacation, and we probably couldn't afford anything there anyway. ha!)
We ended the day with a trip to Griffith Observatory. If you like science, it's definitely an interesting place to visit. There are several exhibits set up that explain things like the seasons, tides, and eclipses. We also watched one of the planetarium shows. I really enjoyed it, but the views were definitely the best thing about the Observatory. We visited right before sunset.
If you can't tell, the second day of our trip was an absolute blast! We were exhausted at the end of the day, but we made a lot of great memories!
