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Platform 9 3/4 to Hogwarts, King's Cross station, London (Scarborough photo)

My daughter has already insisted that the following dates must go on my planning calendar immediately -- the next Harry Potter movie ("Order of the Phoenix") premieres on July 11, 2007, and the final Harry Potter book will be released on July 21, 2007. 

Oh, so now you have to go look at the movie trailers?  That's all right; I'll wait here.

Unfortunately she and I will be enroute Chicago for the BlogHer blogging conference when the book comes out.  We'll be somewhere around Pawhuska, Oklahoma, actually, but I have no doubt that we are going to find and buy that book and then I won't get a word out of her until she's read it cover to cover.  That's the Hogwarts magic.

If you have plans to travel to Britain (yes, rather a leap from Oklahoma) and you have kids, you've got to take a look at the tourism site Visit Britain and its section on Harry Potter's Britain, where you can find out all about the places where the movies were filmed. 

There are locations in London, if that is your only stop in the UK.  The Visit Britain list of London locations doesn't include train platform 9 3/4 (to catch the train to Hogwarts) but it is listed under Hogwarts Express.   Just go to the real King's Cross Railway Station and you'll find the sign where those run-at-the-wall scenes were filmed.  

We also visited the model for the Hogwarts dining room at Christ Church college in Oxford, a pleasant train trip from London.  Other Oxford HP locations are described here.  You do not need to pay for a formal tour group for any of these; they are easy to do on your own and any admission fees are pretty clear up front.

If all of this makes you feel knightly and heroic, take a look at this article from the UK's Times Online about staying in a real castle in the UK.  Too grand?  Investigate a Landmark Trust holiday cottage instead.

Got your kids in a reading mode?  Budget Travel Online's 2007 Family Travel insert has other suggestions for books that inspire adventure and travel.

Technorati tags:  travel,  family travel,  Harry Potter,  Britain,  London,  Europe