Recently, my family and I, plus my parents and close friends, visited historic Ellicott City. I had read online about their Wizarding Weekend celebrating all things Harry Potter, and I knew Stormy would love it! She is crazy about anything Harry Potter, and all three girls love a good scavenger hunt. We had never visited Ellicott City before, at least not the historic area, and none of us knew how big a draw this event would be. We got an inkling of how big and how busy when we started seeing cars parked on both sides of the road. I had studied a map of the town, and I found a parking lot that I thought would work for us on the outskirts of town. We got very, very lucky as someone was leaving as we pulled in, otherwise we would not have gotten a spot. Every lot we saw on Sunday was jammed full, and street parking was almost non-existent.
After parking, we went in search of Parking Lot D where we met up with our friends. In this parking lot, there were several tents set up so participants could purchase their scavenger hunt supplies, aka a map of Old Ellicott City (OEC), and a list of participating businesses. It was $5 for one entry, or one could pay $10 and get 4 copies of the scavenger hunt. The money went directly to the Maryland Chapter of the National Federation of the Blind. The scavenger hunt was straightforward. One just needed to visit local businesses with white owl balloons, answer riddles, and then return the completed form back to Lot D by 7pm on Sunday. One’s entry goes into a raffle, and the grand prize winner would receive a basket full of Harry Potter and OEC goodies.
We started our scavenger hunt in Lot D at a busy café with a white owl balloon taped to a table out front. One riddle done, many to go! FYI, if you go next year bring a pencil or pen as those were not supplied with the scavenger hunt. Leaving Lot D, we made the decision to walk downhill, visiting businesses on the right side of Main Street. We quickly discovered the scavenger hunt was not simple or quick, nor were all of the riddles easy to parse out. We had been told to look for the white owl balloons to locate the riddles, but not every business had a white owl balloon. Some had the riddles inside their shops and we had to hunt for them, while others had them taped to the display glass out front. Those clues that were inside businesses were a nightmare due to the sheer number of people trying to enter and exit the shops. I was so worried Pebble would break something as some of the places sold glass figurines. Between our two families, we had six kids to keep an eye on, and they all went different directions, especially in shops that catered to them, like the toy shop. Despite the difficulty in locating and answering the clues, the kids had a fun time! Stormy thought it was neat that all of the clues were written not only in English, but in Braille as well.
Most of the businesses in OEC were involved in the event, and they had gone all out. The town was decorated to the hilt, and the kids loved finding new backdrops to pose with as well as giant golden snitch decorations everywhere. Flags from Hogwarts adorned fences, shops, and bridges. By the time we’d found 5 or 6 clues, and answered maybe three of those, the kids were already starting to fade. They were surrounded by people dressed like Harry Potter, there were stores selling butterbeer, butterbeer fudge, butterbeer brownies, etc., and even more stores selling a whole host of Harry Potter gear. It was beyond overwhelming, and I think everybody in Maryland turned out for this event, it was that crowded! OEC is an old mill town, and the sidewalks were narrow, which made maneuvering through the crowd a bit of a challenge. Thank heavens we didn’t have a stroller, because in addition to the small sidewalks, nearly every shop had at least one step to climb. It was not an ADA or stroller friendly event…
Everyone took a breather when we went down Tiber Alley, which had been reworked to look more like Diagon Alley. Here we could see the stream running along under the houses down to the Patapsco River, and the kids had fun watching the water for a bit, looking for possible wildlife. Rainbow and Pebble both wanted a drink by this point, and Rainbow was clamoring for some of those sweets she saw along our trek. I had bought a pack of Harry Potter gummy slugs, but those didn’t last long. Pebble discovered the pack was in my pocket, and she kept slipping up next to me and filching slugs. Smart kid!
Pebble, as the youngest, is not yet a fan of Harry Potter, so the highlight of her day, beside the gummy slugs, was when we stopped to look for a clue at the B&O Ellicott Station Museum. The first floor with the freight agent’s living quarters had no appeal, so we headed right upstairs where we found the clue out on the train platform. Right next to the clue was an old bell that Pebble and Rainbow had a blast ringing! There was also a caboose from 1927 that the kids could climb into, and the old Freight House which houses a model of the first thirteen miles of track from Baltimore to Ellicott’s Mills (now Ellicott City.) Pebble was in heaven, and burst into tears when we told her it was time to move on again. I believe we will be visiting more train museums in the future, just a guess!
Leaving the museum behind, we crossed the street, and headed back uphill to where we’d started. Pebble brightened up pretty quickly as one of the first stores we passed had a man in costume out front, and he was using bubble wands to create humongous bubbles! There were a crowd of kids giggling and trying to pop the bubbles. At this point, all adults in our group decided to abandon the scavenger hunt in favor of trying out a milkshake at Crazy Mason’s Milkshake Bar. There had been a substantial line out the door of the place when we’d passed earlier, but that line had shrunk. Inside, we queued up, and tried to get the kids to decided on one crazy milkshake. At $15 a pop, we decided one for our family was enough. No one could agree, though, and the line wasn’t moving very fast. We bailed out, and went to a café in Parking Lot D. There we ordered butterbeer and Hagrid’s giant pretzels. It was a bit of a wait, but the café had seating, shade, and hula hoops for the kids to play with, so they were semi-distracted. The pretzel came out hot and much bigger than we were expecting! It was delicious, and we all devoured it fairly quickly! Hunting for clue is hard work! The butterbeer on the other hand was a disappointment. None of the kids liked it, and my mom and I both felt that something was missing. We wondered if the café, due to the massive surge of people, had run out of some ingredient. The staff at this café looked like they’d been run off their feet and were absolutely wiped!
After our snack, we rounded the kids up, dropped off two of the scavenger hunt sheets for the raffle, and headed for the car. We were all done, and needed some serious downtime. It was a unique experience, and I’m not sure we’d do it again. It was worth doing once, but my kids aren’t fans of huge crowds, so they were over-stimulated by the time we left. My husband was just happy we’d stopped and gotten him a DD coffee before we joined the chaos. He needed the caffeine on board! It was an adventure to remember, and it has also encouraged us to come back and explore this charming old town when things aren’t so chaotic. There is the museum, of course, lots of cute shops and eateries to check out, so long as they aren’t selling butterbeer, plus I’m still curious about the Crazy Mason Milkshake Bar. Happy trails!
https://visitoldellicottcity.com/events/wizarding/
