1 September

September the first is the annual start of the Hogwarts school year. Students of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry gather on Platform 9¾ at King's Cross Station to catch the Hogwarts Express, a scarlet steam engine.

The Hogwarts Express leaves London at precisely eleven o'clock in the morning, and arrives at Hogsmeade station sometime after nightfall, suggesting that the trip takes somewhere between eight to ten hours start to finish.

When students arrive at Hogsmeade station they are divided by a member of the Hogsmeade staff into two groups: First Years, and anyone in the Second Year or above. The First Years are taken to the school by means of the traditional boat trip across the Black Lake, while all the other students are taken to the castle by a group of carriages pulled by Thestrals.

When the students arrive inside the school, all of the students in the Second Year or above are allowed to go directly into the Great Hall, while the First Years are welcomed to the school by a Hogwarts Professor, who then escorts them into the Great Hall to be sorted into their Houses. Once the Sorting is concluded, the Headmaster generally invites the students to begin the Welcoming Feast, after which the Headmaster usually gives out notices to the school before sending the students off to bed.