Waking up early last Friday morning, a surge of excitement coursed through my body because 30 minutes later, this sports editor hit the road to New Orleans for Wrestlemania XXX.

Before I go further, I’ll admit that I didn’t really know what I was getting myself into. Basically, the big reason why I was going was to experience what it’s like to go to one of the biggest sports entertainment events in the country.

Since leaving the Big Easy to come back to my real life world on Monday, I kept comparing my experiences with going to Harry Potter conferences to my time at mania.

There’s only one conclusion that I came up with: Wrestlemania weekend was entirely different and one that anybody should experience, only if they like wrestling of course.

On Friday, I made my way down to New Orleans and met up with my good friends who went with me.

We ate lunch, did some shopping for WWE gear and made our way to Tulane University for two wrestling events — Dragon Gate USA and Kaiju Big Battel.

Dragon Gate is an American professional wrestling promotion that was founded in 2009 as an international expansion of Dragon Gate in Japan.

Kaiju Big Battel is a different story altogether. Kaiju is an entertainment wrestling group that parodies professional wrestling and kaiju films in Japan. The Battels are presented in a style of professional wrestling events with each wrestler dressed in costumes playing different roles similar to Godzilla and others.

I will never forget that night for the rest of my life.

If I were to describe it to somebody, then I’d say it was an awesome sandwich with weird/hilarity in the middle.

Dusto Bunny, French Toast, Kung-Fu Chicken Noodle and Dr. Cube were some of the characters that delighted the late-night crowd.

After day one, we all went to bed with our heads buzzing full of remnants of a great night of wrestling, eager to see what day two will unfold.

Four of my friends who were also in NOLA — Greg Phillips, Nick Duke, Corey Bigbie and Cole Sznura — went to the annual WWE Hall of Fame banquet Saturday night while another friend, Russell Sellers, and I hung out at the hotel where we stayed near the city.

Leading up to the day of Wrestlemania, I kept thinking what it was going to be like crowded with more than 75,000 other fans inside the Superdome.

It was constantly on my mind. It was like a nagging question that I didn’t ask a coach until I realized it later.

Mid to late morning on Sunday, I awoke and couldn’t wait to get to the main event of the weekend.

We ate lunch and after Nick got ready in full Hulk Hogan garb — Nick is a huge Hogan fan, and Hogan hosted Wrestlemania — we made our way down to the Superdome.

We got there early, but it felt like forever to get through the long and big line of fans eager to get inside. Luckily, it didn’t take that long and soon enough, we were in our seats taking in the spectacle.

We had a pretty darn good view and it was easy to see the wrestlers in action inside of the ring.

To give you an idea, the large “Wrestlemania XXX” sign was to our right and the ring was down and to the left.

The pre-show was great and a good setup for the event.

When the actual show started, WWE had good intentions to start with a bang.

In addition to Hogan, former superstars and well-loved wrestlers Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Stone Cold Steve Austin were in the same ring together doing their thing to get the crowd warmed up.

Wrestlemania itself was something I hadn’t ever seen before. Big lights, loud music and great performances by each wrestler kept my interest throughout.

Then, all of a sudden, the thrilling weekend was over and I had to get back to reality.

Having memories of one of the best weekends I’ve had in a long time made the return journey back to Andalusia easier.

As I said on Facebook as a comment on a friend’s post, I intend to hold on to the excitement I felt after this past weekend for a long time.