And on northward

Didn't want to leave Matamata, it's a really lovely town and we met lovely people. But we were headed to Auckland to fly out, so we headed north.

I loved this tree silhouette on top of a hill along the road.














Also saw this lovely rainbow along the way. It went over the whole horizon!



I loved this sign!

SoberRing Thoughts

So much of Hobbiton was about having a really big party. Being solicitous folks, the film people wanted all thos Hobbits in a party mood, so they served them beer. This beer was specially made in Nelson, for the film company. It's absolutely the worst beer I've ever tasted, not worth the water it took to make it!

But the label is cool. Couldn't get it off the bottle because the glue was too strong, so the picture will have to do.

Sheep shearing

At the end of the Hobbiton tour, we had a sheep shearing demonstration. The sheep looks extremely uncomfortable, but was pretty docile in that position.
We got to feed the babies at the end. This cute guy didn't care that I had my camera, only that he got his dinner.

Movie magic

Our guide, Theresa, really loved her job. She giggled a lot, explaining things. She especially had fun in front of Bag End, showing us perspective shots.











She set up shots with people, then took pictures of them using their cameras. Here she's lining up the people from Pueblo (used to live in Denver).
And here are Nancy and me. Theresa giggled the entire time!

She took one picture of a lovely girl from France named Meroe, who had the One Ring. Theresa took a series of 3 pictures that made it seem as if Meroa appeared and disappeared using the Ring--very fun! Like I said, she enjoyed her job.

Bag End

This is the window Gandalf pulled Sam through.












Bilbo's oak tree. In the films there's a big oak right on top of Bag End. Problem was, there wasn't a tree where they wanted a tree to be. So they got a tree elsewhere, cut it into sections and reassembled it above Bag End. Hired lots of students to attach leaves. It appears in the film for probably no more than a minute!

This is what's left of it.





I found mushrooms! Merry and Pippin would have been delighted.

Bag End

And here's Bilbo's hole, Bag End. You can see how small it is, seeing the guy inside. It was tall enough to stand up in, but not much more. Maybe about 15' wide, 10' deep. Must not have done too much filming inside.










Terry and BD in Bag End. The rest of the people on the tour were very taken with BD, and one of the guys (from Pueblo, as it turns out!) is assisting her to sit in the window.













Very nice view from up here, BD enjoyed it a lot!












View fom inside Bag End.

Yet more Hobbiton

There really are sheep there, roaming around and not appreciating the gorgeous scenery, or the history, one bit.

These, however, are not the sheep used in the movie. Peter Jackson didn't think those sheep looked "English" enough, so he imported another kind for filming.










BD in Hobbiton.












A Hobbit hole that's been alowed to deteriorate. Most of the holes were just painted plywood fronts with nothing behind them.

More Hobbiton

Between these two poles is where Gandalph drove his cart. There's no trace of the road anymore.











The Party Tree! The site was chosen from the air because of the close proximity of a big tree and a lake.
The Party Tree is big!

The lake is out of the picture to the right.
The lake, to the right of the tree.

Hobbiton

Matamata is the town closest to the sheep station where Hobbiton was built and filmed. The contract the film company signed with the owners of the station included restoring the site to its original state. When filming was completed they started restoring the site, but rains interfered.

When they came back several months later to complete the job, the owners had had enough requests to see the site that they had rethought this restoring business! They opened quite a thriving little tour business that's booked out of the Info site, and the town makes the most of it.

Here's Terry at the info site where we bought our tickets.
The sheep station is just gorgeous; looks like a big green lawn with Hobbit holes, just like the movies. Sans a few gardens and such. This is part of what's left. Where the original holes are no longer there, such as Sam's house, they've put up pictures from the movie.
Bag End's hillside.

Updated route

Here's our updated route. Once we decided not to go up the West Coast because of weather, we headed back inland and east, retracing our route from Christchurch. We went further north from there. 

The road along the east coast is one of the most beautiful seacoast highways I've ever been on. Only rivaled by parts of Oregon on Highway 1. Just stunning. 

Then we headed back west along the north coast to Nelson. That's where we met our most twisty-turny road. I think we were all about seasick when we got there. 

Then we headed back east to Picton, took the ferry to Wellington, and went north to Auckland from there.