New Zealand - Lord of the Rings

Found this in the wool shop at the Agrodome in Rotorua. This company did not exist prior to the movies....
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Beware! This blog entry is not for the faint of heart. The following passages contain some very dorky facts and photos. Parents should screen the content before subjecting children to such blatant nerddom.

Many of my readers already know my passion for these films. I think they are nothing short of the finest pieces of work ever to hit the cinema. They are lacking nothing in content, creativity, and character, in my opinion. Therefore, it would be somewhat blasphemous to my love of movies, and to these especially, if I did not dedicate some of my vacation to seeing where these films were shot and learning more about them firsthand.

For LOTR fans only! All others may die from nerd exposure.

At Hobbiton with the party tree over my right shoulder.
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First, know that New Zealand really is middle-earth. Without any tour, guidebook, or even vivid imagination, it is easy to see the movie's scenes here just by looking out a bus, train, or even hotel window. The cast and crew has been quoted several times saying things like, "It's like Tolkien tramped all over New Zealand and then sat down to write the trilogy." To see all the country has to offer in terms of places, tours, and trips would take more than a month and probably close to $5000. If only I had it...

First shot of it as I walked up the hill.
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So, since I couldn't do it all, I chose two tours and as many free things as I could find as I traveled the route I've described in earlier entries. There were a few sites I would have liked to have seen which were not on my existing route, namely Edoras, the Argonath, and some sites near Queenstown, but they were only available through expensive tours that would have permanently separated me from my traveling family. And I was having too much fun with them to do that.

The first tour was on a ranch in Matamata. The undulating hills were fabricked with grass as though it were dark green felt laid by a giant hand. Trees were peppered here and there with the occasional lake filling up the lowest point in the earth. This was Hobbiton. Although it was a guided tour, which I'm never too crazy about, the price wasn't extravagant, and more importantly, the driver of our van and the other passenger were just as big of fans (read: nerds) as I am. My driver's name was Danny, and he made the one-hour drive from Rotorua to Matamata seem much shorter due to his wealth of facts not only about the LOTR movies but future ones as well, namely The Hobbit, which I've recently learned production will begin in 2009 with PJ as the executive producer. Director has yet to be named...

Step 1: Hug the party tree for good luck.
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At the Hobbiton site, we were ushered through the different Hobbit-Holes while our guide gave us plenty of trivia knowledge and ample opportunity for photo taking. As I looked around, I realized most of the people were like me in that they weren't really listening to the guide. We were all too excited to be on such hallowed movie ground. For those who do not know, one of the guidelines PJ (that's Peter Jackson) had to follow was returning the land to its original state once filming had concluded. So, why do the Hobbit-Holes still exist, you ask? On the day the bulldozers were to start demolition it began to rain. Hard. For days on end. It made it impossible to get the equipment in there at that time. Since there were many other sites to 'restore', the dozers left to come back at a later date. When they were ready to come back, the farmer who owned the land had changed his mind and decided he'd like to keep the holes intact. Brilliant for him and lucky for us fans.

Step 2: Have a dance under it for better luck.
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All of the Hobbit-Holes still exist but have been stripped of their decoration and gardens that are seen in the movie. The only one that was destroyed was Sam and Rosie's at the end of the film. Sam's is there. Mr. Proudfoot's is there. And, of course, Bag End is still intact. We were shown the spot the bridge and mill stood as well as the Party Tree and where Bilbo made his famous speech. Our guide had told us that it is good luck to hug the party tree and even better luck to dance under it. So, being a good little hobbit, I did both, which you'll see in the photos.

The party tree from the perspective of Bilbo's speech.
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The second tour I took was in Wellington, home to PJ, 3 foot 6 productions, and the wonderful Weta Workshop, the special effects company rivaled only by Lucas and his ranch in Marin. The tour operator was a somewhat-awkward but very friendly guy named Ted who had found most of the sites on his tour himself by piecing together clues, asking people associated with the films, and going to the sites with a computer for confirmation. In the morning our tour group was me and two others, who Ted and I could easily tell were not too fanatic about the films. However, the afternoon crew easily earned their elf ears and hobbit feet.

The site where the bridge and the mill stood. You can see the colored markers where the supports were.
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The sites around Wellington number several, even though the large majority of filming took place on the south island. The reason for this, as you may have guessed, is the proximity to the studios and cast's homes. That's right...HOMES. Once he knew filming would be close to one and half years, PJ bought, not rented, homes for his stars in nearby Seatoun, a very nice suburb of Welly. No better way to feel at home, than to actually have a home for friends and family to visit, right?

Some of the sites we saw on this tour were merely where things once were. For example, we saw the site where the large 'wet set' once stood. It is now a car park, but it had been the lot on which scenes for Osgiliath, the Dead Marshes, Helm's Deep, and other wet scenes were shot. Another of the like was the quarry in which the huge sets of Minas Tirith and Helm's Deep were filmed. This was the one set the company could not hide because of its size and proximity to the public. During filming, traffic was often slowed or stopped here because folks would get out to watch (and illegally film) the action. Too cool. How I wish I could have been one of those lucky few.

Sam's hobbit hole, as a single man. The only hole with the chimney still intact.
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Luckily, the tour consisted of much more that just those sites which required a lot of imagination. We saw the Rivendell set location, the gardens of Isengard, the road on which the Hobbits were scared by the Black Rider, the place where Aragorn washed ashore after the Warg attack, and many other noticeable areas. Ted was well prepared with a laptop and portable speaker system so we could watch each scene while we stood at its site. He then took our pictures, in actuality usually just mine, in the precise locations the actors were in, sometimes with props (I can hear your laughter). For those so inclined, I invite you to match some of my photos with scenes from the movies, mainly the first one. Don't own the movies? BUY THEM...or I won't speak to you anymore. :)

Does this need a description?...
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On to the south island. As I mentioned earlier, more scenes were filmed here, yet I chose to see less. Gotta leave something for the next trip, otherwise why would I return? Several landscape photos I shot with no guide but following a very handy book, Ian Brodie's LOTR Guidebook. It gives details, and often GPS coordinates, to access the public film locations. Unfortunately, many sites are on private land, and only available by [$$] tours. However, I tried my best to find what I could given my limited accessibility with the bus (i.e. no car), time, and money. My biggest find was actually a store in Queenstown. In Matamata, Danny had told me to find Nomads Safari. Ted echoed that command in Wellington. I now know why. This store arguably has one of the best collections of high-quality LOTR goods that I could imagine save PJ, New Line, or Weta itself. Helmets, swords, gowns, posters, figurines, and even edibles made specifically for the movie. Often the artisans making the collectibles were the same folks who were making the actual props for the movie. And since PJ favors realism whenever he can get it, the item was usually genuine in function as well.

The most famousest of all hobbit holes, Bag End.
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That's it! Enjoy the pictures! Chuckle, giggle, or laugh out loud. I usually did right after hamming it up for the camera, so I don't blame you. And, if you are interested in seeing a video I took concerning LOTR, I will gladly send you a link, because this site does not let me post video.