Above is a map of our journey "there and back again" in New Zealand. (I hope it is readable - click to enlarge). I have added a few extra locations, some of which have been mentioned in the recent Hobbit filming updates - some are Lord of the Rings filming sites. The temptation is to post too many photos - I will probably place a lot in an album in the sidebar.
I will try to tie in the places we visited with the filming locations of The Hobbit. Most of the time we were ahead of the filming by a few days to a week. Only once did we actually see a set, but there is so much wonderful scenery that I imagined The Shire, Mirkwood, Laketown and The Lonely Mountain (Erebor) in practically every place we visited. It is going to be fascinating to see how Sir Peter Jackson and team manage to weave their magic to make the locations into Middle Earth. I was reminded of the fight the production had to keep the filming in New Zealand last year. Having visited there, I can envisage no other place in the world that has the abundance of visual beauty, variety of landscape and sparse population allowing panoramic shots without seeing buildings etc. Having seen one set and been staying close to that location, the employment the film industry has created is a positive. Not only are there local people being employed as extras, crew, set builders, but drivers have been employed to transport sets,costumes,freight ... and the actors; accommodation has been booked out and local services therefore benefit.
31st October 2011 (Sir Peter Jackson's birthday)
Arrived Auckland in the late afternoon as NZ is 2 hours ahead of us. Cloudy and showery as can be seen from this photo. We had an early start for Rotorua the next morning but managed a two hour walk around the city. The whole of the country was still full of euphoria given the All Blacks' victorious win in the Rugby World Cup.
There are some lovely buildings in Auckland (above is the University clock tower) - we didn't have time to see that much (as can be seen from the fading light in these photos). Early start next morning.
1st November: Auckland to Rotorua via Waitomo. (I like to call this my road to The Shire).
Filming was happening at Matamata and at Mangaotaki/Piopio/Te Kuiti. You can see that visiting Waitomo, we were incredibly close but as we were on a bus, we did not spend time hobbit searching. As mentioned in a previous post, our driver knew quite a bit about the filming at Matamata and two UK tourists we bumped into at Rotorua had difficulty finding accommodation at Waitomo because the production had booked it all. (They did meet some of the stuntmen in the bar of one of the hotels however). Many of the cast/crew I believe were staying at Hamilton. I had a suspicion there may have been one or two staying in Rotorua as it isn't that far from Matamata. I expect the dwarves would have been working closer to Te Kuiti/Waitomo/Mangaotaki. Eric Vespe from "AintItCoolNews" blog, and official Hobbit blogger, was over at Matamata with Martin Freeman and Ian McKellen. (See "An Unexpected Journey: Quint on the set of The Hobbit Part 1 and Part 2.). Thorin may have been there briefly if PJ has decided to keep in the scene where he meets Gandalf at the Prancing Pony outlined in "Unfinished Tales".
We were unable to take pictures inside the Glow worm caves because of the problems with flash photography - I did however think that the cave system would make a great venue for "Halls of the Elven King" in Mirkwood where Bilbo finds Thorin and the other dwarves locked in the cellars and they start their escape in the barrels on the river (which starts underground). Maybe even one or two tunnels/caves at Erebor itself?
A couple of photos follow however to give you a taste of the countryside. These were taken while travelling on the bus towards Matamata and Rotorua.
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