Cosmic Camper

With full enthusiasm and a thousand bags packed, we start our day with breakfast. Kay has eggs with pulled pork and I have vegetarian vegetable fritters. The waiter, an Indian, happily chats with us about India and New Zealand! Finally, at 10.00 am, we pick up our van. After an introduction on how everything works, we hit the road. Left-hand traffic! I am a bit nervous driving the big rental car on the roads... Our first destination is the Botanical Garden in Auckland... The way there, of course, we first drive the wrong way, is easier than expected. The garden is huge and we enjoy the walk past beautiful roses and prickly cacti.
Next, we have a big attraction ahead of us:

Hobbiton! We drive there without having booked tickets beforehand and luckily we actually get a spot for the tour! We also book the Waitomo Glowworm Caves and Te Puia (A Maori village) for the next day, on sale.
So, Hobbiton!
First, you are driven in by bus accompanied by the music from lord of the rings, immediately you feel like you are really in Middle-earth.
On foot, you continue past various hobbit houses with lots of information about the movies and how everything was built and filmed.
Attention spoiler if you also plan to go there, don't read this:
I found it funny that, for example, they planted apple trees from which they removed the leaves and fruits and replaced them with plum leaves and fruits.
Why? In the book, there is a line where the hobbits stand under plum trees, but the size of the real plum trees wouldn't fit.
You can see these trees for exactly 4 seconds in the extended version of The Lord of the Rings...
They also had to remove all the leaves from a giant artificial tree because the director didn't quite like the color.

I can only recommend Hobbiton, it is a lot of fun to imagine being a hobbit and living here and there are so many little details to discover everywhere! The best part is that after the tour, you can have a beer at the famous Green Dragon Tavern and you can also dress up as a hobbit. Great!

Another challenge for today: Finding a camping site.
We decide on a 'camping site' with an icy shower and a flush toilet for 10 dollars a night (a field in front of a school). After all, we have to keep an eye on our travel budget.
It's nice and quiet here and the next morning we only have to drive 45 minutes to the caves.
Our first dinner, mmmhhh, noodles with tomato sauce. Delicious!