Day 3 - Two nerds in the Shire

Uncomfortable beds can help you get up early... So our day started at 6:30 am and we set off in the morning fog heading south towards Matamata.

The route through Auckland itself was not the most scenic route in itself, but it had the great advantage of having souvenir shops there. The first one was able to fulfill our wish:

The highlight of the day (and the whole trip so far) was 'The Shire' (Hobbiton). Or rather, the film set of it. In the spirit of 'a picture is worth a thousand words', here are some impressions:

Fun Fact: The Uruk'Hai were played (at least in part) by members of the New Zealand Army.

At the beginning of filming The Lord of the Rings, Russell Alexander's property was chosen as the location to represent the Shire. However, there was no infrastructure on this property at the time and it would have been expensive to build it. To finance both the filming and the construction of the necessary infrastructure, Peter Jackson approached the country of New Zealand. Since the country did not have enough money either, it turned to the New Zealand Army. The army agreed to help with the construction of the infrastructure and was rewarded with roles in the film.

Fact (without Fun): There is only one artificial tree at the Hobbiton set.

The tree on Bilbo's hobbit hole was dismantled for the filming of The Lord of the Rings, "imported", and reassembled on set. By the time the filming of The Hobbit started, these assembled parts had rotted. To replace the tree, an exact replica with 200,000 handcrafted leaves was created in Wellington.

The extremely successful day ended with the tasting of original New Zealand specialties: