Saturday, April 12, 2025

We did not plan to visit Hobbiton as we didn’t initially sign up for this excursion.  But after talking to some of our fellow travelers, I changed my mind and signed us up independently through Viator.  Wise decision.

It took about an hour to backtrack north west of Rotorua, but the scenery alone en route was worth it. 

I’ve seen the Hobbit movies, but it’s been a while.  But right away, walking through the movie set, much of it came back to me. 

I was surprised to learn that the land belongs to the Alexander family and is part of their 1250-acre sheep and beef farm.  It was discovered by New Line Cinema in 1998 and construction began in 1999.   They had to build a 1.5km road into the site to build the 39 Hobbit Holes for the Lord of The Rings.  After they filmed the outside scenes, they had to return the land to its original state!  But then they recreated it again with permanent materials in 2009 for the Trilogy series, and filming only took 12 days! 

Because the land changed during the interim, they had to BUILD a tree with steel and silicone to match the tree in the original movie series. 

The site is now maintained for visitors, and is PERFECTLY maintained by only 9 gardeners who get to keep all of the food they produce.  It truly is a magical place …

After the tour, we were given a free beer in The Green Dragon and a lovely buffet lunch.

We snoozed during our hour long return trip to the hotel because we had another excursion that same afternoon.

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