Okay so time to play catch up again.
December 27th- We had planned to hike part of the all day Tongariro Alpine Crossing but woke up to rain. Deciding that would not be very fun we decided to drive down to Wellington instead. So we only got to see Mt. Doom from afar and I did not take pictures before we drove past since we were planning on hiking by it. So upon getting down to Wellington the rain had not let up and we decided to get a room instead of spending 10 hours or so sitting in our van. So we relaxed and did not much of anything.
December 28th- This was the day that we went on an all day Ultimate Movie tour. From 10 AM to 6:30 PM we drove around the Wellington area and saw all the local Lord of the Rings locations while getting information about facts about the locations and filming in the location. None of the sets still exist but the tour guides had pictures from the scenes to help our imaginations a bit. What was amazing to me was the amount of work that went into protecting the environment and ensuring it was exactly the same as they found it. They also had some props for people to pose and re-create the famous scenes.
So here is the quarry where the sets on Helms Deep and Minas Tirith were built. We weren't allowed inside but really this was all there was to see anyway since the valley has filled in mostly since filming took place almost 14 years ago now.
Here at a local park is where they filmed the scenes of Isengard. In this one there built the path way in this field and had Gandalf's stunt rider ride up to this blue wall which is where they later placed the Isengard tower there.
And here was our Isengard gardens. The park bench was made into a CG bush and here was our first scene recreated.
So the Hutt River is where the filmed the second half of the scene where Aragorn washes ashore in the Two Towers. The first half of the scene was filmed on the South Island and then they imported a bunch of sand and picked up the scene from the river bank. One thing that I'll have to look for the next time I watch the Two Towers is the fact that the two rivers used flow in opposite directions. The scene is being re-created above with one person playing Aragorn and the other his horse. They were both good sports about it.
It was during this area that I got distracted by a bee. New Zealand is well known for their honey and you can find it at almost every souvenir shop and along the side of the road you can see a lot of bee hive boxes.
Next stop: Rivendell. This was set in a national park. The area was beautiful and hard to imagine a set being there. This was because before filming, they came through and took photographs of the area and uprooted many plants to make a big enough clearing to build the set and film there. They kept all the plants in a nearby greenhouse and once filming was done and the set was torn down they replaced all the plants back where they found them. Pretty neat stuff.
This tree in the Rivendell forest was used for a promotional poster for Legolas as our Asian Legolas demonstrates here.
And here's Mom on the swing bridge in the Rivendell forest area.
Next we went to another National Park area where they filmed many things for the hobbits leaving the Shire in the Fellowship of the Ring. Here is where they filmed the hobbits falling off a hill into a pile on the road. The scene was hilariously re-created but I never got a good picture because of the damn tourists in the way.
In the same area is where they filmed the famous Nazgul trying to get the ring. You'll have to imagine a large tree where they are hiding in the roots.
And this hill in the same area is where they filmed the Nazgul on the hill as they are trying to get to the ferry. Our recreation was three boys and they were all once again good sports as they stood on this hill in that position for a very long time.
Next stop: The Weta Cave. Now Weta is the company that did all the special effects and CG for the Lord of the Rings but they are now one of the biggest special effects companies in the world. Their resume includes Avatar, King Kong, Man of Steel, The Avengers, The Chronicles of Narnia and the list goes on and on. So their cave had some really cool stuff in it but alas it was very dark inside of there so most of my pictures were blurry so I chose to just post the better ones.
That last picture was forced upon me due to our tour guide stealing my camera and forcing me to get into one of my pictures. He was quite a funny guy and a good tour guide despite the torture he inflicted on his tourists.
Also if anyone has a few hundred dollars laying around feel free to buy me Tauriel's bow and knives because they were awesome.
After that we drove down to the Stone Street Studios, which is where all the in-studio stuff is shot. I didn't take a picture because honestly it didn't look like anything but plain warehouses which was the point. To anyone driving by they would have no idea that there were movies being filmed inside of those buildings. It's more low key then Hollywood. In fact they jokingly call Wellington Wellywood due to the fact more and more movies are being filmed here.
So that was our all day tour of the Lord of the Rings areas around Wellington. I had a blast as a super fan, can't really vouch for Mom who stuck it out and humored me.
December 29th - Was the day we caught the ferry down to the South Island. Our ferry was a four hour ride but there was a small theater on board so we watched the movie "Gravity". It was quite good but very intense. Once we landed in Picton we drove 3 1/2 hours down to our campsite in Westport. We hung out and didn't really do too much since we were both tired from the early morning.
December 30th (TODAY)- Okay so today we drove down the costal highway 6. Which today it was quite rainy and stormy out on the sea but the drive was still breathtakingly beautiful. We stopped at the pancake rocks which are these interesting rock formations that scientists cannot explain how they were formed.
It was a nice little walk around and it was raining but not too badly but once we finished the track the skies opened up and it downpoured. So we hightailed it out of there and drove to our next campsite in Franz Josef. Tomorrow we check out the glaciers. Stay tuned for more!
