February Part 2

Picking up from the end of yesterday’s!

We had another sea day after Auckland and I got a couple pieces of good news.  First, that our tour to Hobbiton the next day was a go and I got 5 whole boxes of Brand Spankin’ New books for the library!  This is, of course, librarian paradise and some of the books are much needed.  I also seem to have lucked out and gotten a great group of bridge players on this cruise, which is always a plus.  In general, the people on this cruise are super friendly so far and I’m really enjoying them!  It was a typically busy day, but Murray, the Internet Manager, and I had each others’ backs so it went smoothly.

This leads up to the 16^th and our return to Tauranga on our way back south on the New Zealand coastline.  I got permission to leave work a few minutes early (there were less 200 people left on board anyway when I left so I feel it was all good) so I could make our crew tour to Hobbiton on time!  There ended up being twelve of us who went and we had an absolute and utter blast.  It takes about 50 minutes to drive out there from the port and, once out there, we picked up our tour guide, Henry, who then took us into Hobbiton.  The set is gorgeous and the only set like it in the entire world – every other set ever made on site has been demolished.  We also lucked out getting Henry because he’s one of the bigwigs and was an amazing tour guide – he had so many stories and was great at pointing out all the locations truly important to the movies.  We had to sign a nondisclosure act so I am unfortunately not yet able to post my pictures online but I will as soon as I’m allowed – it’s technically still a live movie set!  That being said, we had no restrictions on pictures and could take them of everything and anything, which we did.  There are 42 Hobbit Holes on location, plus gardens, the Green Dragon (the pub), a mill house and various other important structures/places – such as the party field and party tree and the tree over the top of Bag End.  5 of the Hobbit Holes were built specifically for use, apparently, in the Hobbit and even Henry didn’t know their use, so we’re all eager to find out.  This made me want the new movie out even sooner so I can be all: I’VE BEEN THERE! about all the Hobbiton shots.

After touring the set for almost two hours, we returned to their home base where we got complimentary tea/coffee and ridiculously delicious muffins.  I also bought a bunch of items at their nice store.  As a final little moment, we all got to feed the sheep since it is still a working sheep farm with almost 12,000 sheep!  The coolest part was how much they’ve done to maintain the site and how much they’re doing to continually improve it and make it a really big thing.  I’d love to be able to come back in a few years and see all the improvements!  One thing they’re going to do is open the Green Dragon to private parties, all decked out with the props and everything – once the first movie is out, Peter Jackson is going to apparently release some of the stuff/props and design the Green Dragon for them.  They are also going to add an area near to where the crew and cast areas were (trailers and make up and all that) where they can host groups of up to 1,000 people for their complimentary tea/coffee and muffins.  They’re also going to open up Bag End (Frodo and Bilbo’s house) more to allow you to step inside, since that façade extends inwards 2 meters or so.  I chatted with Henry a bunch at the end, because by then he knew I was the one who had organized the entire thing and he was asking my opinion on whether I thought the thing was sustainable and how they could advertise better.  It should be amazing. 

This night was also our pool party, which went fairly well despite being early in the cruise.  It was also darn cold out!

We hit Napier where I was IPM for the long day there in port.  I worked late and then did laundry.  Once that was done, I went upstairs for lunch and some reading time and stayed up there until work – Michael came up and we chatted for quite a while too in between my reading of Gregor the Overlander series by the woman who wrote Hunger Games and these books, let me tell you, different in some ways but just as good in a lot!

Wellington came next where I did my own thing, although just happened to head off at the same time as Michael so chitchatted with him into town.  Then we split and I went and road their iconic cable car up to the botanical gardens.  Once there, I spent two hours in their Carter Observatory where they had really nice, concise exhibits and attended an hour long planetarium show which included a movie on the Space Race – cheesy animation but good idea/story – and then an actual talk about what we’d see in the night sky these days.  I also picked up a complimentary star chart so I can do some exploring on my own one of these nights when it’s clear.  I then wandered the entire length of the botanical gardens and was most impressed – their rose garden and hydrangea areas were both very, very impressive.  Not so impressed by the food on offer but grabbed a brownie just to put something in my stomach.  I then took the cable car back down and returned to the ship where I was hoping to take a shower – unfortunately, our shower was in a million pieces when I got there – so I grabbed my Kindle and Gregor and went upstairs to grab some substantial food and read.  I ended up pretty much reading all night even at work because I was so engrossed by the series.

Picton came next on the 19^th and I’d totally forgotten I’d made plans after last Picton to go hiking with our Lifestylist Jo, but luckily she reminded me.  We ended up doing a 3+ hour hike all along the ridge near town out into Queen Charlotte’s Sound.  We had a really good time and got lots of good fresh air and exercise.  The only negative was how bloody loud the cicadas were at points.  We literally had to plug our ears and they were ringing for hours afterwards from the continuous sound.

I got a tour in Akaroa again – the only tour I could do the entire trip! – that was a sheep shearing demonstration.  Turned out to be a lot more than that.  The man, Murray, who gave us the tour was a 6^th generation farmer on the land and his family’s heritage there stretched back to the very first French settlers on the land back in the 1840s.  His son will take over the farm in the next few years and he’ll be the 7^th generation.  They raise sheep, cattle and deer and breed race horses (his great-grandfather was the first one to bring horse racing to NZ).  They also train sheepdogs and his son, Willie, has already won top awards for his dogs at NZ wide competitions (and with about 30 million sheep in NZ, you can imagine what his competition must be like!).  He gave us the entire life history and then his daughter-in-law, Hannah, demonstrated a sheep shearing for us, which was pretty jaw dropping.  She really had to wrestle the sheep!  Then we went outside and they showed off Hannah’s sheep dogs in a little round up and then chase off episode.

Following that, we were invited to their house for tea/coffee and scones, all of which were delicious (I could have eaten 10 of the scones.  I restricted myself to 2) and the tea was some sort of very flavorful black that was delicious.  All serves in their own mugs and on their little patio.  They had a gorgeous flower garden which I got to wander with a mug of tea (what could be better?) and they were just all around super nice and approachable.  They also run a B&B on the side so I grabbed their card – anyone traveling the length of NZ should make a stop with them, definitely!  They told me I should come back for my first honeymoon – I’d be tempted! (they told everyone else to come back for their second or third…)  Unfortunately, it was then time to head back to port.

Dunedin was the 21^st and again, I was IPM, so I spent my day doing a general emergency drill, calling home and posting through the end of last cruise on the blog.

Today is the first of 3 sea days, although today was dominated by scenic cruising through the Fjordlands National Park.