Three weeks in New Zealand - 4/12 - 5/4/2024

Day  3-HobbiTon-4/14/2024

Today we are going on an all day guided tour to visit the Hobbiton Movie set.  The Hobbiton Movie Set is a significant location used for The Lord of the Rings film trilogy and The Hobbit film trilogy, serving as a stand-in for the town of Hobbiton in the Shire in both trilogies. It is situated on a family-run farm about 5.0 miles west of Hinuera and 6.2 mi southwest of Matamata, in Waikato, New Zealand.  It all started in 1998 when Peter Jackson’s team of location scouts were searching for the iconic rolling hills and lush green pastures of Hobbiton. An aerial search led them to the Alexander farm, a stunning 1,250 acre sheep farm in the heart of the Waikato. They noted the area’s striking similarity to The Shire, as described by JRR Tolkien, and quickly realized that the Hobbits had found a home.

We got to the meeting point to hop on a luxury bus that will take us to the movie set.  The drive from Auckland to the Hobbiton movie set is about 2 hours and 15 minutes.

The tour bus dropped us off at the Ticketing office

This is the rest area before another bus will take us to the movie set.

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Coffee shop at the rest area.    

We are staying in line to get in the official bus that will drive us inside the movie set.

The movie set is situated on the Alexandra farm, a family-run farm. The Hobbiton movie set was first created for ‘Lord of the Rings’ in 1999, with road-building help from the New Zealand Army, and then the set was completely rebuilt and expanded in 2010 for the ‘Hobbit’ movies.

The road you see here was build by the New Zealand army so the movie crew could access the movie set.

Sheep roaming freely in the green pasture

Closer look at the sheep.

We have reached Hobbiton movie set and our tour guide is giving us a debrief on what we will see today.

Our tour guide was really good and we did learn a lot about Hobbiton.

Map of Hobbiton movie set.

We are now entering the Shire, a region of J. R. R. Tolkien's fictional Middle-earth, described in The Lord of the Rings and other works. The Shire is an inland area settled exclusively by hobbits,

This is the first Hobbit hole you see when you enter the movie set.

The current Shire movie set you see today has 44 hobbit homes, farms, and gardens, and covers 12 acres of land.

Hoa and I in front of one of the hobbit home.

The set is extremely well maintained and looks like the hobbits might live here.

Another hobbit home with a blue door.  Notice the chimney is on top of the hill.

More well maintained hobbit homes.

They pay a lot of attention to details and it definitely looks like a family is staying in his house

The tour is very well organized and is divided into group of 20-30 people.  We can easily walk around and it is also very quietly as the group in front of us is far away and we cannot hear them.

Our tour guide explaining that Hobbiton has a gardening team that planted almost 3,000 natives seedlings around the movie set and surrounding farmland.

The area is filled with fruit trees and maintaining biodiversity is a key focus and efforts to protect and enhance the environment at Hobbiton Movie Set

A huge pumpkin on the ground.

Beautiful pumpkin laying on the garden.

 The set has a wide range of native plant species that are selected to provide important habitat for native fauna, as well as supplying targeted feeders to support the native bird species.  The gardens also provide excellent conditions for a range of pollinators.

A beautiful apple tree.

A nice hobbit hole with a yellow door.

A group tour ahead of us.  As you can see they are pretty far ahead of us so we never felt that the tour was crowded.

Honey jars in the front lawn.  The honey is harvested on the farm.

Closer look at the honey jars.

Bottle gourd on a vine.

Area for storing wood fire logs.

We are now heading to the top of the hill where the Party Tree is on top.

Walkway to the top of the hill

People heading to the top of the hill

As we go up higher the view of the area is even better.

These Hobbit Holes offer an authentic glimpse into the charming dwellings of Hobbits going about their daily lives in the Shire

In front of the house there is a variety of bread on a table.

Laundry drying in fresh air.

Going up...

Straight ahead and on the other side of the pond is the Green Dragon inn which was the meeting place for all residents of Hobbiton.

The area is so green and so beautiful

Panoramic view

The house of Bilbo and later Frodo Braggin at Bag Eng.

The roof has a mossy roof as it was built into a hillside.  Just above the house there is an old huge tree overlooking Bag End.

Interestingly ,the old tree is the only artificial tree in the Hobbiton movie set and it was carefully crafted out of steel and silicon, with its leaves being attached to the branches one by one.

View of Bag end from Biblo's house.

Magnificent view.

NEXT... Hobbiton continuation