Day 18 - January 24, 2010

Today was a very fun day! I started off with another great breakfast from Neville at the B&B, then it was off to my Lord of the Rings tour. I have never seen any of the movies, but read the books a long time ago. It didn't matter though, we had a great time. There were only two of us girls on the tour, me and Suzanna from Austria who was a major fan of the movies.

Ruffel, was our guide and knows anything and everything about the movies being made. We saw some of the most beautiful places I have ever seen (slide show 3) on earth. The weather started out crappy, but got much better and was beautiful by noon. I don't remember all of the places we saw and what they were in the movies, but it doesn't matter, enjoy the pics. We went to several parks and did a few hikes. In the middle of the tour, we went to the WETA Cave which is a mini museum of the WETA offices which do all of the costumes and special effects for Lord of the Rings and other movies, such as King Kong and Avatar, which were all made in New Zealand. Wellington is very proud of Peter Jackson (we drove by one of his many houses on the island) and they are proud of all of the movies that have been made here.

The next movie they are working on is the Hobbit. We got to see the studio they are building for this as well as a ship from King Kong.

At the end of the day, I went to dinner on the Queens Quay and then went to a summer festival at the Botanic Gardens with a band from Wellington who played Bollywood music. It was a lot of fun!

Here are 3 slideshows from my fun filled day!