At school in New Zealand after each term they have two weeks’ holidays, so my family decided to spend some of this time visiting Rotorua Area. The great thing is that just there Peter Jackson shot his movies: Lord Of The Rings.
We left on Sunday morning: two cars, eight people, one fewer than The Fellowship of the Rings, but we , like them, are from different places: Italy, Australia, Holland, South Island, Wellington and, obviously, Morrinsville. Leaving our little town the first place that we reached, was: Matamata, or better: Hobbiton. Like for the Fellowship, which place was better than this one to start our trip in the Middle-Earth?
They say that Matamata is a small part of England transported to the other side of the world. The name means Headland in Maori but it was an Englishman, Josiah Clifton Firth, who emigrated from Yorkshire in 1855 that developed this area. Traveling south on business, he established a friendship with local Maori and by 1884 he had purchased 56,000 acres of swampy marshland. With a strong vision for the area, he commenced large-scale drainage of the fens and planed vast paddocks in grass, barley, wheat and oats. In the ensuing years it was transformed as hedgerows grew alongside with oaks and elms. And just there, thousands of kilometers from Sarehole and Tolkien’s rural England, in 1999 Hobbiton was created. Now in this location you can see about fifteen of the thirty-seven original Hobbits’ houses and also walk up Bagshot Row to Bag End, to stand outside the most famous Hobbit hole in Middle-earth.
On the second day, our trip continued in Rotorua city, but there were only three of us, finally also the Fellowship separated. So, we spent two days in Rotorua and two in Taupo: this area was once one of the most prolific volcanic areas in the world, with Lake Taupo formed as a result of the largest eruption seen in the last 5,000 years: the effects of the eruption were seen in the sky as far away as Europe and China! Just in this area there is a lot of the Lord of The Ring’s outdoor location shot: for example the mountainous area that Frodo and Sam crossed, the niche were, again Frodo and Sam, hid from Sauron’s Army and the pool where Gollum was captured.
After five days we went backto Morrinsville where nobody of the Fellowship had passed. But now, after this little trip I can say the same thing that Elijah Wood, better known as Frodo, said: New Zealand is gorgeous! Every element of middle-earth is contained in New Zealand. It’s perfect. There are so many different geographical landscapes: mountains, woods, marshes, desert areas, rolling hills and the sea.
Sofia D’Angelo (4C)