The Best Day of My Life

Clearly the title states it all. After having the best breakfast I've had yet in New Zealand at this cute cafe, we wandered aimlessly in Wellington. While my initial opinion of Wellington was negative because it was so early when we arrived and it was incredibly windy, it is actually an adorable city. The architecture was really neat and had a mix of a lot of styles.

We eventually ended up at the Te Papau Museum, which was perfect since it was free and we had time to waste. It ended up being one of the coolest museums I've seen. It was really interactive and I think we spent most of our time going through all these pictures and videos of New Zealand you could look at. Despite being about a decade older than their target audience, I had an amazing time. In two hours, we had only covered the bottom floor and there were more exhibits to see. I wish I had had a week to check everything out, but we had an appointment.

We walked to our pickup location where I unpatiently waited. Once we saw the van pull up with Wellington Movie Tours on the side, I knew that this was going to be a fantastic day. The group I was with kept laughing at me because I was so excited, I had a goofy grin glued to my face. Thats right everyone, we were going on a Lord of the Rings Tour!

I knew immediately that it was going to be so much fun. Right off the back, the tour guide and I began swapping trivia as he drove up the windy roads to Mt. Victoria. This was location for all the scenes when the Hobbits are escaping Hobbiton from the Black Riders. First stop was a small cliff which they used for the hobbit's perspective looking down at the Black Riders coming to Weathertop. It was also used in the 3rd film for Dunharrow when Aragorn and Theoden are surveying the Rohan camp. Not too exciting yet, but was still fairly cool. Next, he shows us a scene on his laptop from the extended version (which I am quite familiar with) when Frodo and Sam are leaving the Shire. Then, he pulls out a frying pan and two pipes, exactly like the one in the film and says "Who wants to be Sam and who wants to be Frodo". The nerd inside me explodes.

We take turns being both before heading to the shortcut to mushrooms scene. We all pile exactly like all the hobbits when they escape from Farmer Maggot, in the exact spot Elijiah, Sean, Billy, and Dom had all been, even including the broken carrot. Farther down the road was the "Get off the Road!" scene, and the hiding from the black rider in the roots of the tree scene. Unfortunately the tree in that scene was artificial, but it wasn't difficult to imagine. We also turned Cayla, Lannette, and I into a Black Rider at the top of a hill, which was quite clever. Then it was back to the car.

Seeing the exact trees and spots for filming was amazing, but next we were heading to somewhere I had been dreaming about for years; the Weta Workshop. At this point I was literally bouncing in my seat and had to get a stern look from Cayla to calm down a bit. We arrived at the Weta Cave and walked in to see Lurtz to my left (hes the big Uruk kai who kills Boromir in the first film. To my right, Gollum. I was definitely in my geekdom heaven. There were props and costumes and puppets and books galore. I couldn't take it all in at once. We watched a behind the scenes of Weta movie where I recognized some people from the DVD appendices. After that, I had a great chat with one of the workers in the cave who had been in the film and shared my love for Alan Lee's artwork (Conceptial artist for LOTR). I was strongly encouraged (peer pressured) into buying Arwen's evenstar since they had been discontinued and I had wanted one for years. I was the last person in the cave and was rushed out to finish our tour.

We drove by the beaches where the inspiration for Shelob's lair was found and headed back into Wellington. We drove past the location for the premiere and I pictured what it must have been like with all the people and the red carpet. It was truly a great tour and cost less than it was worth. I look forward to making another stop at the Weta Workshop before I leave New Zealand.

We went out that night before we had to catch our ferry at 2:30. It was nice to put on makeup and be girly for the first time in a week. We had fun before we headed to load our car onto the ferry. This is when I get really stressed. We had apparently lost our confirmation number, were supposed to be there an hour before instead of a half hour, and we weren't being allowed on. The other car was already there and had to come back to help us. After what seemed like eternity, we figured it out and threw everyone in the car as we raced down the ramp to the ferry.

Once on board, I found a nice corner in the play area, curled up, and fell asleep. We awoke on the south island at 5:30 in the morning, drove long enough to find a park, pulled out sleeping bags and went to sleep. We got a few more hours in before the long drive to Christchurch.

Heres a link to all the pictures from the Tour, there are some pretty good ones.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=156750&id=665896295&l=adcb9da96b