Hi all!

Well, I think the picture above is something like LA will look like if my experiences of Hobbiton are anything to go by. You would think a movie set would be glamourous. Er, no. You have never seen so many sheep in your life (even in Wales) and the hills, rolling, is an understatement.

Hobbiton is the only location with bits of set still remaining. It is all on a sheep farm in Matamya (?). One line cinema found the location after doing an indepth aerial survey of the NZ with a helicopter. They were trying to find a lake and a tree to match the party field descriptions in the original book. One afternoon, the Alexandra family of farmers were watching rugby and there was a knock at the door from the film company asking for permission to film on the farm. Farmer Alexandra Senior had never even heard of the Lord of the Rings but his wife persuaded him to do it cos she knew of the books. Why can't I get a life changing moment like that?!

Anyway it took nine months to prepare the farm and some of the things they did, you would not believe. First of all, the NZ army built the roads etc. Not only were they the most capable but they thought they would keep the secret. However some soldiers let it slip what they were doing after a lot of drinking at the local pub. Confidentiality was a huge thing. There was only one man allowed to take photos and anyone else who did was sacked and their employer's contracts dissolved plus two outsider, NZ pilots lost their flying licenses for life for trying to take aerial photos of the set.

They needed an old oak tree to go behind BagEnd (which I went in) but there are no English oak trees on the Alexandra farm so they were originally gonna use an NZ tree and strip it of it's foliage and then replace it with fake leaves etc (as they did for the plum trees). However, an oak tree was spotted at a farm down the road so they got permission from the council to move this to set. However to move it, it had to be chopped in to pieces. All the pieces were numbered and�each piece�was then glued together again behind BagEnd until you had the original tree again. The tree was in the film for about six seconds!

The intention of the film makers was to destroy the set after filming because even the cinema company only have rights to the images or something. Therefore, the sets were not made to last long. Just a few months. Most of it including the bridge across the lake was made out of polysterene (One of the Alexandra's drove his tractor across it one day not realising the film company were using polysterene. He thought when they waved at him, they were greeting him. Really they were trying to stop him from going plop in to the lake! Luckily the bridge took the weight of the tractor and the farmer�got safely across.). Apparantly they even brought a polysterene factory all of their own so they could get the stuff when they needed it. This was sold at a profit when filming finished.

Anyway during filming, there was a drought. When filming ending, they began to dismantle the sets as they were doing elsewhere in NZ but suddenly the drought ended and it became too dangerous for demolition work. There was a six month delay which was when the Alexandra's started getting enquiries about seeing the set and in the end, they persuaded the film company to leave the remaining set in place as it is. The only maintenance the farmers have been able to do is to put a piece of wood in front of a couple of the hobbit holes because the sheep were going in there for shelter and in lambing season, this meant the farmers could not get in to tend to the lambs!

Anyway, it was quite surreal to see all these hobbit holes in the hills. Really beautiful place. I took a few photos but my camera broke. I guess if it was gonna break anywhere, it would be the Lord of Rings set after how much I used to begrudge watching the films. Serves me right for being a hypocrite. Am a bit gutted tho, my camera and my suitcase have become like my best friends on this trip! A disposable just won't be the same!

Went to the art gallery earlier today because it feels like a 'sophisticated' Sunday morning type thing to do�and also, it is raining again! It was huge and there was an awful lot of art in there. Some of it was traditional and I don't know much about art but some of these pictures, you could have just walked in to. They were really good.�Others were boring and other pieces was interesting. There was a rabbit covered in tinsel and no joke, a standing lamp like granny and grandad's just flicking on and off. There was also a painting ,I did not really get, with some broken plates in front of it. The lady in�one exhibition asked me to do a survey when I came out but I honestly don't know what I would have put. I did not really get it so I sneaked out.�

Anyway off to see if the rain has stopped now.

Take care�

Sam xxxxxxxxx