Saturday 29th July - Yes, Matamata is where Hobbiton is from Lord of the Rings, we are that sad!! So arrived the night before at the campsite to be confronted with this massive maori guy! He was really friendly and only wanted to talk to us because his son now lives in England and he used to play rugby for Wigan in the 80's! Anyway next morning we went on a coach to the farm and area where all the hobbiton scenes were filmed (see pics). It's was all a bit commercial and for the price we were a bit sceptical but it turned out to be quite fun! there was more of the set left then we thought (most of it was taken down by the studios straight after filming) and they showed you just how they set it all up. They showed how Peter Jackson (director of the films if you're not geeky enough to know) got the army to build road to the set and got a no fly zone declared over it to stop pics, he was obsessed with confidentiality! anyone entering the set had to sign an agreement not to speak about it and the security guard on the gate had just a week off in the 13months they were there! even worked xmas day! Also if you happen to notice the sheep in the film, they are specially brought in stunt sheep! The farm had 12,000 sheep on it and they didn't use one of them! Only down side of the trip was having to share it with a bus load off badly behaved Korean school kids!! Grrr!! My kids won't be anything like that once I start teaching! So back on the road again and drove that night to a town called Rotorua, see next entry! If me or laura write these one day at a time it means we don't get cut off half way through when out internet time runs out! and it means you can savour then in little bite sized pieces rather than getting some kind of travel journal overload!