The Road Goes Ever On And On

I keep biking down the road, leaving past photos further and further behind. So to catch up at least a little bit, instead of telling you about Hobbiton I’ll just show you. Super nerdy, super touristy, loved every minute of it.

The painstaking, loving attention to detail is just above and beyond. They left Bilbo’s pipe and book on the garden bench in Bag End. And at Sam Gamgee’s house, his kids haven’t put away their toys.

Peter Jackson is so obsessive over the details that it wasn’t enough for him to have the hobbits hang their clothes out to dry. For days before filming, he’d have crew members walk back and forth from the hobbit holes to the clotheslines so there would be a barely visible worn track in the grass.

More obsession with detail: the Green Dragon is old and weathered to the point that you can barely make out the green of its dragon, while the lamppost out front is something you’d only ever notice by accident. (I got bonus points from the tour guide for spotting it.)

I have only one complaint about the entire experience, and that is the photo opportunity with Gandalf. It was a life-size statue, the same as I found in the Wellington visitor information office. Wrong wrong wrong. Obviously it needs to be eight or nine feet tall, whatever height is necessary so I look like a hobbit standing next to him.

Weta Workshop, you don’t even need to pay me royalties for the idea. Just build the right Gandalf and then fly me back so I can get my picture with him.