Today was beyond special (apart from the hours of coach travel, which were tedious). The countryside is beautiful - reminded me a lot of our bit of Wales. We stopped off at a little place called Tinau for lunch, and Hannah’s gluten-free app found a lovely cafe called Enchanted Places, which seemed appropriate…
We dropped our cases at the very posh Novotel in Rotorua (my room is enormous and palatial) then backtracked to Matamata.
We arrived at Hobbiton mid-afternoon, and I burst into tears on the spot when Julie started playing the Fellowship theme in the coach. Oh my! Actually being in Hobbiton was beyond amazing - I was walking around with my hand on my heart and a huge grin on my face. It was a gorgeously sunny afternoon, as you’ve seen from the photos, which showed it at its best. Julie, the tour leader was wonderful at offering to record special moments on our phones - I have a video of running in Bilbo’s footsteps “I’m going on an adventure!”, picking up post from the Bag End mail box, and smoking Bilbo’s pipe (consciously channelling my father). Every hobbit hole was different and the level of detail was (as you might expect) superb.
One highlight for me was visiting on of two hobbit holes on Bagshot Row, which they’ve completely kitted out inside (which opened at the end of 2024). We were able to spend 15 minutes wandering from room to room, capturing all the wonderful details. Which is why there are so many photos. I’m so glad that Maz / Dad has offered to help me make a photo book when I get home, and that I’ll have these blogposts to remind me of the details.
Then we had dinner in a pavilion behind The Green Dragon, followed by a lantern lit procession (shades of Hucklow, Becky and Arran) up to Bag End and the Party Field, before piling back into the coach and heading back to Rotorua,
Honestly, it could not have been more wonderful!
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