Behold the Argonath, the Pillars of the Kings...

On the 11th we embarked on our last booked adventure, a 3 hour 4WD tour around the Queenstown area with some focus on Lord of the Rings areas. Luckily it did not rain for this one, which was a great improvement over the disappointment of yesterday. After leaving our hotel room, we stood outside and waited for our ride - a heavy duty land cruiser capable of doing some off-roading. Joe saw such a vehicle drive up towards the hotel, then watched somewhat confused as it kept on going off down in the other direction. "Were we in a vehicle that says Nomad Safaris and Safari of the Scenes on it?" he asked. "Yeah, probably." Janelle replied. Just as we started to worry, the vehicle in question turned up, having turned around and raced back to get us. That's the confusion you get when you have two similarly named places right down the road from each other (Oaks Shores and Oaks Resort). We are pleased to report that our van's licence plate said Thorin on it. Apparently each vehicle in the fleet has a Hobbit themed plate, and seeing others with plates such as Smaug and Bombur confirmed this.

Our tour guide was named Graham, and he had a demeanor of a dwarf about him, if not the stature. He, like most of our good tour guides to this point, had his interactions with Peter Jackson and Co. Back during the Lord of the Rings, he was offered the chance to be a Rider of Rohan, being from a farm and knowing how to ride, but he turned it down due to other work commitments. Despite this lack of immediate connection, his knowledge of the film sites was commendable. Right away after picking up our other guests we were out of Queenstown and up a mountain (the Remarkables Ski Area) that offered great views of the area. Up and up we went, until finally we stopped short of our goal, but only because the clouds were literally only ten to twenty feet above us. Here we were shown Deer Park Heights from above, the setting for both Rohan (Rohirran refuges and Warg battle) and locations shot in the Hobbit. Unfortunately, we were not able to visit these sites close up, as the farmer who owned the land got tired of people vandalising and being idiots in areas where he had valuable livestock and show animals.

Back down the mountain we went, and at this point the sun was beginning to burn away the clouds. Warm weather raising our spirits, we arrived in our next location. Just before doubling back onto a narrow dirt road to get to the site, we crossed a large bridge, and to our left was an older, smaller bridge. What was remarkable about this bridge was that people willingly throw themselves off it strapped to giant rubber bands. What was more remarkable is that that bridge is where, twenty five years ago, a man was able to commercialize it for the very first time, meaning he could get people to pay money to throw themselves off strapped to giant rubber bands. It was the birthplace of Bungie-Jumping. 

The narrow part is where the Argonath stood

More important to us was that the site we got to halfway along the narrow dirt road, leading to a winery, was the gorge where the Argonath was digitally added in the Lord of the Rings. The site was majestic enough without two giant Gondorian statues. Interesting film tidbit: Peter Jackson was well aware of people who studied films to notice errors, and so he put one into the film on purpose to see who would notice. As the Fellowship passes through the Argonath, the statues both have their left hand raised. As Aragorn looks back, one of the statues has its right hand raised, so he actually had 3 of these incredibly detailed statues built and then digitalized for this shot.

Another tidbit is a rather unfortunate fact. True to the books, Peter Jackson built an orc camp alongside the river after the Argonath as it was J.R.R. Tolkien mentioned. Tragically, this coincided with the massive flood New Zealand got during the filming, and before the film crews could shoot, the camp was entirely destroyed.

Our next stop was Arrowtown, where we left roads behind and took the trek towards Macetown, a ghost town and remnant of the mining boom that led to major settlement of the area. The road boasts twenty five river crossings. Our heavy duty vehicle could only handle four before the water became too high (due to severe rain the day before) and we had to turn back. Just after the fourth ford, we were able to witness another remnant of the mining boom: gold in the river! After hot chocolate, cookies and actually good fruit cake, we were given a chance to pan for gold, and with a little help were able to find the tiniest little bits of rare metal (Janelle and I were the only ones to find any)! Not enough to pay back our trip, but definitely a cool souvenir. Back near the start of the track again, we turned right out into the river and stopped with water rushing all about us, where we found ourselves at the Ford of Bruinen, where the Black Riders were swept away.

The Remarkables

Our last stop was not Lord of the Rings focused, but it did involve another mountain. Driving up the perilous, winding roads of Skipper's Pass we were glad to have an experienced driver and a heavy duty (but not bulky) vehicle.  We were also glad the driver waited until the way back to tell us of his own experience in driving to and from work in a bus every day on those roads, even in winter, and in one condition rolling right over the edge as his driver continued on despite skating rink-like conditions. Still, the drive resulted in some incredible views of such wild landscape that it was easy to believe we were in Middle Earth. En-route back to Queenstown, we also drove through a huge, beautiful valley. It turns out it was land that Peter Jackson actually owns. He had purchased it because he loved the natural, unaltered view of the valley and the oncoming mountains and lake. Rather than see it become commercially developed with hotels, vineyards and such, he bought the whole stretch and left the few little farms on it to continue as stewards of the land.

Arriving in Queenstown, we were dropped off at our hotel. If that alone was the only difference between today and yesterday, it would have been a great day, but as it stands the day was fantastic! To top it all off, we had another good supper of curry!

The next morning we were able to sleep in a little as the night previous we decided to call Reception to see if we could arrange a late check out. Turns out our special fancy room already had a late check out! So, not having to leave until noon, we woke up slow, had a rice porridge breakfast, then lunch of leftover curry and a pack of instant curry side pasta, then slowly packed up our things and left the hotel. It had become our 'home away from home', being the place we spent the most amount of time at in New Zealand, and Queenstown will likely forever be our most favourite big city in all the country.

Our first stop was to escape the sun and head into a movie theatre to see Thor 2. The film itself was good, but the theatre was not worth the money as it was quite small, quiet and had yellow lines throughout the screen (luckily we went on cheap night and 'only' paid $14 per adult rather than the whopping regular price of $19). Following the movie, we tried the famous Fergburger (apparently enjoyed by Orlando Bloom), a burger so good that the hole in the wall where it was served has lineups outside for almost the entire working day. The burgers were pricy ($12), but they baked their own buns throughout the day and it was definitely some of the best cooked, large sized burgers we've ever had to pay for (still not better than our pasta though).