On the hunt for Frodo Baggins in New Zealand

During my first trip to Australia, I had the toughest decision to make. Do I want to visit neighboring country New Zealand or the closest island of Fiji? I only had two weeks in the land “down under” and couldn’t do all three. Ultimately, I decided on New Zealand because of Hobbiton.

Lord of the Rings trilogy is one of my favorite movies! Frodo Baggins, the main character in the film, lives in the shire (village) in Hobbiton. The actual film set for Hobbiton used in the movie is location in Matamata, New Zealand. Not knowing how long the film set was actually going to be up and available for tourism, led me to make my decision. Fiji will be there and I definitely intend on going back to Australia one day!

I flew from Sydney, Australia to Auckland, New Zealand. During my stay I didn’t rent a car and relied on public transportation. I stayed in an airbnb, back when airbnb was amazing and my go to housing while traveling. My host, Alia, was a realtor, a recent empty nester and widow. I ate breakfast and dinner with her and drank plenty of red wine. She even dropped me off at the bus stop each morning and would pick me up in the evenings.

The same bus system that caused me to have one of the worst emotional break downs ever. Once I got in the city, I took the wrong bus and missed my schedule time slot from the Hobbiton tour. There were no more openings for the rest of the day and all the tours the following days were sold out. I came all the way to New Zealand for nothing.

I can remember it like it was yesterday, I sat at a bus bench and literally cried for at least ten minutes straight. Snot, puffy eyes, red cheeks, everything. The cancellation and reschedule policy for the ticket seemed so inflexible, I just knew my dream of visiting the shire was not happening. Snapping back into reality, I decided to call and see what they would say. Luckily, by the grace of God, I was able to get on a tour a few hours later! I don’t know why at the time I just broke down and didn’t call at first. Maybe it’s because traveling in new places can be so overwhelming at times? This was not my last travel breakdown.

After arriving at check in, a bus took about twenty of us to The Shire’s Rest to meet our guide. It’s about ten minutes away and that’s when the excitement truly begins! The Shire’s Rest cafe and gift shop has the most amazing views of the surrounding landscape of rolling green hills that appear endless. It is just so beautiful and looks unreal, it is even sheep roaming around! How in the world do places like this exist?!

We spend a few minutes at the cafe and meet our guide and go up to the shire! The movie set is twelve acres and the tour lasts for 2.5 hours. He went over some details about the property and movie trivia that most of us knew. Surprisingly, it was several people in my group who’ve never seen any of the movies! But, Hobbiton does look pretty cool nevertheless, so I see why the chose the tour. At then end of the tour, everyone gets a complimentary drink at The Green Dragon Inn. They have an alcoholic apple cider or ginger beer. I remember one guy did not like apples or ginger, so I had his drink and both were pretty good.

After we strolled around and took pictures at the shire, a bus took us back to the gift shop and then back to the main entrance. It was a very emotional day and journey, but it was an experience I will never forget. I went five years ago and the memories are just as vivid as if it was five days ago.