Today we went on our long awaited, dreamed-of, private tour of Hobbiton, where scenes of the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit movie trilogies were filmed.
Oh. My. God, the excitement! Karine woke up at six, and couldn’t wait to get on the road to our 2pm tour.
From arrival, it’s obvious the site is built to handle the traffic. It’s also obvious we did the right thing and splurged for a private tour, so we could be on our own with our guide instead of stuck in a group of 40 lemmings.
We were amazed with the level of detail that went into building the set (including building a very realistic but entirely fake tree over Bag End) and the hobbit hole entrances, as well as the maintenance invested in keeping it looking pristine.
As we were going through the tour and enjoying our guide’s extensive knowledge of the filming process, we were awed by the natural beauty of the site - beyond the swampy terrain that was drained, the hills were not modelled at all, the set designers simply built into the existing landscape.
All in all, while Karine knows I enjoyed my time, Karine will be dreaming of this time and reminiscing the visit for a long time to come.
Almost 8 years later Karine still and I still talk about that day.