One for the geeks....Ride of the Rings in New Zealand

I've been waiting to write this one for awhile. Our group arrived to Queenstown and after a night out on the town...everyone parted ways to do their various activities. Some were going canyon swinging or bungy jumping off a bigger cliff but I had chosen to do something a little different. Since a lot of the Lord of the Rings movies were filmed in New Zealand, and I'd already seen so much of the beautiful countryside....I wanted to go see where the movies were filmed. There was a horseback ride through the national parks and forests....where a part of the movies were filmed. So, the next day, I decided...to go on the scenis horseback ride of the national forest.

I was picked up in the afternoon by the bus and taken to the stables...our guide was a girl who was in her early twenties and was a little kid on the set when they filmed the Lord of the Rings. One day she'd actually barged into Aragon's tent during filming...or at least that was the story they told us...We mounted up on our horses and headed off into the forest. It was amazing to see the national forest with such old trees and foliage. It was a requirement of the government that Peter Jackson and his crew leave the national forest untouched...so every tree...rock and twig had to be left as it was when they starting filming. 

We walked through the forest where the big fight scene at the end of the first film....where Aragon get pinned up against the tree...his battle with the big Orc...etc...it was all filmed there...Towards the end of the ride, we saw where Boromir died...:( lol...but that wasn't all...the photos from inside the forest were quite dark...but you could recognize the forest from the film pretty well during the ride.

A few other points is that Lord of the Rings isn't the only movie which was filmed here...apart from movies like Wolverine...Prince Caspain....was one my childhood favorites....one of George Lucas's less popular movies...where Val Kilmer...is a rugged long haired rebel...called Mad Mardogan....?? Anyone...anyone...yup you guessed it....WILLOW!! I still like that one...this movie has so many childhood memories attached it. We used to watch it over and over and over again as kids...

 The Misty Mountains were also in the same area and you can see them in the background. It was a beautiful day to ride...crisp and cool...It was blinding how at that part of the world at about 15:00 during the day, then sun would be level with your eyes...It makes it a bit hard to see some of the photos...

 When I watched the Lord of the Rings for the first time, I was blown away by the scenery in the film and this was part of my reason for wanting to visit New Zealand....oddly enough...bungy jumping wasn't one of them...:)

The trial around to the mountains

 In this same spot....was also Fangorn Forest...and the River where Saroman's tower was located...and it was all in the same place...

 This one is a little better...you just need a little tower in the middle...:)

The group

Me and my horse

I really wanted to go on a longer ride, that was 3 hours and through the forest with a guide...crossing rivers....but I wasn't experienced enough as a rider...that...was one day...I thought...maybe I should've told a little white lie about that one...;)


I really enjoyed this one...

The Road to Queenstown Part 2

After a nice sleep in the ski shalet, we woke up the next day for the rest of the drive to Queenstown. There was a buzz on the bus about going bungy jumping, sky diving, canyon swinging...all kinds of crazy acts that involve voluntarily jumping out of  or off something...this has never been my cup of tea. 

We stopping in the morning at a small ski town on the way to Queenstown, it was cute but pretty small...and the buzz and trepidation was building because the next stop was the skydive...some had signed up and looked a little pale for most of the morning, but others were still undecided whether to go or not....the final decision was only 20 minutes away...After the time clock ticked away, we dropped off all our brave souls at the skydive place and headed to town for a few hours.

Little town by the sky dive place

 While in the ski town, I was able to do a bit of shopping, I'd been freezing since arriving, so I was able to buy a hat and use my doubled up mittens from the Chicago winter, which were conveniently hidden in my bag for most of the trip. I had actually forgotten to unpack them and almost threw them away..once while in Malaysia...but I was glad to have them now..:)

                           We made a few stop during the morning for photo opportunities...

 After we'd waited for a few hours, we went to get our faithful companions at the air strip. I was delighted to find they had an aircraft musuem. Sadly, it was closed but the dog fight painting was pretty cool.

Dog Fights

 These planes were just like the planes from our childhood trips to Canada...and I guess this was the place that you could've flown an aircraft, which was on my list, but sadly...they weren't doing that anymore.

A few members of the crew coming down from the skydive.

 After our friends triumphants return from the skydive...he headed off...it was amazing to see the change from the shaking with trepidation...to the return after accomplishing the skydive..:)

We truddled down the road to Queenstown and just shy of the city was the 33m bungy jump place. I guess the guy who invented the bungy cord is from New Zealand and th  idea came from a Moari tribe ritual where the women would jump off a cliff...then for some reason..it was changed to the men.  This same man was also arrested in Paris for bungy jumping off the Eiffel Tower in the late 80's. 

There were two girls of our group who jumped...our group watched the whole thing...from the observation deck. Everything was on film and the whole experience looked pretty traumatizing...but hey...everyone likes different stuff. In this jump, you could actually hit the water and dunk yourself depending on how you jumped. Both the girls came back looking white as sheets and saying it was terrifying. I guess everybodies different...:) right..?