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Published: July 31st 2012
So we made our way North from Auckland in Red Dwarf. It was dark by the time we arrived in Pahia so we just cooked some dinner and had a few games of cards. There was a big family from Australia staying at the campsite who had been to a wedding, so the kitchen area was pretty busy and noisy! They were a nice bunch though, and even offered us some mince they had cooked (think they looked at our beans on toast and fell sorry for us!). We set up the car- which is a spacewagon with the back seats removed. Instead is a big chest with storage for dishes, food and bags and a fridge. The matress just went on top of the chest to make the bed. Red Dwarf also had a DVD player, and we got to pick 2 DVDs to bring with us, and we could swap them at different locations around New Zealand once we watched the ones we picked.
Next morning, we drove up to Pahia town and on our way we stopped at the beach to take a walk. We saw lots of sea birds including oyster catchers, cormorants and herons. We
then headed into the town and booked a boat trip around the Bay of Islands starting that afternoon. In the meantime, Dave cooked eggs on our gas cooker in the harbour carpark. Proper travelling folk! We boarded the boat after lunch and sat on the rooftop deck. We had a great trip around the bay and saw loads of islands, some of them privately owned. The Bay is now a National Park, but only became one very recently, so there are lots of houses on the islands. We picked up people from Russel harbour, also known as "The Hellhole of the Pacific" becausse once sailors started exploring NZ, they would come to Russel to repair their ships and pick up supplies. While they were there, they got up to all sorts of divilment. We saw Cook Island, where Captain Cook first landed on NZ. We passed a pod of dolphins who hung around the boat for a good half hour, and we took loads of photos. We got back to Pahia about 5pm and drove straight back down the North Island through Auckland to a place called Waihi, where we intended on staying the night. We didn't arrive till 10pm,
and we had hoped to stay at a "Top 10" campsite but by the time we got there, the gates were closed. So we drove around for a while and a park. The office was closed, so we parked Red Dwarf in a spot and left a note under the office door to let them know we would pay the following day. The holiday parks in NZ are really good; with hot showers, kitchen and laundry facilities, powered sites and loads of other facilities. We cooked our late dinner and watched a DVD in the car. Next morning, we paid the owner and did some much-needed laundry. We met a couple in the kitchen while we were having breakfast who have been living in their campervan for 10 years. They were asking us about the rugby. The Kiwis are mad about rugby, and everytime we said we are from Ireland they always said "Oooh how about those tist matches ay?". There was a kitten on the site who got into our car so we shooed him out and he hid under the car. The owners dog, a little Bichon, saw the cat and started going nuts, wanting the cat to
chase it. The kitten looked less than amused, and eventually pawed the dogs face but the dog still pestered him!
We set off from Waihi and drove to Matamata, where the Hobbiton village is. Hobbiton Village is the movie set where they filmed parts of the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies. It's a huge farm owned by a family who have had the farm since 1975. The bus picked us up outside the tourist office and took us to the farm. The weather was pretty dreary and wet, but we were excited about seeing the movie set nonetheless. It was a brilliant tour, we had a great tourguide called Ben, who worked on the set when they were filming. The hobbit holes were tiny, they were only facades- there was nothing inside. We saw the Party Tree, which is a few hundred years old and absolutely massive. We saw the mill and the Green Dragon pub, as well as the dell, Bag End and Sam's house. The oak tree on top of Bag End was growing somewhere else, and Peter Jackson liked it so much, they chopped it up, numbered the pieces and reconstructed it on
Russell Port
aka "The Hellhole of the Pacific" looked pretty nice to us though!top of Bag End. The leaves on the tree are plastic and imported from Taiwan. You can tell Peter Jackson had plenty of money to spend! When the tour was over, we got to bottle feed some of the lambs on the farm, and feed some of the sheep, before we were ushered into the giftshop and back on the bus which took us back to Matamata. We got back into Red Dwarf and drove to our next destination- Rotorua.
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