New Zealand: Day 10

Gold rule

January 12, 2013

The day was clear and sunny with only a few clouds. Temperatures were in the mid 70s.

If the theme of Day Eight was benign tourist traps, then the theme of this day is the films of Peter Jackson. We had an early start this morning, quickly reaching Tongariro National Park. Mount Doom, er, Mount Ngauruhoe was the first peak visible, but Mount Ruapehu (RUE uh PAY who), was the first one we passed. Mount Ngauruhoe is more volcanically active, but no smoke was coming from its peak this morning. As recently as August of last year, Mount Ngauruhoe was throwing out rocks 3 meters across. Mount Ruapehu last erupted in 1996, and our driver told us the eruption was quite spectacular. Seeing an active volcano is on my bucket list, but that entails seeing flowing lava. Both Mount Ngauruhoe and Mount Ruapehu failed that test on this visit. Still, they were quite nice to look at. Moreover, it was quite easy to imagine lava flowing down the side of Mount Ngauruhoe as at towards the end of The Return of the King.

The entire drive today to Wellington, New Zealand's capital, was quite scenic, the best so far. This is our last day on the north island as we will be taking the ferry to the south island tomorrow. That's where the viewing is due to become truly spectacular. We arrived in Wellington at 1:25, theoretically just in time for me to catch either of the two half day tours of Lord of the Rings filming locations in the Wellington area. However, one told me they couldn't accommodate me (without explaining why), and the other company never responded to my inquiry. So, after a tour of the city and checking into our hotel, I dashed out to the Weta Cave, a small display space of artifacts from films with which Weta has been involved in developing visual effects, creepy creatures and the like.

Weta obtains its name from the insect, the weta, the largest insect in New Zealand. It is one nasty looking bug! The helpful fellow at the Weta (WET uh) Cave told me the company had chosen its name because it had gotten its start creating creepy creatures. I was surprised at the wide range of films and television programs with which the company had been involved. There is The Lord of the Rings trilogy, of course, and they now are deeply involved in The Hobbit trilogy. Weta began working with Peter Jackson on his first major motion picture, The Frighteners, which, interestingly, was the film that first piqued my interest in New Zealand. They were involved in the creature effects for Xena, Warrior Princess, and more recently they were involved in Contact, Avatar, District 9, the Chronicles of Narnia films, The Adventures of Tintin, and Prometheus.

Unfortunately, by the time I arrived at the Weta Cave, tickets for the final tour of the day of the Weta Workshop just next door already had sold out, so I was limited to the Weta Cave, and the 20-minute video it offered. The Weta Cave, only two rooms not including the movie theater, was fascinating enough. It had life-sized figures of Gandalf the Gray, Gollum and an orc, and displays of some of the props used in the films on which it has worked, but its primary purpose was to sell, sell, sell. Items ranged from pins and refrigerator magnets, to limited edition fine art replicas of Sting for the low, low price of NZ$11,498.85. If that's more than you're willing to pay, then you can buy the non-limited edition version for the even lower price of NZ$7,906.25. Still over your budget? How about a reproduction of Bilbo's contract from The Hobbit for a mere NZ$649? Weta is taking pre-orders for Gandalf's staff at US$179. Perhaps a replica of Thorin's map at NZ$29 is more in your price range.

But this must be said: FEAR ME MERE MORTALS FOR I HAVE ACQUIRED THE ONE RING! You know, the One Ring to rule them all ... and in the darkness bind them. My precious! Okay, so it's only a replica; you may do a replica of paying obeisance to me! Oh, and if you should see Thorin, tell him he dropped his key to Erebor and I have it. The Arkenstone might be a fair exchange. As if these acquisitions weren't enough, I also bought a t-shirt with the Weta logo and a silhouette of Sauron's tower minus the eye.

One Ring to rule them all
My Precious

After dinner I decided to go see The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey again, this time at the Embassy Theatre which is where The Hobbit had its world premiere (as well as some of the LotR films). The outside of the theatre currently is decorated with a large figure of Gandalf and a depiction of the front door at Bags End. I'll have to get up early tomorrow so I can get a photograph. It's not an IMAX screen, but I thought it would be a great bookend to the day to see the movie again with a New Zealand audience at the very location where the film premiered and in the country where it was filmed.

The theatre is very nice, but not especially elegant. The auditorium itself, though, puts every other theatre to shame in terms of comfortable seating. It's as if every seat in the house were a club chair. The armrests between seats are padded and wide enough for adjoining seats to share. Seeing the film again was a good idea because I caught some things I had missed the first time.

Gold rule

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Last revised: August 26, 2015.

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