New Zealand: The Last Roadtrip

(Well, after traveling through Sydney and flying across the Pacific, we're back home catching up with family & friends and looking for work. Now that we are mostly rested, we are ready to start updating the blog again.)

Before flying out to Sydney, we rented a van from the only depot in Wellington. JUCY vans are a bit ostentatious. In the past, we avoided companies that heavily branded their vehicles because they screamed 'tourist'. We had read online that this can attract thieves, but despite our reservations, we didn't have any issues. On the plus side, you can take a few minor liberties on the road and chalk it up to being a tourist. Need to go around a round-a-bout a second time? People will just think: 'Oh they're not crazy, they're just tourists.' Accidentally cut in front of someone? Now you're a crazy tourist rather than just crazy. ^_^

Anyway, Aorangi Forest Park is a national park a few hours out of Wellington. It is home to the Putangirua Pinnacles, the filming location for the Dimholt Road in LOTR: Return of the King. Aragorn and co. take this road to reach the entrance to the Paths of the Dead:

The pinnacles are an example of badlands erosion, with the softer gravel eroding over thousands of years, leaving behind these amazing pillars. They were really cool to see and a lot of fun to explore.

After a few days out in the bush, we made our way back to Wellington to make one last stop before dropping off our ride.

A.k.a. 'Wellywood' or 'The Windy City'

The Weta Cave is a novelty shop filled with replicas and motion picture props produced by Weta Workshop over the years (most notably for the Lord of the Rings trilogy). Here you will find life-sized statues of Gandalf and the Uruk-hai, Lurtz (an orc). You will also find display cases with bows & arrows, swords & armor, even a replica of Bilbo's contract with the dwarves from "The Hobbit". For a few bucks you can do a scheduled behind-the-scenes tour of the workshop itself.

Unfortunately, due to scheduling, we didn't have time. We did have twenty minutes to watch the free in-store movie that they show in a side-room. It talks a bit about the history of the company, which was interesting, if not a little over the top. I didn't realize how many projects they had been involved in. Seeing Avatar and King Kong on the list wasn't too much of a surprise but the nostalgia from seeing the Xena and Hercules shows from back in the 90's caught me off guard.

The best part of the shop I think is the main entryway. Three large trolls that 'greet' you as you approach the shop make for some fun photo opportunities.

 Imagine going outside to get the paper in the morning to find this ugly mug on the way back.

A dangerous business going out your door indeed!

Kawarau Bridge: Home of the Bungy

Even though Andy and I saw some bungy jumping while we were on Bob's Peak in Queenstown, we knew we had to see it at the Kawarau Bridge.

Why?

Because this is where commercial bungy jumping officially began! Opened by AJ Hackett in 1988, the Kawarau Bridge is the world's first permanent commercial bungee site and home to the original 43-meter jump!

About half an hour east of Queenstown, the Kawarau Bridge was, conveniently, on our way out to Dunedin. But after Andy finished panning and we finally left Arrowtown, the sun was going down fast and I was convinced we had missed our opportunity to see the bungy jumpers that day.

When we pulled into the lot of the Kawarau Bungy Center in our dusty black van (and wearing jandals no less), we were met with fancy cars and people with champagne glasses wearing suits and evening gowns. Clearly there was an event going on that night and the viewing area appeared closed off to the general public.

But one step out of the van and I began to hear a countdown going on.  5... 4... 3... 2...  I looked towards the bridge just in time to see the back of a man in a white shirt leap off to screams and cheers.

As we ran around the center looking for a place to watch without sticking out like a sore thumb, we ended up rushing to the other side of the bungy centre out by the road for a better view just as we heard the announcer say "Okay, this will be the last jump of the night..."

And with the sun setting behind us, we quickly readied our camera and videotaped just as the countdown began again:

Sweet as!

After the final jump, all the well-dressed spectators headed indoors for what must have been a wedding reception or a cocktail party of some sort. As the crew was packing up, Andy and I had the chance to cross the bridge and admire the amazing views from the top (which included yet another great Lord of the Rings filming location!):

The Kawarau River and Gorge (a.k.a. the Anduin River and the Argonath/Pillars of the Kings)

Great end to a great day.

Next stop: Dunedin!

Gold Fever: Part II - The Arrow River

In the spring of 1862, Jack Tewa, a sheep shearer, found a chunk of gold in the Arrow River just outside of present-day Arrowtown. By the fall of the same year over 1,500 miners had set up shop along the river to lay claim to one of the richest strikes of alluvial gold in history. Here, I followed in their footsteps and tried my luck.

This also happens to be the same area as another Lord of the Rings filming location. This is where the Ringwraiths were swept away while trying to cross the Ford of Bruinen in Fellowship of the Ring.

At first I only found a speck or two but I knew I had the scent. I decided to hike downstream for a while and then I found it. A huge pool that was clearly the remains of a historical dredging operation. Just upriver of this pool was a little island in the middle of the river with a lone shrub growing on it. Little more then a sandbar, I knew that this was a fresh deposit of sediment untouched by other tourists. I waded across the river and started digging into the loose gravel.

When I met the other prospector over at Twelve Mile Delta, one of the things I learned from our conversation was that you won't find black sand at Twelve Mile like you do in most other rivers. Black sand contains iron and is much heavier then most other sediment that you find in a river. In most cases if you don't find black sand you won't find any gold. After a short time, I had dug a cross-section out of the sandbar and could see the layers of sediment. Layers of black sand were clearly visible. I focused on these areas and started to find more specks here and there. Clearly, my luck has improved:

Here is a rough estimate of what I found while panning near Arrowtown.

Time passes very quickly when you are panning for gold. There are some crazy panning competitions where people can go through a pan in under thirty seconds. However, when you are first developing your technique it can take up to half an hour to sift through a single pan. Even after all that work you can come up empty, which is discouraging. But once you start finding two or three specks of gold after each attempt, you start to lose all sense of time as you work from pan to pan. After spending three or four hours down on the river it started to get dark and we wanted to make it to Kawarau Gorge in time to watch some bungee jumping!

Paradise: The Gateway to Middle Earth

**Nerd Alert**

Paradise provided the amazing landscape for movies such as X-Men Origins: Wolverine, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Hobbit, and of course The Lord of the Rings trilogy!

To get there, we followed the signs from Glenorchy, which took us down a gravel road for about 20km. Soon enough, the scenery began to look very "LOTRish."

Several Lord of the Rings locations were filmed here, including: Isengard, Lothlorien, and Amon Hen. Boromir's death scene was filmed here as well.

Like our experience at Twelve Mile Delta, we knew we were in the general area, but we didn't know the exact locations for each place. Without even a guidebook to help us out, we had to guess. Luckily, some of them didn't seem too difficult...

Entrance to Lothlorien(?)

Lothlorien or Amon Hen. What do you think?

Just take out the cows and the fence and add the Tower of Orthanc... Isengard, anyone?

We followed the gravel road as far as we could go, through forests and over creeks, until we ended up at a car park and the start of several trails, including the Dart Trail. Though we didn't end up going tramping this day, Andy did do a bit of panning along the creeks we passed:

Movies aside, Paradise really is a beautiful place that definitely lives up to its name. If we ever make it back here, I would love to explore this area more thoroughly on horseback. :)

Taters and Oliphuants

I mentioned earlier that Twelve Mile Delta was a DOC campsite we stayed at for the duration of our time exploring Queenstown.

Despite being by a lake, it was a hot, dry and dusty site with hardly any shade.

Lake Wakatipu

We were able to amuse ourselves with interesting insects and gold-seeking adventures, but that was hardly the draw that got us to here Twelve Mile.

So why did we decide to camp here?

Other then the fact that it was the closest campsite to Queenstown that didn't cost an arm and a leg, we knew that this was where they filmed Sam and Gollum's "tater" scene as well as Frodo and Sam's "oliphuant" scene from Lord of the Rings!

(We couldn't resist...)

So on the day of our arrival, we explored the area for a bit, looking for the film "spots." Though the whole area looked a lot like the backdrop for the movie, we couldn't find the exact locations, so we asked the camp manager who we rented the panning equipment from. She was able to point us to a tree at the far end of camp by Lake Wakatipu. Supposedly, this is the area where they filmed Sam and Gollum's exchange over coney stew and taters:

Even then, we couldn't find the exact spot, but we felt like we got pretty close :)

The other location she directed us to was this ledge on the other side of Twelve Mile Creek:

This was where they filmed Ithilien camp, where Frodo and Sam looked down and saw the oliphuants for the first time in The Two Towers.

We found a way up the ledge and took some pictures looking down, as you see it in the movie:

As it's been over a decade since the movie was filmed, the area definitely looks overgrown, but the resemblance is still uncanny.


To end this post, I will leave you with this remix of Sam and Gollum's "taters" scene.

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/taters

Enjoy!