The Largest Kauri Tree, Hobbits, Kelley and More!

We got to the Waipoua Kauri forest around 10 am ready for some walking. Our first stop was a quick walk in to the woods to see the largest Kauri tree known as Tane Mahuta to the Maori or Lord of the Forest. It was huge, 51.5 meters in height and a 13.8 meter trunk girth. It easily made me feel small and insignificant in only the way that nature can. What I particularly liked about these type of trees was their ability to sustain other forms of plant life in their branches. I found it breathtaking.

After this quick stop we continued to Cathedral Grove, a quick drive on the highway. Here we were able to go further into the Waipoua Kauri Forest and see more of the beauty this place had to offer. We saw the second and seventh largest Kauri trees in this walk along with a grouping of trees titled Four Sisters that were all quite close to each other and born from the same seeds.

This formation was my favorite as it allowed me to reflect on my sisters at home. Although it hadn't been long since I had seen them last it was nice to be reminded of my family in such a serene setting. After hiking through the woods we made our way over toward Matamata where Hobbiton, the set for The Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films was made!








It was quite a long drive and we passed through Auckland along the way and its beautiful skyline.

We decided to stop in Hamilton for the night despite being told Hamilton wasn't worth a stop we needed a place to rest. We ended up at J's Backpackers just outside of town. The hostel was very cute and booked full with lots of cool people hanging about when we arrived. We made dinner and ate in the yurt they had built out back that had a few picnic tables and reading areas. After dinner we went out back where a group of people were hanging about, sharing stories, and my favorite, drinking beer.

It was finally time to make our way to Matamata and easily found the Hobbiton center...conveniently located at the iSite. We booked our tickets and had to drive a bit out of town to get to the actual film location. When we arrived you still couldn't tell we were actually at the film location until we hopped on a bus and got taken over a couple rolling hills where the scenery opened up. My inner nerd lighted up with giddy excitement. It was pretty neat!

Throughout all the picture taking, we learned some very cool facts about the filming of The Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit movies. Perspective and camera angle were used whenever possible rather than CGI to create size differences along with different sized hobbit holes.

Bilbo's House - No Admittance Except on Party Business

Samwise Gamgee's House

The fence Bilbo jumped over in the first Hobbit stating he was "Going on an adventure!"

Lastly towards the end of our trip to Hobbiton we stopped at the Green Dragon and we were given a free pint of cider.

The Green Dragon

I was belly up to the bar...

Because I brought the cider into town on my wagon...








After all that fun we made our way to Rotorua where Thomas and I would part ways the following day. I found a nice hostel outside of town called 4 Canoes. They had plenty of open rooms available and we were able to get a 4 dorm room ensuite for $22/night with free wifi. Not too shabby! After settling into our hostel I took off to walk down to the Thursday night market in town. It was similar to a farmers market at home but quite a bit smaller. I tried a mussel fritter which is apparently a big thing in New Zealand (fritters in general).

It was surprisingly tasty but didn't satisfy my craving for mussels quite yet...I think the South Island will be of help for that! After dinner at the market, I stopped at an Irish pub for a pint. There was a one man band playing and he was quite good so I stayed for another as well and met some firefighters who were in town doing training. After a few pints I called it a night and made my way home for sleep.

Finally the day arrived that I got to see Kelley for the first time in New Zealand! With all that excitement it was hard to figure out what to do with my day! It really wasn't that hard since there was so much fun stuff to do and beautiful things to see in Rotorua. In the morning we went to Hamurana Springs Reserve.

It was a beautiful hike along a river that led to Hangarua Spring. The scenery was beautiful and the spring area was crystal clear.


We even passed through some redwood forests along the way and I was reminded of home in so many ways.


We made our way back to town and checked out the geothermal area in town that was free. We saw some bubbling mud pools and everything smelled of sulfur.

It was interesting to see the earth bubble like that but I think it may have been more worth while to go to an actual paid area to see better preserved geothermal activity. I made my way over to Base Rotorua and checked both me and Kelley into a 4 bed dorm ensuite and proceeded to make my way down to the pool for some R&R before Kelley was arriving that night. The pool was geothermally heated so it was not refreshing to jump in and it was a really hot day. I mostly lounged in the shade reading Wild (From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail) by Cheryl Strayed. It has been a good book to read while traveling on my own and although I am not quite on my own in the woods, it has given me a good sense of adventure. Kelley cam to town around 11 that evening and found me at the hostel bar, Lava Bar, that was right next door.  I managed to meet a group of cops that were doing a rafting competition that day.  It gave me the bug to want to do it the following day.  They were a fun group and we played quarters most of the night and drank mason jars of sugary mixed drinks.

Kelley and I woke up in need of adventure...in the form of a 7 m or 22 ft waterfall to raft over.  It seemed like a sensible idea at the time so we took off for some breakfast and came back in time for our rafting adventure down the Kaituna River with Kaitiaki Adventures. It was a blast!! Take a look at us heading off a 7 meter waterfall!






After the waterfall we grabbed some pizzas at the Lava Bar (pro tip: included when you book your tour to Kaitiaki with Base) and beers. We decided to get away from the hustle that the Lava Bar brings and head to the actual downtown area in Rotorua.  Despite it being called RotoVegas (more so for the adventure available), it was quite a sleepy town.  We walked the lake and had some ice cream from Lady Jane's Ice Cream Parlour since it had been recommended to us by a few people.  It was decent but nothing to write home about.





My last day in Rotorua and with Kelley for this portion of the trip so we decided to make a trip to the town for a scone and coffee. Kelley introduced me to cheese scones...omg...heat them up and add butter and it is so good! She also got me on a trim flat white which is our equivalent of a latte-kind of- but better. They have lattes too but these are much better.  New Zealand has their own entire vocab dedicated to coffee which as a foreigner makes it hard to decipher. After breakfast we made our way over to the Green and Blue Lakes in Rotorua that we meant to have a nice 2 hourish walk so we took off for that.

We began our walk along the water and decided to carry on...after about 3 hours of walking we ended up at the highway no where near where we needed to be! It was getting late so we decided to hitch hike back to Rotorua. We got picked up from a nice man and his son and they dropped us at the turn off for the lakes from town and we proceeded to ilhitch hike yet again. This time a nice man and his dog picked us up as he was heading to the lake to walk his springer spaniel. The dog reminded me of my old dog Maggie and made me want a dog even more than I already had. Once we made it back to the car it was time for dinner. We were both craving Indian food and Rotorua had a few stand out places for it. We went to Indian Star that served a complimentary glass of wine with a meal and ordered up some great food, butter chicken, chicken jalfrezi, garlic naan, and roti. It was delish. After dinner we headed back to Base where I dropped my backpack and headed over to the Polynesian Spa to soak in some geothermal pools. Kelley didn't have long so she stayed about an hour and took off. I stayed at the spa for quite a bit longer just relaxing as my new ride was picking me up from Base at 9 pm. Once I was done at the pools, I used the shower facilities and took off for Base to meet Sebastian and his campervan. He arrived at about 9:15 and we took off for a rest stop just outside of Rotorua to sleep for the night. Sebastian builds campervans for a living and is from Chile but has been between Australia and New Zealand for the past 3 years. More on our adventures in the next post!