this is not a picture of hobbiton

this photo was taken outside
of the tourist office in matamata, nz
it is NOT part of the hobbiton tour

a friend recently asked me, "hey miss dewey decimal, where are the pictures of hobbits?"  well new zealand is more than just hobbits my friend.  shame on you for thinking otherwise.

that's a lie.  new zealand is all about lord of the rings.

so i did go to "hobbiton" which is the sheep farm that peter jackson turned into The Shire and will be filming the upcoming film, The Hobbit starting next week.  however, in order to be let into hobbiton i needed to sign my life away, promising not to post any of my pictures on the internet.  SO, if you know me in real life and would like to see my pictures of hobbiton, you will have to come over my house and look at them in a private, personal, non-commercial way.  like, maybe i'll leave my laptop open and then while i am fixing us some tea and finger sandwiches you will happen to locate my pictures in iPhoto.

but here is what i can tell you without fear of peter jackson suing me ... hobbiton consists of many hobbit houses built into the sides of hills.  they look really cool, i swear.

the tour consists of walking around hobbiton on a fenced-in path so that you can't ruin the set.  apparently they have had some problems with visitors climbing on stuff and killing plants and doing other damage to the very carefully crafted set.

but you do get a very nice view even though you can't go right up to the houses and pose in the door frames like they did in America's Next Top Model.

our tour guide told us many interesting facts about the making of the set, none of which i can share with you here, as i am sworn to secrecy.  then afterwards we got to watch a sheep shearing show.

yeah, that's right ... a sheep shearing show.

there is something i realized being here in new zealand ... it has always been my dream to shear a sheep. i think i must have seen some little clip about it on mr. rogers or sesame street, and now i really want to take those crazy shears and shave a sheep.

i finally get to hold a sheep ... almost as good as
shearing one myself

they do NOT let random tourists shear sheep in new zealand.  even though they have SO many sheep available.  and trust me, i have tried.  we have seen many a sheep show advertised and none of them let audience members shear the sheep. wtf?!

however, in hobbiton, after watching a trained professional shear a sheep (apparently it takes four years of training to be allowed to shear sheep) ... we were allowed to go into a penned little area where the nice sheep farmer released a whole bunch of lambs.

ps.  i think more villains need to shout "release the lambs!"