Queenstown/EXTREMEtown!

Extreme!

Next up: Queenstown, a.k.a. Extremetown. This is the home, the Creator, of bungee jumping (and a haven for all things EXTREME!!). So with JR being afraid of heights and me hating the feeling of falling, we were straight up ready to dive into everything Queenstown had to offer.

A relaxing gondola ride up the side of a mountain followed by a Lord of the Rings tour. EXTREME!

(Side note: the most hilarious thing about Queenstown is walking around and seeing the number of bandages, crutches and casts on just about everyone there. THAT is where extreme gets you y’all. And you know what? I end up with crutches and casts just walking down the street- I don’t need to encourage injury by biking down the side of a mountain or jumping out of a plane.)

First day there we pretty much just walked around and checked out the town. We ended up going to Atlas for dinner, which was really quite fantastic- the pork belly was some of the best I’ve ever had AND it didn’t have hair on it! Huzzah! It also just happens to be a craft beer bar (well, New Zealand’s version of a craft beer bar, anyway. They're getting there!). And they were matching all donations to Christchurch, which I thought was very cool, so that’s where I chose to throw my money. JR really enjoyed the duck spring rolls. (And more to come- there was a beer there that tasted like roasted marshmallows with coffee- no joke! Review will be on MBR… sometime, when I get around to it.) That night we hung out at the Qtown location of Dux de Lux and met Danni and Tim, a couple of fun folks from Sydney. Tim was planning to do the canyon swing the next day (no thanks), but Danni didn’t have any plans, so I invited her to join us for a brewery tour. We’ll be meeting up with Tim and Danni again in Sydney!

So next day we headed out to Arrowtown on Luke and Kelly’s recommendation to visit Arrow Brewing, which is just a 15 minute drive from Queenstown. We met up with John, the brewer, there and he led us through a really nice tasting of his beers and a tour. Of course, when I say “really nice tasting,” I mean the experience more than the beer. The beer was meh, but we really had so much fun hanging out and talking. And John can talk. Hardly noticed that it took three and a half hours to taste seven beers!

When we got back to town, we dropped Danni off and went to meet our friends Chris and Susan, who were our buddies from the Waiheke wine tour. We really had fun with them- they were there celebrating their 50^th birthdays and 30^th wedding anniversary, and they were just really cool. Kind of hilarious- Chris was all about the extreme stuff. He did the bungee jump earlier that day (Susan refused) and the next day they were scheduled to go skydiving and zip lining. Apparently Susan had suggested zip lining as a “distraction” to the skydiving that Chris wanted to do and somehow got roped into both. We look forward to hearing how it went for them! Most hilarious part of the evening: when they told us how much they admired us for quitting our jobs and doing this trip--- and how they’d never tell their kids about us. Cheers to Chris and Susan!

And, of course, the gondola and the Lord of the Rings tour. The gondola up the mountain was nice- very pretty views of Queenstown and the surrounding area (I might be able to see myself living here…. What do you think?). But the Lord of the Rings tour is what I was waiting for!! And I let my nerd flag fly (oh my god! that’s where Arwen crossed the river to get away from the ringwraiths after Frodo got stabbed by the morgul blade!). JR had some pretty classic quotes throughout the day- including when the tour guide asked us if we’d all seen Lord of the Rings (duh?) and JR responded, “Yes, but I apparently didn’t memorize everything. Is it still ok that I’m here?” The tour was actually really great- JR was not following the LOTR scene references at all until our guide showed pictures of the movie scenes (“I could follow everything the astronomer at the star gazing lookout said, but haven’t understood one thing she said today.”), but the tour was filled with a lot of local history and geography too, so it was good even if you aren’t obsessed with LOTR.

So we visited the Misty Mountains, the Mountains of Mordor (which are actually the same mountains, just in different seasons), Isengard, Amon Hen, the scene where Frodo/Sam/Gollum see the Oliphants, Ithilien (where Faramir and his band lived), and a few other sites. We took tea in Lothlorian. It was kind of awesome. Thanks JR for putting up with me.

The Pass of Caradhras

Mountain where Frodo drops the ring and Boromir hesitates to give it back

Lothlorian

Isengard (looks different without the tower. And Orcs)

Arwen wipes out the Ringwraiths here

Ithilien and where Frodo, Sam and Gollum first see the Oliphants

(they were looking over that rocky ridge at the top)

Mountains of Moria/Misty Mountains/Mordor

Some fun/funny local LOTR stories:

- a lot of the shots were done at the tops of the mountains and apparently Sean Bean (Boromir) was terrified of helicopters (the only way to get to the top. Also, apparently owning a helicopter in Qtown is as common as owning a car, according to Julie.). So he went to make up/costume very early each day and hiked his ass up the mountains every day to film- so on any given day if you were out skiing, you might run into Boromir in full costume hiking across the ski fields. How hilarious would that be if you were a skier?

- Peter Jackson did a lot of local calls for extras and most of the time it was women who would turn up (or men who were too fit/good looking to play a refugee of Rohan, so they were turned away)- so the vast majority of the riders of Rohan are actually women with fake beards on. Some trivia for you.

- Most of the scenes were filmed in National Parks and you aren’t allowed to leave anything in the parks- even scenery for a giant movie. So they had to make all of the scenery light enough to carry out every night and carry back in the next day.

- A lot of locals were used in the battle with the Oliphants- apparently if you look close enough, you can see a lot of them dying some particularly spectacular deaths so that their friends and family would be able to pick them out. Check it out.