Thursday, February 21 - Edoras, capital of Rohan

      As you know, we're big Lord of the Rings fans, and one of the best locations to visit is Mount Sunday, the stand-in for Edoras.   

This is how Mount Sunday looked during filming.  Peter Jackson's crew spent
 11 months building, filming, and carefully deconstructing this huge set.

This is how it looked when we were there.  I had read that the mountain
itself was on private property, and off limits to visitors.  However, common
sense prevailed, and the DOC has opened the mountain to visitors.

So of course, we were delighted, and hiked over to take a closer look.

Even without it's appeal as a LOTR film location, it sits in a beautiful, lonely
valley, surrounded by forbidding mountains, making it worth a visit in
its own right.

Still, it is fun to imagine being here when the film was being made.

As an added benefit, this side valley was used as the location for
Helm's Deep.  We could see it from the top of Mount Sandusky.

That night after dinner we went for a walk in the misty mountains.  It's nice
to look more like a wizard than a dwarf or a hobbit for a change.

We stumbled across this little hedgehog.  I tried to encourage him
to pull his face out of his hidey hole with my shoe, but strangely, he stayed put.

Wednesday, February 20 - Goodbye Kelly and Dan

OK, here's a few hugging photos.  I guess even the camera was a little
bleary-eyed.

Tuesday, February 19 - Sharks, and Christchurch

We camped near the mouth of the Waitaki River.  The beach there on the
Pacific Ocean is very popular with surf fishermen.

The long, wide beach is made up entirely of flattish limestone rocks ...

... and they're none too comfortable to walk on.

This little shark was washed up on the beach

I won't be sad if he's the largest we see while in NZ.  Especially when we
go sea kayaking.

We got to Christchurch in the evening.  The city
recently had two major earthquakes , one on September 4,
2010, that did a lot of damage, but resulted in no fatalities...

... and the second on February 22, 2011, which resulted in 185 deaths.  It was a
huge catastrophe for a small city in a small country.

A 25 block area of the center of town has been fenced off, and over 1600
buildings will eventually be torn down, including almost every one over
five stories tall.  Looking through the chain link fence at the trash blowing
lazily through the deserted streets was like seeing into
a post-apocalyptic future.

Signs advertising sales, flyers of upcoming events,  all the immediate paraphenalia
of a living city remain.  But weeds grow in the cracks of the sidewalks ..

... and evidence of vandalism haunt the closed city.

A small area of the downtown is called 'Re-Start', and cleverly uses shipping
containers for a well-designed neighborhood of shops, restaurants, and
businesses.  But the city has a tremendously long way to go for complete
recovery.  There are many competing visions on how that should be
accomplished, as can be expected.  It will be very interesting to watch
what happens there over the next couple decades.

As I blogged a few days ago, that night we ate at a restaurant to say goodbye
to Kelly and Dan

This was my favorite.  Only Mike McCabe could brew a better beer.

Monday, February 18 - Oamaru, NZ SteamPunk Capital

Australia was filled with 4WD vehicles.  NZ is the Land of the Van.  And a
lot of them are rentals.  This company, Escape, paints each of their vans
with a different artistic motif.  Our Dutch neighbors at the campground that
morning were traveling in this sweet Picasso Toyota van.

We returned to Oamaru the next day.  It sits on the south-east coast of the
South Island a couple hours drive from Dunedin.  When the first English settlers
arrived they found a nearly treeless plain which was perfect for farming and sheep
raising.  But without much timber for construction, they quarried the thick layers of lime-
stone for their buildings.

The city went through a couple booms, including agriculture and gold mining,
and for awhile it was one of the richest cities in NZ.  Then in the early 1900's
the highly indebted city crashed, and declined sharply.

Without money to tear down the 'old' buildings and throw up newer ones, the
city just sort of sat there and decayed.  Finally in the 1980's the inherent beauty
of the architecture was rediscovered, and a renewal driven by local and national
investors restored the appearance of the 1860's and 1870's Victorian streets.

The old grain warehouse has been converted into Steampunk HQ.  If
you don't know what steampunk is, just look at the next photos and you'll
probably get an idea.

Generally speaking, steampunk imagines an alternative world where electricity
never becomes an important part of technology.  It's usually includes a Victorian
setting.  The nearly universal Victorian architecture of Oamaru makes it perfect
for steampunk enthusiasts.

Not all steampunkers include ghoulish themes to their art, but these guys
certainly do.

Kristy drives a mean tractor

Check out the hood ornament

We were delighted to see our name on many of the iron castings around
the place.  Can you imagine how much our son David would love it there.
He's been a budding steampunker for most of his life.  Kelly too.  Maybe
there's a future New Year's Eve theme here.

The community of Oamaru has embraced the steampunk ethic.  This artist,
whose name is Purple, heads off to her day job of driving a bus.  The motorbike
is hers, and she rides it every day.  The League of Victorian Imagineers throws
an annual Fashion Show and Steampunk Ball.  And one of the local galleries
hold a yearly Steampunk Exhibition.  

The town has many large art and performance spaces residing in the Victorian
buildings.

Dan plunks out a little Beethoven for us.

      Oamaru is one of the most fascinating towns we've ever visited, and if we ever do return to NZ, it will be at the top of the list.

Sunday, February 17 - Birds, Dunedin, and other oddities

We headed out from Dunedin to the Otago Peninsula, populated with
fishermen, and birds

Black swans, ...

and white gulls

At the tip of the peninsula there is a colony of
Royal Albatrosses, one of the only places on
earth they inhabit that is not an island

Because they are raising their chicks, they stay close to land.  Otherwise,
they'd be far out to sea, looking for the Ancient Mariner.  Seeing them soar
above our heads was one of the most exciting things I've ever witnessed.

Noisy gulls also were nest sitting in the area

We drove back to Dunedin for a little sight seeing ...

... fine old Scottish style architecture ...

... and cricket on the green.

We also visited Baldwin Street, the steepest residential street in the world...

... and a really good place for a race, ...
if you're into the sort of thing. 

Then on to see the Moeraki Boulders.  We made
our demo video for Cirque de Soleil here.

This is sure to be the next big thing for them

Speaking of big things, ... what the?!?

Our last stop for the day was Oamaru, home of a terrific playground.  Here,
Diana plays at being a gerbil ...

... and Kevin ...

... and Dan show their stuff on a zip line.  It was quite a thrill in the dark.

We also spotted these blue penguins on shore looking for their nests.
We would return to the town the next day for more explorations.  Stay tuned
if you're into Steampunk.