Ben's Big 8th Birthday Weekend Adventure - Part 2: A Hobbit Tour in Piopio

                                  

We had a special opportunity on Saturday to visit a film location near Piopio from "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey".  This tour (Hairy Feet Waitomo) is not yet open to the public, but will be this summer. The owners, Suzie and Warrick, offered us the chance to preview the beautiful location, and gave us an amazing tour, since we were going to be in the area for the weekend.  It was a bit misty, but that only added to the beauty of their land.  

The scenes where the dwarves set up camp in the farm house ruins, their ponies are stolen and they encounter the three trolls are filmed below these craggy bluffs.

 The scene at the cave where Bilbo receives his sword, Sting, was also filmed at this site.

The scene where Radagast finds Gandalf is filmed here, too.

And the warg attack.

And just a few more pictures from a beautiful site and a fun tour.

Ben's Big 8th Birthday Weekend Adventure - Part 1: Hamilton and Waitomo

Ben and Cris attended their first professional rugby test on Saturday night in Hamilton.  They had a great time celebrating Ben's 8th birthday cheering on the New Zealand All Blacks as they defeated the Argentina Pumas 28 to 13.

One of Ben's favorite parts of the game was the traditional opening Haka by the All Blacks. 

Pre-game fuelling

Crazy Argentina fans

Jackie Thomas, winner of X Factor New Zealand, performed before the match

Ben used some of his birthday money (thanks Boppa and Bakka!) to buy himself a souvenir hat

"Crouch, bind, set... yes 9!"

They had such an amazing time and a once in a lifetime experience!

The next day we stopped at the Waitomo Caves, one of the top items on Ben's must-see list.  We toured two of the caves: Aranui Cave and the Waitomo Glowworm Cave.  

And a couple of cheesy tourist pics...

Another successful, family adventure getting to know this great country of New Zealand!

Ben's Big Soccer Day!

Ben played on the Aranui School soccer team this week as they faced five teams in a city-wide tournament.  They had three after school practices and several noon recess practices to get ready for this big day.  The weather was perfect and a very fun time was had by all!!

Father's Day?!?!

Seems like just a few months ago was Father's Day.... oh wait, it was!

But here in New Zealand it is celebrated the first Sunday in September.

We spent the day going on a drive to see some sights that were on Daddy's must see list.  We drove up Highway 3 toward Mt. Taranaki.  We made it as far as the town of Hawera, where we looked around town and had lunch.

One of our stops was at a beautiful beach by the town of Waverly, about 40 minutes up the coast from Wanganui.  It used to have a stone arch which unfortunately, we found out upon arriving, fell about two years ago.  It was still a great stop with amazing views and a small beach with caves accessible at low tide.  We also had our first seal sighting!

Happy Father's Day!