Mackenzie Country, New Zealand

Friday and Saturday, 11 and 12 January 2008

Gentler terrain follows. We head through Mackenzie Country towards Lake Tekapo, which is in the interior of the South Island. On the radio, the country mourns the death of Sir Edmund Hillary, a man Kiwis are very proud of.

We reach Lake Tekapo. Its water is a very weird blue. This is due to “rock flour”. WARNING: unless you are a big fan of glacier science please skip to the next paragraph. Apparently, as a glacier moved through the valley, its stony underside scraped against the rock below and produced fine particles which now hang suspended in the lake. These particles refract sunlight and give the water its turquoise colour. Against the backdrop of the burnt yellows and browns of the surrounding hills it makes a stunning contrast. We try to impersonate ruddy-cheeked hill trekkers by walking up the side of Mt. John which has a good view over the lake and the plains beyond. Our camera's memory stick is being put through its paces!

Back on the road, we travel alongside the canals that link Lake Tekapo to Lakes Pukaki and Ohau, which were built as part of the region’s hydroelectricity system. We also try to find the Plains of Rohan, which will be a familiar name to Lord of the Rings nerds. It was pretty embarrassing asking the lady in the local tourist information office about this but it was clear that this was not the first time this question had been asked by low-brow tourists like us. She gave good directions, telling us that we wouldn’t be able to get all the way to where the scenes were shot but should be able to get close. Of course, when we got there, it didn’t look anything like the movie. We settled on one odd-shaped hill in the middle-distance as possibly being to the side of one screen shot. But we were not sure. We could see a lot of sheep (not hard in a country with a sheep population of 40 million) but not a single hobbit. We had spent a few hours on this fiasco and this may be our last attempt at Lord of the Rings tourism.

If you want to see photos click here.