From Wired.com: Whether your fantasy hotel is a Star Wars -style cave dwelling or a Hobbit hole in New Zealand, specialty accommodations around the world will fulfill your nerdy needs. Other hotels geek out with crazy gear, from Apple- and Microsoft-themed suites to virtual golf courses….Woodlyn Park is home to Billy Black’s Kiwi Culture Show, with sheep shearing and a dancing pig. But the real star of the complex is The Hobbit Motel, two polystyrene-block units with circular doors built into a hillside. Geek factor: You can pretend you’re a hobbit.
Category: Fans
The Cruise to Middle-earth made its way to Hobbiton the other day, hampered by some rain and a terrible crash on the road, but we made it nonetheless. For the three Brandybuck sisters, this was like returning home for them. The location is still just as beautiful and Shire like as it was in the films, while also remaining a working sheep farm. We encountered a good many sheep and lambs, and the things they leave behind. But no one really cared, not once they saw the Party Tree and Bag End.
Continue reading “Cruise to Middle-earth off to a rainy start”
November 23, 2008 is when the Celebrity Millennium will set sail with a group of your fellow Ringers for the Cruise to Middle-earth. One set of our Fellowship are already down in New Zealand right now doing a pre-cruise tour as part of the Wizard’s Journey. They are currently in Queenstown and will then transition to Wellington in the next day or two. The rest of us, on the Hobbit’s Journey, will join them this weekend. TORn’s own Tehanu is leading the Wizard’s Journey, showing everyone Rohan and Amon Hen, Rivendell and Ithilien, among other locations. I leave the US tomorrow evening and will make the occasional post from the ship so you will know what our Fellowship is up to. And yes, there will be pictures too.
Annette writes: I noticed that at the Unique Sheep website that they will be hosting a Lord Of The Rings Knitting Sock Club in 2009. The patterns will be based or inspired by the books. I just thought there might be other enthusiasts of both LOTR and knitting that might want to know.
The Brits are to beat Kiwi-born director Peter Jackson in creating the next Lord of the Rings movie. But the new film won’t have the $166 million budget the other movies had or the backdrop of green New Zealand pastures and snowy mountains. An amateur film-maker from England is digging into her own pocket, appealing to sponsors and has hired several actors willing to work for free to make a not-for-profit movie inspired by J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy novels. Briton beats Jackson to next Rings movie
Fans of the Lord of the Rings films are making their own movie inspired by the trilogy – and none of them are getting paid for it. Orcs take a rest from filming in Epping Forest for a new chapter based on the epic trilogy, ‘The Lord Of The Rings’ Born Of Hope, which has a £25,000 budget, is being made in the UK. But the Middle Earth subject matter has attracted people from around the globe to join the team, including some of the film’s original cast and crew. When it is released, around November 2009, the low-budget production will be free to download on the internet. The film’s backers say the trailer from the test shoot in April 2006 has been well received at many conventions and exhibitions worldwide. Orcs Back: New Rings-Inspired Film