{"id":841,"date":"2009-08-09T09:21:27","date_gmt":"2009-08-09T09:21:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth--part-one-hobbiton.html"},"modified":"2009-08-09T09:21:27","modified_gmt":"2009-08-09T09:21:27","slug":"chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-one-hobbiton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-one-hobbiton.html","title":{"rendered":"Chronicles of Middle Earth– Part One, Hobbiton"},"content":{"rendered":"

You will no doubt by now be familiar with this fellow.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span>
(courtesy LOTR\/ New LIne Cinema)<\/p>\n

Bilbo Baggins lived at Bag End in Hobbiton.  And I am happy to be able to report that the story he wrote about his life ‘There and Back Again’ should become a movie called ‘The Hobbit’.  The sad part about this is that Peter Jackson, due to a falling out with New Line Cinema, will not be the main director and producer of this film, but we are assured he will be involved all the way through, which no doubt will be a relief to Bilbo.   But I digress.<\/p>\n

Ann and I were fortunate enough to visit Hobbiton (it still exists, and apparently will be used once more as a venue for The Hobbit movie).  Like an ancient archaeological site, we found it rather spare and bare, with no one at home to enjoy second breakfast.  And we did find nearby a reasonable facsimile of Shire’s Rest where they did serve second breakfast and also Hobbit ale, called  SobeRing Thought, Lord of the Beers.<\/p>\n

Peter Jackson decided to “brew a beer
\nspecifically for actors to drink while shooting bar scenes in the
\nmovie. He didn’t want them to have to drink ginger-ale, or tea, or root
\nbeer. He wanted them to feel like they were drinking real beer (though
\nit doesn’t taste quite<\/span> like real beer). So he approached a brewery and asked them to produce a 1% beer for the cast” (my thanks to Glenn Murphy of Office Glen blog for this info).  I am unsure whether Bilbo would approve, it being a non-alcoholic ale, but there you have it. 
\"sobering-thought.jpg\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

In order to find this place you need a reliable road map, and Ian Brodie has produced one. It is called The Lord of the Rings. Location Guidebook Extended Edition <\/u>(Harper) and it has many stunning pictures of where the films were shot in Middle Earth. <\/p>\n

Near the town of Matamata (so good they named it twice), we find Hobbiton located on the Alexander Sheep farm in the middle of the northern island.
\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Yes Hobbiton is a holey place, to say the least. Here for example is a picture of the approach into the village. <\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

As you can see only sheep are in residence, with one exception on this sunny day.  Note the party animal still hanging around on the Party Tree (a massive pine).<\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

A normal person has difficulties getting into a Hobbit hole. Remember how Gandalf kept bumping his head in Bilbo’s residence.  It helps to have yourself “shrunk”.
\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

My poor wife has been carrying me for years.  But as you can see from the following shot, I managed to squeeze into Bag End, barely…..<\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span>
The scenery in Hobbiton is still spectacular, especially if you are fond of idyllic scenes involving sheep safely grazing, rolling hills, ponds, and majestic trees.  It reminds one ever so much of the dales in Yorkshire.  Here are a few shots to prove it.
\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

In our next two episodes we must explore two issues: 1) sheer nonsense, or how to fleece a sheep (a major occupation in Hobbiton and NZ); and 2) Second Breakfast at Walnut Cottage.  Did I mention Elevensies?? <\/p>\n

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You will no doubt by now be familiar with this fellow. (courtesy LOTR\/ New LIne Cinema) Bilbo Baggins lived at Bag End in Hobbiton.  And I am happy to be able to report that the story he wrote about his life ‘There and Back Again’ should become a movie called ‘The Hobbit’.  The sad part…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nChronicles of Middle Earth- Part One, Hobbiton - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-one-hobbiton.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Chronicles of Middle Earth- Part One, Hobbiton - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"You will no doubt by now be familiar with this fellow. (courtesy LOTR\/ New LIne Cinema) Bilbo Baggins lived at Bag End in Hobbiton.  And I am happy to be able to report that the story he wrote about his life ‘There and Back Again’ should become a movie called ‘The Hobbit’.  The sad part…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-one-hobbiton.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-08-09T09:21:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2009\/08\/lordoftherings_bilbo-thumb-400x533-6911.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Chronicles of Middle Earth- Part One, Hobbiton - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-one-hobbiton.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Chronicles of Middle Earth- Part One, Hobbiton - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"You will no doubt by now be familiar with this fellow. 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A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/841\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}