Where on Wednesday: Thirteen - Aussies in New Zealand - Gold panning, off-roading & LOTR

Usually the #whereonwednesday tag is about where I would rather be on a Wednesday however today I actually am where I would rather be - So today's whereonwednesday is about where I absolutely am.

We went four wheel driving today, did some gold panning and saw a few Lord of the Rings film sites as well. A legit day all round.

Obviously I don't have my own 4x4 here in NZ so we decided, at the last minute last night, to get onto a small tour. When I say small I mean as in how many people there were as we don't like having too many around...There were only four of us plus the driver on this one.

[Image removed]

Not really, but she did find a speck! Here's Jill, the driver and guide, pointing it out in the pan. I know, you can't see anything...I needed my reading glasses on to see it myself! It's there for real, although we threw it back in for the next panner.

We chose this particular tour as it offered a balance of off-roading, some gold mining heritage/history stuff and some Lord of the Rings elements. It wasn't cheap, some $220 a person however it was worth it in my opinion; Having a local guide (from Boston, Massachusetts, USA as it turns out) gave us invaluable local knowledge and made it fun - Besides, I don't have my own 4x4 so if I wanted to hit some trails I had no choice. The only crappy part of it was that I wasn't permitted to drive.

A lookout right at the start of the Skipper's Canyon access track. This looks out over the Wakatipu Basin below. Queenstown is towards the right.

Stopped at a lookout on the way down to Skipper's Canyon. You can see the track away below in the distance. This is a very narrow track cut into the sides of mountains, and through them on occasions!

As you'll see in the images it was an overcast day. In fact the cloud was down around our ears at some points, however I have never let a little cloud get in my way and we had a great time nonetheless. I think my photos would have been better with some sunlight but it is what it is I guess.

If you've seen LOTR you may recall that scene when the Ring Wraiths, the Nazgûl, were chasing Frodo who had been poked with a sword by one of them previously. He was delirious and being carried on horseback by Elf-hottie Arwen (Liv Tyler) towards Rivendell for treatment. She had just crossed the Ford of Bruinen when the Ring Wraiths caught up with her. They tried to cross but she cast a spell causing the waters to rise up and wash them all away - Only to return later. A nice little fact is that it was in Liv Tyler's contract that she was to do no horse riding so when you see her "riding a horse" it's all movie magic.

So, that's where we stopped for cake and hot chocolate out of the back of the 4x4. It was cool. It's actually a place called the Arrow River. The filming for this Black Riders/Arwen spell sequence was all done here but they also used the gorge area from Skippers Canyon which was added by CGI into the Arrow River site. This is the gorge section in the film through which Arwen's raging water spell rushes through. Local riders and horses were used for the Nazgûl and as it turns out most were women-riders.

We went to Deer Park Heights, the site where Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas battled the Warg Riders and where Aragorn toppled off the cliff to [supposedly) his doom. Unfortunately we were not permitted to walk upon that hill as it is closed to the public. We also went to the Kawarau Gorge where the fellowship boated downriver after leaving the elves of Lothlórien. You may recall the massive statues, Aragorn's king ancestors. standing guard over the narrow gorge - The ones with the upraised arms. This area was also used in the scenes showing the refugees fleeing Rohan. An interesting fact is that The Director of the movie actually used the real-life likeness's of the father and grandfather of Viggo Mortensen (Aragorn actor) as the faces of those two big statues. Cool huh? There's also a fault in the movie regarding these statues...Do you know what it is?

The four wheelin' was pretty cool today, narrow tracks, creek crossings and some mountain passes also. For me this was the coolest part and as you can imagine I was eager to get behind the wheel. It was not to be though unfortunately. I've made up a collage showing some of the action as below. I also took some GoPro video as well but that might have to wait until I get better interwebs speed.

A creek entry. I think the driver, Jill, was yahooing as she knew I did a lot of off-roading and was bummed I wasn't allowed to drive! You can see the sort of tracks we were on up ahead.

This was us entering the river at one point. All the same sequence shot on my Samsung S9 - The first image is top left then go left to right top to bottom.

Here's view over Queenstown. To the left out of picture is the hill, Deer Park Heights, where the Warg Rider fight happened as mentioned above.

Well, I think that's enough for now. I have loads more images but due to the speed (or should I say lack of) with the interwebs connection it takes ages to upload so...I'm done.

Want to get involved with #whereonwednesday?

Just tag #whereonwednesday in your post, on a Wednesday, to join in if you would like. It's not a challenge or anything dumb like that, neither do you get anything for it. It's just a chance to post your thoughts and maybe a picture or two.

Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default
Discord: @galenkp#9209 🇦🇺