New Zealand - Day 10

 October 27

Another full day planned and it started with Baptisms for the Dead at the Hamilton Temple!

It was pretty much just us and the temple workers until a youth group arrived as we were finishing up.

Definitely a different experience than what we are used to going to the constantly busy Bountiful Temple.

After the temple, we headed to another anticipated destination - Hobbiton.

As soon as we booked this trip, we watched all the Lord of the Rings movies so the boys would appreciate Hobbiton and the landscape of New Zealand itself.

We had a little fun in the gift shop before our tour started.

Noah and me and Gandalf . . .

Darren found the directions in the bathroom to be very specific!

Because the land where Hobbiton is located is privately owned by a family, they bus you on to the property.  So after perusing the gift shop, we loaded on to our bus and finally arrived at the Hobbiton set.  We learned that after the first movie, they completely dismantled all the sets and restored the land to how it was before they filmed there.  After the second movie, the family that owned the land had so many trespassers trying to see where the movies were filmed that they came up with the plan to do Hobbiton tours.  And from what we learned, they're continuing to expand and add more hobbit homes including ones you'll be able to walk in and out of.

It was a fun afternoon and totally worth the visit.

To wrap up the day, we went on yet another hike!!

We did the Wairere Falls hike.

We knew this one was going to be a little more intense, but figured we'd be fine.

Somewhere along the way, Caleb either rubbed up against something or something fell on him . .  but he ended up with some kind of poop on him.

He was not happy for the rest of the hike - hence the change from the smile above to the frown below.

This hike included stairs . . . lots and lots of steep stairs.

But we did it and we finished the hike.

Crazy thing is, while we were up at the top admiring the waterfall, another couple was up there with us.

Turns out, they were from Southern Utah.

Small world.

To wrap up the day, we stopped by the cemetery one last time.