Hobbit Artisan Fair, Wellington.,

Today, I thought I'd go down town to Waitangi Park.  For the next week there is a Hobbit Artisan Market there, with Weta Workshop showing off things.  There's the guy who 'loomed' the cloaks the hobbits and Gandalf wore in LOTR,  there's LOTR jewellery, sculptures, Weta t-shirts, the armourer from the film selling knives.   There was a maypole, and a throwing-horseshoes game.  Also a huge screen that showed all the video log entries for Peter Jackson as he has worked on The Hobbit, as well as the Air New Zealand middle earth tv commercial that I absolutely positively adore.  Families were eating their sandwiches in front of the screen.  It was a lovely picnic day for people. 

The screen and the market will stay in the park until the 'The Hobbit" world premier.  The big screen will show the red carpet arrivals and speeches.  Waitangi Park is only a block away from where the premier will be.  I can't really see people preferring to watch it on screen when they only have to wander around the corner to see the real thing.  But, then again, they'll probably see more on the screen.  Our main tv channels will also be showing the red carpet from 3 pm or 4 pm right through for several hours.

 

I took the bus to the market.  It didn't open  until noon, so I wandered around Te Papa Tongarewa, the Museum of New Zealand.  My sore foot was okay until I got off the bus on my return home to hobble the block back to my house.  The rest of the day, it was truly sore, darn it.  My foot just has to be better for my trip to Ohope Beach/Whakatane.  Cross fingers.