Middle-earth Tours
Peter Jackson filmed Middle-earth across more than 150 New Zealand locations. Some you can walk into.
Between 1999 and 2012, The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit were shot almost entirely in New Zealand, using more than 150 locations from Northland to Fiordland. Most were public conservation land, restored to their original state after filming — which means the majority of Middle-earth is now simply landscape again.
The one permanent set
Hobbiton near Matamata is the exception. Built from temporary materials for the first trilogy and demolished afterwards, it was rebuilt permanently in 2011 for The Hobbit and now operates as a full-time attraction with 44 hobbit holes and a working Green Dragon Inn.
It is the only place where you can walk through a standing set rather than look at a hillside and be told what it once was. Access is by guided tour only.
Landscapes that played themselves
Mount Ngāuruhoe in Tongariro National Park was Mount Doom, and the surrounding Rangipo Desert was Mordor. The Tongariro Alpine Crossing takes you right past it.
Around Queenstown: the Remarkables were the Misty Mountains, Glenorchy and Paradise stood in for Isengard and Lothlórien, and the Kawarau Gorge was the Argonath. Dedicated 4WD tours reach the sites that are otherwise on private land.
Near Wellington, Kaitoke Regional Park was Rivendell and Mount Victoria's pines were the Hobbits' flight from the Black Rider — a 20-minute walk from the city centre.
Where the effects were made
Weta Workshop in Miramar, Wellington, built the weapons, armour, creatures and miniatures for both trilogies and runs public tours of its facilities. The Weta Cave houses props and full-scale figures.
It remains a working studio — the same teams have since worked on Avatar, District 9 and much of modern blockbuster cinema, so the tours are about current craft as much as nostalgia.
Header photograph by Joe Ross via Wikimedia Commons, licensed CC BY / CC BY-SA.