An Unexpected Journey – Bag End, Hobbiton, The Shire, Middle Earth.
Unlike my famous namesake far-removed uncle Bilbo Baggins, I, Bilbo Brown, am always happy for a bit of adventure, travel, thievery, gold and dragons. This is a small story of a small journey from Auck-land (happily not Orc-land) to visit my long-lost relations in Hobbiton as I make my way towards the now-peaceful Mount Doom.
I walked on my hairy feet until I came upon the local purveyor of donkey-carts and paid far too much gold for what he called a Jucy-Van. It seems to take me down the path with invisible donkeys and has a cosy hobbit-cave inside with a mattress softer than straw and a cold box to hold my first and second breakfasts.
I loaded my baggages into the cave-space and started down to the south-east. I passed by many beautiful fields, lakes, caves, forests, villages and a large amount of tasty-looking cows and sheeps. When I arrived on the verges of Hobbiton, surrounded by rolling green hills, I met a local hobbit boy Haydn who guided me through the small paths into the village, consisting of 44 hobbit holes. He took me past the artist’s house, the community garden and down to the woodworker’s house where I spent a few happy moments turning a leg for a hobbit-chair on a pedal-lathe. By way of some elf magic you can watch here http://youtu.be/NBSYIn3VV6M
We then walked to my uncle’s Bilbo’s hobbit hole, Bag End. Unfortunately Bilbo was out on an adventure of his own so I couldn’t stop in for a short visit and partake of whatever snacks he had locked away in his pantry.
At the far end of the village I stopped in to whet my whistle at the Green Dragon Inn. I had a pint or two of Girdley Fine Grain Amber Ale and exchanged journey stories with fellow hobbits Kimarla, Denise and Jenny and an elf called Chloe. We formed a fellowship, vowed to search far and wide for adventure, and shared scones and raspberry jam.
The ladies shared a very large pony-cart called a Britz-Van and I followed them down the winding paths until dusk fell and we stopped for the night at a campsite in nearby Rotorua. I cleaned my patchwork woolen clothes down at the river and then we went for a steamy swim in a local hot-spring pool, the heated water coming up from deep underground where Smaug lays sleeping. There we met a wizard who must have been related to Gandalf, sporting tattoos and an epic wizard beard. After a second-dinner of dwarf-cheese and elven-wine, I snuggled gladly in my cave and quickly fell asleep, dreaming of my next supper.
