Hobbiton, the film/movie set, is at the very edge of the Cambridge economic and social catchment. Tucked into rolling farmland between Cambridge and Matamata on the Buckland Road – to the east of here – it is now a significant tourist attraction. Hobbiton’s presence has added value to the local economy – which is great. That the fictional Shire is located among those hills in which I grew up has always seemed entirely appropriate to me. This is, of course, sentimental nonsense but does reflect some of the magic I felt about my surroundings when growing up, and still do. I have yet to grasp what is actually happening in the stoush currently surrounding The Hobbit – but here’s hoping this special place does not lose it’s place both in the imagination and the real world.

Overnight (20/10/2010) Twitter chatter for Wellington, New Zealand via Russell Brown.

Russell et el; Hard News: Anatomy of a Shambles