The Firth Tower and House. The original was burnt down in 1902
3k’s or so outside of Matamata is the Firth Tower Museum.
Its an amazing collection of original buildings in the grounds of what used to be a farm for the Firth family in Auckland to feed the flour mill. It later became the base for a well known Waikato family to farm.
The original farmhouse was built with the tower in the later 1800’s but the farmhouse burnt down in 1902 and was replaced then by the current house. It was then owned by the McCaw family. Don’t forget you can click on the images to enlarge them
Firth Tower Museum Historical man cave
The Coach
Original Tractor
Milking .. love the old radio
Each building had its own collection
Out with the washing
Love the stick with the fork
Where we parked for the night, that’s the back of the van with the arrow. From the top of the tower shot through the glass.
Madam checking out the Phone box
The House with Tower
The Schoolhouse, Post office and Church
Madam all dressed for the occasion
Firth Tower
Sunset
In each of the buildings there is a theme of history, Agriculture, Transport, Medical, local war involvement, and there is even two carriages with the History of the Kaimai tunnel as well.
The volunteers who staff it were all wearing historical gear to add to the feel of the place. When we visited, there was school trip of local primary school kids and they all got dressed up in historical clothing to add to the occasion.
Dusk with The Tower
For $10 you can stay the night with power or free parking without power. One of the nice things about being on the road is discovering new places to stay and how nice they can be and often it is the least expensive that are the nicest places to stay… this was one of those times. A great way to spend the day and it really is a well setup museum.
As the posts here are a bit infrequent at the moment, if you click Follow at the bottom, you’ll be notified of a new post to save you checking in. 🙂
After Te Aroha, we headed to Matamata to see the Firth Tower Museum complex and Madam was keen for some retail therapy.
Usually, I’m passing through Matamata and only really stop at the KFC shop on the way to Rotorua or a cup of tea on the way back so it was nice to actually stop and check it out properly.
Its an amazing little town. We arrived early around 10am and went for a walk through the town, stopping for a cuppa in an Italian coffee shop as you do in Matamata!
Getting to the end of the main strip, there was this amazing I site, all done up as one of the Lord of the Ring buildings, complete with a thatched roof. Now that we’ve been in and got all the brochures, we both decided that we would save the tour to the Film set for another time. Click on the images to enlarge
Madam in front of the Isite
Madam looking happy about some retail therapy
Main street of Matamata
The I site.. easy to see we are in Lord of the Rings territory
After getting some food for tea from various shops, we decided to head for the Firth Tower Museum, where we would probably stay the night.. More on that tomorrow.
Fiona & Chris, two empty nesters put their dreams of doing something different into reality… Now back in a house, they were living in their Motorhome, come along for the ride.
Bugger It, we are off - www.buggeritweareoff.com 
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