The Start of The Aviation Dream: Solo Nav done

Progress is fairly slow on the flying front! I have done 6 flights in the last 2 weeks and I still maintain my zero weather cancellations! 4 of them were with my instructor and 2 of them were solo navigation flights.

The past few navigation flights with my instructor have been mainly sight seeing at new aerodromes and also refining the procedures of arriving into controlled aerodromes. My weakest area of my flying at the moment and has been since I started is making the radio calls in controlled aerodromes. It's a bit different to the UK radio calls so I have been trying to learn the NZ radio calls.

My first solo navigation flight went as planned meaning I found all the places I needed to along my route and I also practised some procedures like steep turns and engine failures while en-route. I felt a sense of freedom being up there alone and not overly busy with tasks to do. The hardest task is trying to spot the other planes in the area. Luckily the Cessna has a traffic alerting service which shows other aircraft on a map in relation to you. This however is not always 100% as not all aircraft carry transponders which is what is needed for the traffic alert to work. There were times that I could see aircraft coming close on the screen but when I looked out I still couldn't spot them.

For my second solo navigation flight I went to the north to a place called Whitianga which is on the Coromandel peninsular. The sights up there are just incredible. I feel so privileged to be able to see these sights first hand as only a select few people get to see them from 4000ft. The 2nd leg of my route was to Tauranga which is controlled airspace and has specified arrival and departure procedures. So while I was flying towards the control zone, I had to brief the arrival for things like which runway is in use by listening to the Automatic Terminal Information Service (ATIS) the circuit direction and altitude you need to join the control zone at which are specified on a plate which I carry with me. Each aerodrome has its own plate so you have to make sure you have picked up the correct plate. You also need to brief the departure so that you know which direction you are going to leave in and at which altitude you need to be at. All of this can become very stressful if you don't do it far enough ahead, it is very difficult to play catch up as things happen very fast. Thankfully after going to Tauranga a few times now, I feel confident going there and everything went smoothly and as planned. My final leg was back to Hamilton but with some general handling along the way (steep turns, stalling and simulated engine failure).

For my travelling adventures, I went up to the Bay of Islands for the weekend with a few NZ friends which was a great weekend. It was a long weekend of driving (1000km by the time I got home) but I enjoyed my time there exploring. As always there will be pictures to follow. I have also been to Auckland Zoo which was cool, most of the animals were posing for the camera . I can't remember the last time I had been to the zoo. Another trip which I failed to mention in my last post but included a picture of was my trek up the Pirongia mountain. We didn't quite make it to the summit because the weather was getting worse and the thunderstorms were getting closer so we opted to descend and give it a go another day. By the time we reached the bottom, we were soaked to the bone! Looking at the rainfall stats from the last 30days, the day we climbed the mountain, there was more than double the amount of rainfall than any other day. We few of us took another trip to Kawhia beach for another relaxing day laying in a pool of hot water. It was better than the first time we went as we found a hotter source and managed to get the pool deeper. Paddle boarding in Raglan was great! It was only my 2nd time on a paddle board and I managed to go 2 hours without falling into the freezing water. The views were great, I have included some pictures below.

I have back seated a few flights including a night flight towards Auckland. That flight was an amazing experience! The pictures don't do it any justice.