The Start of The Aviation Dream: November 2015

Apologies for not updating for a while, I have been busy preparing for my VFR (visual flight rules) competency assurance (CA) test which I have now completed. I'm pleased to inform you that I passed the test and have now completed my last VFR flight in NZ. This also means that I have very few lessons left before I leave NZ... :(

A couple of days after my last post I completed all of my solo flights. My last flight was going to be a shorter flight as I was a little bit over on the amount of solo flight time but it turned out to be 20 minutes longer. This was because I came back to a lot of traffic trying to land at Hamilton and the controller could only take so many people into controlled airspace at the same time. This meant I had to circle outside of controlled airspace for 20 minutes which wasn't very exciting.

Following my final solo flight, I had an upset recovery flight. This is basically putting the plane into unusual attitudes and then recovering to normal flight. This is so that if the plane entered a nose high or nose low or even some control locking, we would know how to recover to safe flight. We also pulled high G-force turns which was quite fun along with the zero G dive.

So over the last month I have basically been doing navigation flights to various locations with different scenarios for each aerodrome in preparation for my test.

Along with the upset and navigation flights, I have completed both of my night flights which was awesome! The first flight was a navigation exercise towards Auckland. The objective was to identify the different towns along the route by judging the size of the lamppost lit areas with what is on the map. We then got to about halfway to Auckland before turning around and returning to Hamilton to practice some landings. The first landing was quite hard but the rest were smooth. The 2nd flight was just circuits. I was the only plane in the circuits so my instructor threw every scenario at me he could think of. These variants included landing with all of my instruments in front of me dimmed to the minimum so I could not see them. I had to judge height and speed purely buy guessing the speed by how high the nose was on the horizon and judging my height by the orientation of the runway lights as he had also turned off the approach indicators which normally tell you how high/low you are. It was one of my best flights I've had, the night conditions make it really calm to fly and I enjoyed the challenge of judging where the runway was in the final stage of the landing because he also made me land without landing lights. All but one landing was really smooth which I was really chuffed about.

Last week I had my CA test which marked the end of my VFR flying. The flight went well and thankfully I had a really good instructor who gave me some helpful hints. He made me feel at ease on the flight which meant that I could get on with what I have been practising for the last few months without too much pressure. The whole flight went well and I was able to execute everything he had asked me to do without a problem. I did make one mistake on the radio as I was coming back to Hamilton which I had never done before, but it didn't really matter. After the flight, the instructor congratulated me on passing and said that he enjoyed my flying and that I was at a high standard which made his life easier and his flight more enjoyable.

So my next phase now is onto instrument flying which consists of flying purely on instruments inside the cockpit. We have 7 simulator flights and then 5 actual flights left to do before I return home in 4 weeks. The time is going to fast and I really do not want to leave! Some people on my course can't wait to leave, not me, I would quite happily move here to live I love it that much here!

Travelling wise, I did one of the great walks of New Zealand, the Tongariro Crossing! I did it with a few mates and we couldn't have chosen a better day to do it on. We left the hotel at 0730 to embark on our 19.4km hike up and across a volcano. The weather was foggy at the village but at the start of the walk we were above the fog and there was not a cloud in the sky! The walk was the best walk I have ever done and the scenery was just outstanding! I had only flown over the area a week before which was also my favourite navigation flight I had flown. We did the walk in a casual 7hrs 30mins which gave us plenty of picture stops and an hour to sit next to a lake eating our lunch. The following week me and a couple of the lads went mountain biking in Rotoura which was great fun! My legs didn't feel like they were part of my body by the end of the climbs but it was great to experience some specifically designed tracks. We ended the bike ride with a nice soak in the hot and cold pools which was about 20mins further down the road. This is basically 2 streams that meet together. One is heated by geothermal activity and the other was just a normal cold stream. You just position yourself in the river in a location that is at a comfortable temperature for you. I also did another mountain walk which was next to the gold mine gorge I had done a couple months ago. It was right next to an area which a lot of our training flights go past, it was good to see the views from a different perspective.

My time in NZ is running out and I still have a few things on the list that I would like to do before I return home. Here are some of the pictures from the last month... the next update should be quite soon.