Day the second

Today is Northland day with the GNZ Awards Officer.
However all flights have been postponed until after Easter Egg hunting with grand daughters:-)

All sorted, tanks topped up and we takeoff  for the 55 minute to the Northern Centre of air power. Whenuapai.  Welcomed by Peter Thorpe and his merry men including Rex, Roy Neville and others.
They dont have a clubhouse but do have a hangar and a caravan launching with a Microlight with water cooled engine they are a happy we band of aviators.  Somewhat stiffled by being an Air Force sports club  and having limited trial flights they opine that Part 115 will not  really affect them.

Then onwards and upwards into a fantastic looking Northland skies, theramsl to die for. Unfortunately we were on a mission to get to Kaikohe so had to power on. It got a bit "bumpy" so we climbed to around 7500ft to fly over the lumps and bumps. In the North airspace is free as a bird. How does an uncontrolled ceiling of 9500ft going to 13500ft grap ya!!!. Fantastic.  Nice casual descent into the lovely rural and QUIET strip at Kaikoe to be met by Thomas Keith & Dave.  

What a club! 9 members, Two 2 seaters and two single seaters a winch and some privately owned gliders and a motor glider. The motor glider is the cousin to our Sinus, its a Taurus.  Just after we left I heard them call top of winch at 2600ft!!!

Had been trying to phone Paul Rockell off and on all morning but couldnt raise him.  No worries, off to PuiPui, home of the Whangarei club about 12 minutes flying time from Kaikohe.   Flew overhead and noted 3 cars outside the clubhouse.  Low pass and overshoot. Maybe we could rasie them to come outside as nobody responding to teh radio.  Second low pass, nobody came out(damn those Sinus are quiet) this time at about 50ft noted at least 2 electric wire fences across the strip so it was up up and away on our way South. IT was lovely to have the 25knot tailwind on the way north, bit of a pain as we headed south.

Keeping up with the plan not to go thru controlled airspace we descend to pass off Auckland City coast at 1400ft. Lovely to see the traffic jams at Mission bay as we pass bay on a lovely sunny afternoon.  Then a nice climb out on our way back to Tauranga. Total flight time 3 hours 59.