Byron Bay Trippin

Roberta and I are now back in NZ and are already planning our next next vacation. Hmmm.... We are dreaming about Japan, or Thailand, or maybe Vanuatu or Fiji. In the short term we will be coming back to the states in August to visit friends, go to a wedding, and be there for my dad's 60th birthday and retirement party.

Our trip to Australia was great. The security conference was a real eye opener (There is another post coming) and the trip down the east coast of Oz was great.

We start the vacation part by having Roberta's flight on Emirates Air from NZ to OZ canceled with no compensation. Normally the airline would offer some type of discounts on future travel but nope.

I picked Roberta up from the airport in Brisbane and we drove about 2.5 hours south to Byron Bay. Roberta wanted to stop and see Surfers' Paradise but I just told her to imagine Reno with a beach. We pulled into Byron Bay and were only planning on staying for a night or two but when we saw this cute little hippie town we decided to spend our whole vacation there. We would also highly recommend the Byron Central accommodations as they were reasonable priced, walking distance to everything, and nice. In the off season ask them for a deal on multiple nights.

The weather there was as close to perfect as you could get. Nice and warn during the day but not oppressive. The water was warm enough to swim in after a brief period of screaming like a school girl getting used to the temperature. The sand on the beaches reminded me of flour it was so fine.

Our first walk around town we noticed that there were almost more crystal shops than people. You could get all your fire spinning needs filled at a couple shops that only sold fire spinning goods.

And the restaurants.... Oh the restaurants.... We ate well. After leaving the states we haven't had high expectations for Mexican food but we decided to try the Mexican joint anyhow. It turned out to be as good if not better than most of the Mexican food in Portland. Oh great, I just made myself hungry thinking about it, time to cook some burritos.

We took a hike up to the lighthouse and saw two packs of dolphins swimming by. We were hoping to see whales but no luck. We had some extremely good ice cream up at the lighthouse also. Mmmm....

The next day we took a kayak trip into the ocean. I am glad that I did it as a guided tour as the waves started to pick up. We were out in the ocean rolling throw the waves in these tiny sit on top kayaks. Super fun. We didn't end up seeing any dolphins on that trip but it was fine since we got our dolphin fix the day before. On the paddle back in Roberta and I (in a two seater kayak) got to surf in the waves which was great fun.

Supposedly Byron Bay used to be a nice little community of alternative thinking people. Now it is more of an alternative tourist destination. At points it gave me the feeling of being in a hippie zoo. But hey, we were tourists and we hadn't seen real hippies in a while so it was refreshing. When the housing prices went up and all the ferals (crusty hippies) got kicked out they then took over a town called Nimbin up in the hills. We were going to go check it out but were told that the only redeeming feature of Nimbin is the ease of scoring drugs.

Instead we took a recommendation from a nice lady we met in Byron Bay to go to the Sunday market in Bangalow. We were expecting a couple dozen stands with some produce and hand made tile mirrors. We were shocked to see something that looked like a toned down version of the Oregon country fair. There were booths as far as they eye could see and they all had some cool stuff. Back on the topic of food, one booth had a sugar cane press and was making ginger/sugar cane juice. Roberta got this antique tin with a koala bear on it and I got a camphor wood cutting board. There was also this family band playing there that were absolutely amazing. It was this old hillbilly guy with 5 kids who all played a number of different instruments playing old timey songs. It was a little ego deflater in that these kids could rip it up harder than me and they were only 10.

On a side note, I am joining a band right now and are planning our first gig soon. We are a cross between Johny Cash and Pink Floyd.

After leaving the market our next destination was a glider field in Boohna which was closer to Brisbane. We got there and met some really nice glider folk and got to go up in their ASK 21M which is a large two seater self launch glider. We turned the motor off at 2000 AGL and then I took control and we thermalled up to about 6000'. We hauled ass all around the area for an hour and 16 minute flight. We only came down because Roberta was waiting on the ground to go up. She also had a great flight.

We spent the last night in Brisbane and flew out in the morning. Our Emirates flight back to Auckland was 45 minutes late which was the icing on the cake of never flying Emirates again. Air New Zealand is so much nicer in every way.

High,stinky, hot, and cold.

Roberta and I had the opportunity to take a week off from work and have a nice vacation. We started if off by heading down to Taupo which is about 4 hours south of Auckland. There is a "World Famous in NZ" glider field there that does week long training courses. Roberta was interested in going solo so this was perfect. When we got there the weather couldn't have been any better for gliding although it could have been a bit warmer in the mornings. Luckily we found a nice natural hot spring river that you could go sit in and bake.

We stayed in bunk rooms on the glider field for our time there and they were really nice. There was this Czechoslovakian guy named Dennis who had some sort of OCD which made him the perfect club mother. He was always running around making sure that everything was done just right and that everyone had what they needed.

I was expecting to go down there and do training myself in the two seaters with an instructor. We did one check flight and he oked me for flying in their PW5(single seater) which was a little scary as I only had about 5 solo flights in the PW5. It turned out nice because the thermals were booming the first couple days and I had a few really good flights.

I took a second check flight to get my ridge orientation. To fly on a ridge you use the up going wind that is striking a ridge face. That means that you need to fly really close to the ridge face, which at times can be fairly nerve wracking. After getting checked out on the ridge I spent two days carving out the corners and having a great time. It really teaches you control because if something goes wrong you don’t have much time to recover.

Roberta was able to get some really good compressed instruction on flying because the weather was so good. She had a number of hour long flights which leads to great instruction time. By the end of the camp she was doing the takeoffs and landings with little help from the instructor. With a couple more days she could have been solo.

The final day that we were supposed to fly there the weather packed in so we decided to head over to Rotorua which is know for its stinkyness due to geothermal activity. The good part about that is it also means there are a ton of hot springs. Roberta was to do the swimming portion of a half triathlon the following day so we just chilled out in Rotorua and did the tourist thing. We checked out out the Wai-o-tapu Thermal Wonderland which was really nice and stinky.

The following day we headed down to the lake where the triathlon was and Roberta and her team got mentally prepared.

Roberta started off the swimming portion in a pack of about 200 people.

If I was doing it I probably would have ran into the water and then scampered back out because of the temperature of the water. I am a cold water weenie though. Their team finished in a good time and everyone seemed to have fun.

It was a fun vacation and good to discover new parts of NZ.

Oh yeah, our cats are still cute.

Click here for more pictures of the trip

First Single Seat Glider Solo

Roberta has been getting on my case about posting to the blog so here it goes. I actually haven't been posting much because I have just been gliding on the weekends and not much else.

Gliding has been progressing nicely and last weekend I had my first solo flight in a single seat glider. On Saturday there was a national gliding awareness day called "The Big Day Up" where the public is encouraged to come out and give gliding a try. A lot of the club members came out and put their planes together for display and there was a lot of flying.

I talked to the CFI and got him to let me go solo in the club's Smyk PW5 which is a single seat glider. It has a really short wingspan and is a tiny glider all around. Supposedly it is like a race car compared to the Grob 103 Twin Astir that I had been flying.

All of the experienced guys on the field had been scarring the crap out of me with stories of how hard it was to take off with PIO(pilot induced oscillation). PIOs happen when you correct to get the glider on track but you over correct. Then when you correct for that correction you over correct. Then it just gets out of control. Each pilot told me different tricks to get over the PIOs in the PW5. Bracing my arms on the side of the plane, putting a finger on my wrist to steady it, trim it back for takeoff, just use two fingers on takeoff, stick hard back, etc.....

So I got mentally prepared for the flight and pushed the plane onto the runway and got in and waited my turn. This is always the time that I notice that I have to pee. One of the instructors came over and gave me a couple more words of advice and right before he left he said "And this plane crashes nice too".

With all the pilots and instructors from the club standing up watching, I did the takeoff and it was perfect. No problem. The lift was scratchy and I just got used to plane which was very quick and nice compared to the beast that I have been flying.

I came back in for a good landing and got cheers and handshakes from most of the pilots. Making the transition to the single seaters is big accomplishment for me. Now I just need to figure out how to keep the damn things in the air.

Roberta and I are going to Taupo down south for 5 days for concentrated gliding instruction. Roberta wants to get up to speed but doesn't want to spend the time waiting around at the glider field. I just want to get closer to getting my full glider pilot license. Should be fun to see that part of the country from the air.

Wish us luck.

First Glider Solo Flight

For the past 7 months I have been flying at the Auckland Aviation Sports Club which flies out of Whenuapai (Pronounced Fen-ew-uh-pie). Today I took my first solo flight which is a major achievement in my gliding career. Prior to 7 months ago I had no real concept of how to fly an airplane.

Today the instructor took me up for a check flight to make sure that I was ready to go up on my own. He didn't say a word on the flight which was a little strange. Usually the instructor is back there chatting away about one thing or another and I am constantly vocalizing my intentions of what I am doing. On this flight I was talking but getting no responses which was an odd feeling. I had to do everything right on my own without the typical confirmations.

I came in for a perfect textbook landing and we hopped out of the plane and he said that it was time to go solo. I strapped in and did all my pre-takeoff checks talking to myself. The takeoff went great and I released at 2000 feet. I flew around looking for some lift and found enough to keep me at 1700 feet for a few minutes but not enough to keep me up for an hour long first solo flight. I came in for the landing and stuck another perfect landing to much amazement of the people on the ground.

After that flight I couldn't stop smiling for an hour. What a great feeling to be completely in control of something so amazing and to see the months of work paying off.

The club is completely volunteer and people seem genuinely happy to be out there helping out. The aviation sector has a lot of die hard members, of which I am officially one now.

For any glider pilots out there, my first solo was in our Grob 103 Twin Astir since our Blanik is out of commission.

More South Island Pictures from June

Adam's sister, June, just posted some more pictures on her flicker account . They hit some different spots than Adam and I did.

Gliding at Matamata for Labour Day Weekend

As you all know Roberta and I have been learning to glide and were invited to take a trip to Matamata for Labour Day weekend to glide away from home our home field of Whenuapai.

The weather forecast was looking bad but everyone decided to go anyway. To transport the gliders you have to derig them by pulling the wings off and putting them on trailers. It is actually easier than it seems to pull them apart. Just pull a couple pins out and POP, the wings fall out.

One of the gliders was towed behind the towplane on the trip down. I volunteered to ride shotgun but one of the other students beat me to it. Luckily they went because the trip down to Matamata in the air sounded scary with low clouds and rain.

We got down to Matamata and started putting the planes back together. They are much harder to put together than to take apart. Especially the Grob Twin Astir. There were about eight of us working to get the wings on for about an hour. Luckily all of us were chiefs. Right before we gave up the wing clicked into place. We should have thought about giving up earlier.

In Matamata there is a huge ridge about 3kms from the gliding field and when the conditions are right you can head over there and fly all day. The conditions were not good that weekend. Most of the time you could barely see the ridge because of the clouds. Oh well, it was interesting trying to land on a small field with regular landmarks.

Roberta's first flight was devoted to loops and spins and stalls and such. The instructor took her up to 3k feet and tried to scare the crap out of her. It didn't work. Roberta is coming along with the flying, she will be doing the Aerotow next time she flies.

Here are some pictures of the weekend.
Clikc for pictures