Air NZ's new A320 livery and flying comps!

Today was a chance to see Air New Zealand's latest [and I understand, "permanent"] livery on the first aircraft to carry it - an Airbus A320-232, ZK-OXB.

The aircraft has only been flying in this livery for a couple of days, so this is one of its early visits in this livery*.

In other news, I'll be competing in the Flying NZ regional competitions in late November. Like past years, this will be the PPL Low Flying competition, so it's time to start practicing hard! Expect to hear more on this over the next few weeks!

* post updated to reflect that this was not the first visit of the aircraft. For more photos look at the MRC Aviation Blog

A Cessna 650 is parked up at Wellington

Today's picture is of a Cessna 650, N163JM, parked up at Wellington on the western apron apron outside the Execujet hanger [not in view in this picture...!].

Gulfstream American GA7

Here are two more photos of the Gulfstream American GA7, ZK-CGR, which is registered to a Wellington address.

Local flight to Palliser Bay and Castlepoint

Yesterday the weather was fantastic, today not quite so good. Today was windier but it was good enough today that I could go for a local flight to Palliser Bay and around to Castlepoint with Megan and Matiu along for the ride. Today's aircraft was the Aero Club's Piper PA28-161, ZK-MBG.

We had a brisk southerly, but that was no problem since we were able to stay south of most hills and so missed the bumps. This was a big bonus because the only sick bags on board were clear plastic bags, and I was not wanting to see any stomach contents... In the end nobody needed to use one of the bags, so that's a good result :-)

I didn't take any photos of the flight, but Megan has kindly sent me some of hers. The first is a certain cool dude, all suited up in a lifejacket and about to get on board, approaching Turakirae Head on the way back and lastly, big smiles at the end of the flight!

BTW - best question of the day... "Do we have parachutes?". Sorry, but no...

An awesome day... so I'm flying tomorrow :-)

Despite the weather being the best in a long time, I didn't go flying today, but I am getting up and about tomorrow; at least the weather looks nice enough and if it's as good as it has been today, it'll be fantastic :-)

Not exactly sure where I'll go, but I might pop up for a look at Kapiti Island or back across to the Marlborough Sounds for a look at some of the areas I missed last weekend... we'll see. Hopefully I'll have someone along for the ride, but we'll see.

Anyway, here are today's photos. First up are a Piper PA31, ZK-MJF, registered to the Taranaki Air Ambulance Trust and a Diamond DA42, ZK-CTH, registered to CTC Aviation Training of Hamilton.

Next up are the airliners. Top to bottom we have:

Airbus A320-232, ZK-OJC of Air New Zealand
Boeing 737-8FE, ZK-PBJ, of Virgin Australia Airlines (NZ)
Airbus A320-232, VH-VQC, of Jetstar Airways

Flight over the Marlborough Sounds

I went for a nice scenic flight over part of the Marlborough Sounds today. You'll see from the photos that the weather looked awesome, although with the gentle breeze around, there was a bit of turbulence at times. all fun though - nothing too jarring.

The photos sum it up pretty nicely... I'm sure you will agree that it's an incredibly scenic part of the country and it's one I always enjoy flying over. Top to bottom we have:

Most of the eastern shoreline of Awatapu Island
Northern part of Awatapu Iasland looking south-west towards Queen Charlotte Sound
Queen Charlotte Sound looking towards Picton
[Foreground left to right] Awatapu Island, Long Island, Motuara Island looking south-west
Southern portion of of Port Gore
Airstrip in Port Gore
Looking east towards Wellington on the Sinclair Arrival procedure