The Home of CP16

One week left!

We now only have one week left in New Zealand and each of us have between 4 and 7 flights left to complete. The last week is going to be busy, lets hope that the aircraft don't break down. We now all have our JAR Multi Engine PPLs, and have completed all of the simulator sessions for this stage of the training. The last 8 flights in New Zealand are flown in the Seminole, consolidating the skills learnt in the simulator and at last, we can now fly through cloud! Winter has arrived in New Zealand, it was a cool minus 2 degrees this morning at 6:30am and all of the aircraft needed deicing before flying :-(

We get back to the UK on Wednesday 4th May. See you soon!

Official Opening of the CTC Crew Training Centre - Hamilton

Today was the Official Opening of the new training centre. Work on the building and surrounding area was finished just in time for the opening with some workers adding the finishing touch only a few hours before. We were all involved in the days proceedings to some degree, although John managed to miss the latter half of the day due to a doctor's appointment for a 'ear, nose and throat infection'. The opening ceremony went smoothly, despite half of the speeches being in Maori and no one being able to hear the translator. The rest of the afternoon was spent, chatting to the guests and helping with the running of pleasure flights for anyone who dared step in a plane with Dave Woodington, Matt Skilton or Peter Wheeler, some of our best instructors ;-) Nik welcomed the guests at check-in, but didn't charge a single cent in excess baggage, lucky he's not working for Ryanair! Morgan, Andy, Phil and Tony corralled the guests and made sure no-one missed their flight... except for a couple at the start where Tony managed to get the first three people lost on an apron with only three Seminoles about ten yards from the main doors... (For future reference, Tango is the one with 'T' on the side, Papa is the one with 'P' on the side and Victor is the one that's falling apart...) All in all, an enjoyable day. Back to work as normal on Monday.

Jazz in Tauranga

On the Saturday of Easter weekend, Nik, Andy, Tony and John finally decided they were sick to death of RAF Peachgrove, so they jumped in a car and headed to the East coast (although when originally asked, Tony thought we were bound for the petrol station). The plan was simple: drive to Tauranga, rent an apartment for the night and spend the day kayaking/swimming in the sea, then hit the town at night. Due to lack of advanced planning, we did not realise until we arrived in Tauranga that the largest Jazz Festival in the Southern Hemisphere was taking place over Easter weekend and there was no accommodation available; forget the exclusive designer apartment, we couldn't even get a 1* flea infested motel room!

As the kayak rental dude packed up shop for the day, we buzzed around the Mt Maunganui area looking for a parking space and couldn't help but feel that our expedition was becoming more ill-fated by the moment....at last a space was found, we changed into our swimwear and bounded towards the vast pacific ocean. We negotiated some ten-foot waves and a moderate undercurrent before heading inland for food and beer.

We sat listening to Dude and the Dudesters (CP16 are huge jazz fans, as you can tell) playing live jazz while we tucked into our gourmet meals and we felt as if we were on holiday; a feeling we had never experienced in NZ! The atmosphere was vibrant, with no shortage of sneaky photo opportunities (courtesy of Andy, as Tony's camera batteries were inexplicably not charged). As the sun set, we considered our options: a) get trashed in Tauranga and sleep in the car or b) drive back to Hamilton and try to avoid the other cadets in town (to preserve the holiday ambiance). The sensible choice saw us back in Hamilton and out dining in the finest thai restaurant in the Waikato. The meal was fantastic, the waitress was gorgeous - at least we had some consolation for being back in Hamilton that night. A good time was had by all and the next time we go to Tauranga, we'll book the luxury aparment a few weeks in advance.