But Mother Nature was to have the last say. This pic shows the very nice conditions at Ardmore on departure at 1030 after all the fog had burnt off:
This pic shows the conditions around Paeroa and Te Aroha as we approached the Coromandel/Kaimai's:
:(
One big U-Turn and a city scenic later (Pics available here and here), and we landed back at Ardmore around 1230 a bit bummed that we had not made it to Tauranga.
One of the pax was kind enough to video the landing... thankfully he warned me he was recording, so I made sure it was a good one... note the stall warning light that flashes right on touchdown ;)
And then, to rub salt into the wound, around 1600 while I was hanging around at the clubrooms, I saw a Bayflight 152 (KID) do a Touch and Go at Ardmore... so the cloud had obviously cleared...
Still, not a total loss, I got to go flying (which is always a good thing!), and the guys seemed to have a good time. We, the Auckland based crew, have decided that next time we have a meet, it will either be in summer, or in Auckland!
This flight: 2.0 PinC
Total Hours: 129.9 (78.9/39.7 Day, 4.9/6.4 Night, 5.1 IFR)
6 comments:
No luck trying the Waihi Gap?
Unfortunately not... I was at about 900', hugging the bottom of the cloud and looking towards the gap, the lowest terrain I could see was about level with the aircraft!
Next time, I might try the Colville Gap towards the northen tip of the peninsula... a bit of roundabout trip up and back down the peninsula, but worth a shot.
Funny, I tried to get from HN to TG and ran into the same wall of cloud! I tried climbing and gave up at 3500... So I also turned round and did a scenic over the city (well, the city I live in, at least)
What time were you over that way? I saw a few aircraft buzzing around...
The only reason why I didn't bother trying to climb over it was that I had been cruising up the firth at around 3000' and already knew it was too high to try that :)
Just watched the video - nice landing, very smooth!
I should put the com traffic on speaker when I am filming landings but I always forget to do it.
I must remember to ask Andrew how he got the comm traffic... I think he must have plugged the cam into the intercom somehow... coz I am pretty sure I did not have it on speaker!
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