G'day Coop,

That was a great write-up of a wonderful air show at, probably, the
world's best air show location. Sorry I missed you there, but there
were a lot of people in the Gold enclosure - and most seemed to be
wearing blue jackets ;-) Anyway, you seem to have had a ball.

We were on a package tour which stayed four nights in a pub in
Queenstown, then bussed to and from Wanaka each day. I went by
myself on Friday, and spent most of the day wandering around the
static exhibits and pausing whenever there was something interesting
flying. In spite of the cloud and a big hat I got a bit sunburned.

Next day my wife came with me. Good choice. It had rained most of
the night at Queenstown, and going to breakfast it was not only wet
but bloody cold! Fortunately the rain mostly cleared by Wanaka, but
it didn't get much warmer. We went straight to the Gold enclosure,
and stayed there until it was time to leave - my lady spent most of
the time in the marquee near a heater watching the show on CCTV, while
I watched the action from the 'paddock'. Perhaps she was the smart
one!

Fascinated by the Polikarpovs (which can be seen flying only in NZ),
and loved Jurgis Kairys and his Air Bandits, but the whole show was
very professional and entertaining. Was told that neither of the
Polikarpovs have wing-flaps, so their landing speeds are quite high.
Also, the monoplane (the first one built) has no hydraulics so the
gear has to be wound up by hand, and the handle is so low that you
can't see where you're going while using it! Flying those would be
something of an adventure.

On the way back to Christchurch we stopped at Mount Cook where some of
us flew to the top for a glacier landing in a Pilatus Porter. It was
a beautiful sunny afternoon with almost no wind, so we were able to
fly between and around the peaks without any turbulence. One of the
best flights I have ever had. The following day we spent a couple of
hours at the Wigram RNZAF Museum - wonderful displays, and rather
similar to the RAAF Museum at Point Cook.

Altogether, a great trip. However, I discovered that my Panasonic
DMC-FZ20 is hopeless for taking airborne photos at airshows. You
really need a good optical viewfinder, and preferably an SLR. The
digital viewfinder in my camera just does not cut it.

Mike