From Tauranga it takes less than thirty minutes to fly over the Kaimai hills to the wide open pastures of the Waikato valley, a spectacular experience which always reminds me of the drop down into the Rift Valley in Kenya.   Matamata airfield is some 5 miles from the bottom of the escarpment and boasts a pair of large flat runways ideal for early solo flying.

Last Saturday, April 18th, we enjoyed near perfect conditions and Brian Murphy flew me across in the Eagle to meet up with Steve Holmes from Auckland and Hub Hall from Pukeatua .   Steve has a microlight licence and is consolidating his experience on his single seat Dominator, we started with some circuit practice before heading off on a small formation cross-country.  

Hub Hall has a Deer Farm and by the removal of a paddock fence he has created a small airstrip which needed to be assessed for gyro suitability.  With Hub navigating and flying the Eagle and Steve tagging along at a safe distance we enjoyed a magic afternoon.  The weather was perfect with almost no wind so we did a practice landing on a neighbour’s strip which is somewhat more established but quite undulating.  Beautiful place, must go back when someone is at home!  Pressing on we arrived at the Deer Farm and positioned the Eagle for an approach to a flat strip with a major hazard at one end.  Electric cables cross the threshold at the Western end which could literally catch the unwary!  However anyone briefed on the field should have no problem (subject to due caution and weather) as Steve demonstrated just behind us.  We departed and overflew Richard Main’s property looking for a sight of his single-seat Sportcopter which is nearing completion.  Hopefully it will be at Tauranga for flight test and approval in the next few weeks.  Back at Matamata we did a crew change and Brian flew me back across the hills practicing his ‘zone entry’ radio calls and sounding quite professional. 

Next day it was back to Matamata to show the general public the wonders of a gyroplane as part of a small gathering to promote the airfield and its varied activities.  Another great day with some five Tiger Moths and a scale Mustang not to mention great aerobatics from gliders and numerous Skydivers dropping in.  Shame the weather then closed in and aircraft from all over the Waikato arrived to take shelter from rain and wind.  It was Tuesday before I could rescue the Eagle.  

 Sue and I have been offered the use of an apartment on the Gold Coast for a week.  The rain is lashing at the windows as I write so I need little persuasion, see you all after the 5th May!!  Watch this space for a comparative review of Jetstar and Pacific Blue.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 26th, 2009 at 11:59 pm and is filed under Gyrate Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.