Post by phil82 on Jan 20, 2013 17:20:11 GMT 12
Right, so what did we see? Sam and I intended to go to the Friday Afternoon rehearsals, and did in fact, but first drove up to Mount Victoria in Wellington after learning of the Mosquito fly-past at lunchtime. The run in to the airport from the Newtown side was spectacularly complete by a very hard right-hand turn down the runway out to Island Bay! The Tower then gave the all clear for a reverse run, and he came back very low and very fast!
The drive over the hill was relatively painless with light traffic, but the weather on arrival at the show was not the best. A cold southerly and a couple of heavy showers which passed as quickly as they arrived. Still a good-sized crowd there.
Parking was well organised by the Rotarians and others, except for leaving after the show on Saturday, when they blocked an exit for no obvious reason, which one organise said "you can't go out that way" . He then disappeared! As no one was going out anywhere, one young guy went down the track and found, as we had guessed , there was absolutely no reason it couldn't be used, so he removed the barriers and we all left!
As Zac observed, the free grandstands were excellent, and well-used on a hot day. I thought the commentary team were excellent,professional,and well-informed and knew when to shut up! I didn't miss Jim Hickey at all because he has a tendency to burble on about nothing much in particular, and the last time I heard him he was blatantly sexist!
The Venom can't land at Masterton , so was based at Ohakea, so Sean Perrett had to shoot over there in the RNZAF Harvard, leap out, and into the Venom, and return! Brilliant!
It was great to meet up with some of the posters here in the pub afterwards, although our stay was short.
All in all, two excellent days, and I'm so glad I've ordered one of the HAFU DVD's because the final display by the Mosquito was absolutely stunning.
One of the best moments was at the end of the Seasprite display, when it was announced he would do a "bow to the audience" which he did, and as he tilted forward the undercarriage briefly lowered and raised like a pair of arms accepting the applause. Briiliant!
The drive over the hill was relatively painless with light traffic, but the weather on arrival at the show was not the best. A cold southerly and a couple of heavy showers which passed as quickly as they arrived. Still a good-sized crowd there.
Parking was well organised by the Rotarians and others, except for leaving after the show on Saturday, when they blocked an exit for no obvious reason, which one organise said "you can't go out that way" . He then disappeared! As no one was going out anywhere, one young guy went down the track and found, as we had guessed , there was absolutely no reason it couldn't be used, so he removed the barriers and we all left!
As Zac observed, the free grandstands were excellent, and well-used on a hot day. I thought the commentary team were excellent,professional,and well-informed and knew when to shut up! I didn't miss Jim Hickey at all because he has a tendency to burble on about nothing much in particular, and the last time I heard him he was blatantly sexist!
The Venom can't land at Masterton , so was based at Ohakea, so Sean Perrett had to shoot over there in the RNZAF Harvard, leap out, and into the Venom, and return! Brilliant!
It was great to meet up with some of the posters here in the pub afterwards, although our stay was short.
All in all, two excellent days, and I'm so glad I've ordered one of the HAFU DVD's because the final display by the Mosquito was absolutely stunning.
One of the best moments was at the end of the Seasprite display, when it was announced he would do a "bow to the audience" which he did, and as he tilted forward the undercarriage briefly lowered and raised like a pair of arms accepting the applause. Briiliant!
