WHERE SEAGULLS DARE
BY STEVE WALLACE
SUPPLIED
A SHORT HISTORY OF FLYING ON THE WEST COAST This essay was written for the Aviation Sports Club’s 50 Year Celebration in 2016. I’m not sure exactly when, but I do clearly remember how the seeds of possibility, containing amazing and thrilling flying on the West Coast, were first sown in the fertile soils of my imagination. Pat Dreissen, one of NZ’s most talented glider pilots, wrote an excellent article for Gliding Kiwi recounting, what was to me, a wondrous flight. Towing out from Drury he described a day of fun, daring and excitement flying the coastal cliffs of Kariotahi before deftly negotiating with Air Traffic Control to facilitate a safe glide home. At the time, to me it was too far-fetched to even contemplate that I could ever do something as amazing as this. The seeds had however been planted and as my skills and confidence grew with time, what was once out of reach was all of a sudden just a small leap of faith away. My first tentative step into the lifting joys of the West Coast cliffs was on the 24th April 2000. I towed out from Hobsonville in my Mosquito (KT) into a 20 knot South West wind and was released somewhere a few bays south of Muriwai. I then spent just over an hour timidly picking my way a little north and a little south of my release point, carefully exploring the wonders of this new environment. All too soon though the feeling of being rather alone and out of contact with those
back at Hobby had me looking for a way home. Connecting with a thermal off the black dunes below, I drifted up the long valley behind Bethells Beach, popped over the ridge at the head of the valley and was greeted with the relieving sight of Hobsonville airfield, just a short 15 km downwind glide away. Four months later to check out the coast further south and emulate Pat’s flight, I towed out to the coast from Drury and flew the straight and friendly coastline between the Manukau Harbour and the Waikato River Mouth. The coastal flying was fun and easy but getting home to Drury not so. Drury is 35 km from Kariotahi and the airspace drops to 1,500’. I tried thermalling under it and did get a credible 20 km inland before having to plonk KT down in the school fields of Patumahoe Primary. You have to walk before you can run and step two was a nice eye opener to a coastline with expanding horizons. Thanks to John O’Hara the next flight was to be the big step. John, who was CFI at the time, was looking to incentivise crosscountry flying. John was the first and only ASC club member to have flown a 300 km Gold distance flight from Hobsonville. Kaikohe and back was the goal and many years had since passed; it was time for another ASC member to earn a Gold distance badge. So as an incentive John very generously put up a return trip for two to Sydney for the first person in the club to
repeat his feat and fly a 300 km flight from Hobby (soon to be Whenuapai). This was all I needed to focus my efforts and hatch a cunning plan to snare the prize. For three months I studied topographical maps of the West Coast, measured distances with a ruler and calculator, drove and walked to locations, plotted GPS points and studied the Sporting Code until I had come up with task that I felt sure could be flown and would get me my Gold distance. With the plan hatched, all I then had to do was wait for the weather. The weather did its thing on the 29th December 2001 and using my planned Sporting Code compliant turn points I flew 306 km at 145 kph to claim my Gold distance and the John O’Hara prize. One week later the weather again turned it on and I flew the same 306 km course but this time at 165 kph. These flights attracted the interest of serial entrepreneur, NZGA president and editor of Gliding Kiwi, John Roake who decided it would be a good idea to make and market a DVD to the world wide gliding community about flying on NZ’s West Coast. I teamed up with Bernie Massey and Murray Wardell from the Auckland Gliding Club along with a film crew and various others and we set about attaching mini cameras (before the days of Go Pros) all over the inside and outside of our gliders as well as hanging a big camera out the door of Drury’s second tow plane. We did six flights all up over an 11 month period, with two launches
