My First Flight

At the age of fifteen I started off on an adventure with my girlfriend. We travelled from Dunedin to Hastings to stay with an aunt and to subsidise our expenses with strawberry picking. We started North by the usual means – train to Christchurch-Lyttleton, overnight ferry to Wellington and Newman’s bus through Manawatu and the gorge to Hawkes Bay, an educational trip for us both. We made quite a lot of money it seemed to us at the time. Strawberry picking for half a day and having fun for the rest of the time, meant six weeks went swiftly by. Now it was time to return, and my aunt said “you must fly home. Flying is the only way to travel. It is so glamorous!” So we altered our tickets, and paid the extra money - $5 [£5 ed] I recall. We were excited.

The day dawned beautifully, sunny and warm. Before heading out to Napier Airport we had a last minute local treat – maple ice cream, our favourite! The DC3 took off, and as we made our way across the hills to Paraparaumu I was sick, “Don’t think much about flying, what’s so wonderful about this” was all I could think of. At Paraparaumu the winds were howling and the airport closed. We were indefinitely delayed. Just as it was getting dark the wind dropped so we took off for Christchurch.

On landing later in the evening we were told the flight had been cancelled. If we could find our own accommodation the flight would resume in the morning. The alternative was to be bussed to Dunedin. So we had a very uncomfortable ride, it seemed to take forever and we had no sleep. We arrived at 7am exhausted and very disillusioned about the ease and speed of flying.

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