As it was over 90 here today, your pictures are especially cool, pun intended.

Dropped into meet a friend at the river. The perfect winter weather continues.

You're having way too much fun! ...still not much real backcountry in my area of the world.

Hey Ty,
Looks to me like you still have more than your fair share too!

We try to make the most - cold this time of year though!

Battson wrote:

cool pic Battson

Outstanding photo! ...and you've confused the east and west ends of the U.S. If there are no weather delays, it would take me 2 days each way to reach good backcountry flying. Herr in the east, we have good backyard flying, but not much backcountry.

That night photo IS amazing!
This thread is amazing and inspiring. The flying in your country looks like a blast. Any idea if there difficult logistics for Americans flying there?
Or better yet what about an American plane shipped and flown there on an extended vacation?

Wow X4 bout those pics especially the night shot, truly a beautiful Bearhawk in its natural habitat!!!

Loving this thread, Battson! Beautiful pictures. What a cool place to fly!

Awesome night shot!

So how do I set up my desk top to alternate between Pat Fagan's Bearhawk and this 300 hp monster? This is the Bearhawk with the Barrett IO 540?
Mark M.

Thanks for the comments guys!

Our machine isn't the one yellow running the 330hp Barrett Lycoming IO-540-XP, that was build by Mike Araldi but has since changed hands. We're using a 260hp Lycoming Titan IO-540-EXP. It was tempting to install the 8.50:1 compression cylinders for 290hp, but I didn't like the reduced TBO.

Anyway, enough talk. Here's a few more snaps:

Flying over the ice-lake.


Short clip of landing, with a bounce


Getting set to leave camp for a hike up to see the ice.


Ice looked about 8" thick I guess.


Stopped for a look in a new place on the way.


Flying home over the Marlborough Sounds.


Ended up being 7.5hrs flying, all said and done, a good weekend

Battson wrote:Ice looked about 8" thick I guess.

Great pics Jonathan, but this one brought back a memory. 1989 was the coldest winter in recorded history in east Texas (where we lived at the time). Stayed below freezing for something like two weeks which froze everything, including all the pipes in the house. Anyway, a couple acre lake also froze. I decided it would be a cool idea to walk across it. I carefully slid my feet and inched my way across the lake. I could see turtles and fish swimming around beneath me as the ice cracked the entire way. Darwin was kind to me that day.

Battson wrote:Short clip of landing, with a bounce

Nice video! But sorry, that was no bounce. If you want to see a real bounce, let me know and we'll talk.

Another venture to a riverbed. This was probably the narrowest spot I've landed so far. It's definitely more fun finding new challenges.

Checked out another couple of spots this weekend.

Reasonably short and steep uphill airstrip, the pad on the top looks quite small at 60kts. Had to get the braking just right:

​

Gradually building up to bigger rocks, still at 14psi with bead lockers (no slippage).
Managed to catch a flying stone with the trailing edge of the rudder and elevator, two in one! So that'll be another small patch job.
​

Sorry about the random photo sizes, sometimes all I have is a phone for a camera.










This is a neat little spot, there was some pig rooting at the halfway mark of the airstrip - I rolled the wheels over it, and decided the land on the western 300ft to ensure we didn't get any trouble from the rough surface.

The surface looks great from the air, but you can see the depth of the "bumps" where the port side tire has disappeared into a deep hole where I turned around and got a little off to one side... it took 2000 RPM to pull it out of said hole.

Keeping the BH working hard. Hope you guys enjoy the video, lots of gunning the engine & no music:

Battson wrote:........Gradually building up to bigger rocks, still at 14psi with bead lockers (no slippage).
........

From this comment & your photos, I assume you're running 26" Goodyears? How abut a description and/or photo of your "bead lockers"? Thanks.

Your thread is making me re-think my trip to Australia, great looking countryside in NZ.