Stillwater

Happy Birthday Iain. Without you this forum would not be the same.

I will start in Lonnie, go the west and end in Hobart. I have done the East and North already in previous years.

Thanks for the comment - and enjoy the memories of this great track!

Thank you Graeme. You know what we are talking about in these pictures... Thanks Gumby. Definetively worth a trip, and just a "short" one this is from your island!

Thank you Iain! Thanks a lot, Ken. Indeed a fantastic place, Wayne. The scenery in the sim was already great in FSX, good enough to prepare for the RL trip. In MSFS there is even more to enjoy!

It is time to continue my trip report Warning: Not much flight action in this post! After arriving in Milford Sound we took a walk around the village. The first place for a simmer (and probably for many other visitors as well) is the famous airport. Sure we spotted a number of planes going in and out - all within a few minutes. The scenery has lots of details, I can´t show them all here, ... ... because we went along the peninsula a bit further to Roscos Kajaks. And surely we enjoyed the views of Bowen Falls. We took a boat to Sandfly Point, the end of the Milford Track - hard to spot in the RL photo, but there it is! - ... ... and walked until Giant Gates. The last day in Milford we took a ride on this boat... ... getting close to Stirling Falls. Finally we relaxed on THE bench at the mole, ... ... you may spot her in the center of this picture as well. There should be some more flying in the next post, I propose.

.. there was no GPS and you had to navigate with maps & brain?

Great picture, and keep us updated on his career, Graeme. Eventually he will end up as "airport", I mean "delay" manager one day! And his knees have shown another proof why the 737 is outdated meanwhile...

Happy Birthday Friedi - long time no read from you…

I would „guess“ 787, if that easy guess was meant…

Good suggestion Andy. Booking via Orbxtours is the way. Well, in my next business trip I will use at least 4 Orbx-sold airports, and pass an old classic on the road. I must take some pictures…

Happy Birthday Jean Marc! Let me add I love your posted stories.

No need to invite me, I will give you notice when I know the schedule that is prepared for my visit 😉!

The Stillwater restaurant is a place to go. I will be there in March, be it invited or on my own!

Extreme for me was last Summer in the mediterranean area: 35-39°C and more than 90% RH. I have been in the tropics and India, and experienced the same, but here we were talking about Europe...

I was reading this thread while sitting in an Italian restaurant - about 3 minutes walking distance from our home - that we visit every week since the pandemic (in that time we collected at least one Pizza/week from them). It is more an extended living room that a restaurant for us, and so we celebrated the Chef´s 60th birthday last year as well as the birth of his 11th grandchild last week. But the children need to grow up faster, as they are lacking personnel as well. In addition there is a second Italian restaurant just 50 m away from the other which we also visit nearly once a week. They have the advantage of opening time on Sunday, giving us another option. Good that the distances are so short, no need to wear gloves or a scarf these days.

That is what I initially thought as well, but the seconds were moving in a pleasant way... 😉 Thanks for commenting, Wayne!

Looks like a good morning, indeed!

Thank you John. Good to learn there are fantastic places like these on the Northen hemisphere as well. Thank you Carlos. I can´t keep on with your virtual travels, but I try in real... 😉 Thanks Timmo. I would not be surprised if you have been in that area already. Merci Jean Marc. Hard to beat Usuhaia, at least not when you keep the polar region undisturbed 😎!

Happy Birthday from Germany, Ken!

As a German I have to say we Europeans sit in the same glasshouse.

I forgot to add the driven / flown map:

I have to second / third Ken as well: What an outstanding idea and fun this exam is! But oh so difficult... Let me try. MATHEMATICS: which formulas do not add up to three? That is easy for me: I took my bike and within half an hour I was at the mentioned Racecourse. Nothing happened there (maybe due to the snowy weather), so this did not add up to 3. BIOLOGY: which creatures have four legs? Easy as well. See the picture I took in Kruger park 16 months ago: PHYSICS: answer the following foundational physics questions. 1. Can electrostatic electricity zap you if you rub a wool duck? I would guess: Yes. 2. How many atoms are not enough to fill a hungry Welshman? To fill a hungry Welshman I assume you need a pie of about 750 gramm (don´t know which crazy non-metric units they use in Wales currently). Saying most of this is Carbon, Oxygen, Nitrogen and Hydrogen we use an average molar weight of the pie of 14. This makes 53 moles of the mentined atoms. As you know, a mole is 6 *10exp23 atoms. 3. Will wave optics ever reach the top ten? Not as long as the Stones keep on releasing records. CHEMISTRY: which of the following are used in chemistry experiments? 2. Beakers, test tubes, and Bunsen burners. Take the proof from this 1970 science magazin: LANGUAGE: which of the following are not parts of speech. This answer may be offending to some, so I skip the question. HISTORY: which of the following is actually true? 2, to my knowledge. The genocide done by the british was completed about 150 years ago, the last survivors being Truganini and Fanny Cochrane Smith. Have to say so. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truganini

As many of you will remember, one catecory of sim flights I do is re-flying trips that I have done in real life. Posting screenshots from these flights, I often added some real life-photos. This has become more challenging in the last years, due to two reasons: With MSFS not many sceneries cover the Orbx forum rule "must contain scenery made or sold by Orbx", so these can´t be posted as I did in the past on the Orbx forum. Over the past two years about half of the guys that used to post and comment moved to the AVSIM forum, and half stayed at Orbx. Now that some more attractive payware sceneries have been established, I will try to take up my documentation practice again - let´s see if I can manage it. Last February we travelled with some long-distance night flights to New Zealand, overcoming our jetlag and starting our tour in Queenstown. We went down to the southernmost point on the planet I have been until now: Mossburn, ... ... had late breakfast in Te Anau, ... ... before driving up the Eglington valley. Via Mirror Lakes ... ... to Lake Gunn (the one left below). Followed the road to Homer tunnel. As some of you may know, this is a single-lane tunnel only, so you have to wait before you may pass. Guides say this can take up to 30 minutes in high season. Even with a car it is quite a steep way down from there to the valley. But with a plane this is even more challenging. The routined pilot can do it, before turning into final over the famous sound. We stayed in Milford Sound Lodge, a place that was finally added to the scenery with the area pack. An area we will explore on the follwoting days in more detail.

A nice departure in cool-looking weather, Carlos. I had similar views with 35+°C last summer, showing your shot #6 is really accurate: