The first tour of duty is nearly done...

Hello again everyone,

It’s been a little while since we’ve been able to write, the reasons being two-fold: The move down to Hamilton was rather hectic and our subsequent internet connection has been extremely erratic, and in order to get to the end of the flying programme, Ben has been scheduled for at least 2 hours flying per day for the last few weeks…

Two hours might not sound much, but each flight can take that long again just to plan, and the weather initially meant that we were often spending all that time and then not being able to go anyway! That said, Ben managed about 24 hours flying in about four weeks, which was double that achieved in the previous month. He’s now got almost 87 hours total time, with 47 being solo time, which is about right for this point on the course. The shorter period when we return will prove rather tricky to complete everything on time, but we can worry about that later!

Nomes has been busy too – she’s just finished her final stint of nights in her present job, which was a relief, and the previous few weeks’ work went fairly well. It’s been a pain living apart, however, and something that we really didn’t want to end up doing relatively soon after being married. Nomes has been able to do a little extra studying in the evenings, but is still dreading her exam in March.

We went flying together for the first time last Saturday; a quick 340 miles around the North Island, from Hamilton to Pauanui Beach, then Tauranga, Whakatane, Taupo, Mt Ruapehu and back to Hamilton. We landed (extremely smoothly) 4 times and Nomes even enjoyed it!, though she felt really knackered following her nights’ work the week before. It was a good way for Ben to complete his flying out here, and the weather was reasonable, if not brilliant. Some photos will follow in a week or so, but here's a map of the route at least…



Anyway, that’s us for now. We’re off on holiday for the next week, winding our way down to Wellington and back, and staying with some family friends of Nomes when we get there.

Hope that everyone who reads this is well – Ben’s back in the UK next Tuesday (16th November) so will see some of you then. Nomes arrives back on the 30th, so you’ll have to wait a bit longer for sensible conversation.

Much love,

Benj and Nomes.

Can it rain anymore?

Hello again and another welcome from Aotearoa (The Maori name for NZ which means “land of the long white cloud” or “land of long daylight”, depending on what you read). They might have been better naming it the land of the long wet springtime, but who knows?

We’ve had another week with lots going on - building up to moving to Hamilton for Ben and into basic hospital accommodation for Nomes. All the lads move today (Thursday), but Ben’s going down tomorrow after Nomes has settled into her new place. They’re moving to a converted electrical warehouse – classy!

Flying has seemed a bit sparse, but Ben ended up doing five flights last week or so, which was actually as good as it gets. One of them was his first night lesson, which was good; it’s much smoother at night apart from all the pretty lights, which was a great relief following days of blustery spring weather. He’s done solo Navigation flights that are getting on 200 miles long, so he’s slowly becoming useful to someone in terms of distances covered, though Easyjet will probably want him to go more than 200 miles... It’s one thing to build up the aircraft handling skills for the basic PPL test, but another to bring them together when travelling to new airports. The great thing about these flights is being able to see more of the amazing NZ countryside. Hopefully it won’t be long before Nomes can come along too.

We celebrated Nomes' birthday on Sunday. We all went into Auckland and saw “Saturday Night Fever”, followed by an Italian meal on the water front. All good fun, and a chance for us to go out as a whole group ahead of the move. Nomes is going out tomorrow tonight with a charity called “Streetreach” which does similar work to “One25” that she’s been involved with in Bristol. Due to her time commitments, it’s not going to be a regular thing, but it will be interesting for her to see another church’s approach to helping those trapped in prostitution.

Here's all of us on Nomes' birthday night.
Sash, Rob, Ben, Dan, Jez, Tom, Nomes, James and Col

Right, that’s our news for another little while. Not sure how long it will be before the next instalment, due to uncertain internet connections in our new dwellings.

Love to you all, and thanks to those who sent us emails recently – it’s great to hear from you.

We're moving...

Well - another eventful week. After a last-minute meeting being called on Thursday, Ben was informed that the entire pilot training venture, including accomodation, is to be moved an hour and a half south down the motorway, from the outskirts of Auckland to Hamilton.



We already knew that this was in the pipeline, but what we hadn't expected was the urgency - we're going in 3 weeks' time!

The airport there is better equipped in most respects for the kind of training that he needs, but there are a few issues. The biggest problem is that Nomes can't go - she thinks its better to remain with her current job, until it's over. This means that Ben will be there for approximately one month on his own, and Nomes will remain in Auckland for just short of two months whilst she completes her medical mission.

It's all a bit of a hassle, but such is life sometimes. Nobody's certain that the move itself will go smoothly - 50 lads all moving at the same time plus an entire flying school of a dozen aircraft - all over one weekend seems a tall order to make work at such short notice.

Otherwise - things are ok. Nomes has recovered from her flu and the weather's on the up. And we've both got the weekend off!

News summary

Hello again,

8.38am on Tuesday September 14th. So we’ve been down here for 3½ months now – doesn’t time fly? Ha ha. Talking of which, Ben’s got his NZ private pilot’s licence and is about to start the navigational stage of flying. He’s accumulated about 47 hours thus far, but that’s set to double over the next few weeks, as the focus changes from short flights focussing on manoeuvres to longer excursions, simply getting from A to B around New Zealand. May get some decent pictures for the gallery…

Nomes preservers with hospital work – she’s again had a busy shift pattern since being here, and that combined with Ben’s erratic schedule has meant quality time is often at a premium. Also, she’s had grotty flu last week, and is still not fully back to strength. However, her surgical experience with caesarean sections and the like has increased a fair bit, and her experiences have made her feel that she’s treading the right path at the moment.

We live with a great bunch of seven other lads – and Nomes is often mum, making a large selection of muffins and cakes that last about 39 seconds from green light to final crumb. It’s community living of a different style to that that we’ve seen in Bristol, but fun nonetheless. When study for airline theory exams gets too much (as it often does) there’s been a vast selection of DVDs to distract – Ben’s even watched a few…


A cloudy spring day in September - looking over towards the hills to the south

New Zealand is a good place to be in so many ways. We’ve found it so simple to do lots of things – it’s an easy place to come and live in. There’s so much to do and see if you like outdoors things, and the standard of food when eating out is always really good, especially given that its lots cheaper than the UK. We’ve not done as much as we’d hoped to though, which is frustrating given that it’s such a long way to come, but we’ve had a few good times exploring, as you’ll see from the gallery.

It’s been tough to do anything that isn’t work related for either of us; that means aeroplanes and hospital things are always on the mind. The one breather that we get most weeks is church on Sunday evenings. We’ve found a place up in Auckland which is similar in some ways to Woodies back in Bristol. The guy who heads it up has a real heart for family and sharing God’s love, and he has a strong prophetic edge. We’ve made a good friend there through a Bristol contact, which has been a real blessing too.

So there we have it – the Smiths in an abbreviated nutshell. Hopefully, now we’ve got up to speed with the technology, we’ll put a few more shorter posts giving snippets of life, but we thought a general summary would be good to get the ball rolling…

Missing you all back home!

Our first news from Down Under

This is still very much experimental, since its taken me fifty thousand attempts to remember what the passwords were to even use the service, but here's a quick hello from a sunny New Zealand day in September.

Spring is now on the way, and it feels good, having missed out on summer! Nomes is at work, and I should be studying, but somehow cannot get myself motivated to look at Meteorology for the zillionth time.

We'll write a proper summary ASAP!

Testing with David Jeanneret

Saturday before our adventure begins...