Originally Posted by
zoovet
And going back even further, flights on the old NAC DC3s. They had a cruising altitude of just 8000 feet so a window seat gave great views of the country-side below. Also because they used a tail wheel while sitting on the tarmac there was quite a steep walk to get to your seat, as they had a similar rear entrance to the present ATRs. Several years later I was flying from Auckland to Queenstown, and the flight route included a CHC - Mt Cook - ZQN sector. Once in the Southern Alps the flight flew down the Murchison Glacier to the Tasman Glacier before arriving at Mt Cook. A beautiful scenic flight on a fine winter's day.
My wife and I also traveled to Rarotonga in 1970 to visit expat friends there before they had an international airport. We flew to Nadi in an AirNZ DC8 and then flew to Rarotonga via Pago Pago in a small turbo-prop plane. The whole journey took about 15 hours!
Reminds me - I took the first CHC-MON-ZQN flight when they reinstated it for a trial season back in December 2012 (actually unknowingly during the flight with a fellow FTer who has commented on this thread!) - wow, what an experience being in an ATR 72 into MON! To this day, it remains my favourite and most scenic approach and departure - I guess the ATR isn't capable of doing the glacier approach - we approached and departed over Lake Pukaki. We got extremely lucky with the weather.