The Hawke’s Bay and East Coast Aero Club at Hastings Airfield held their Christmas Party this evening. We took Max along and a salad for the dinner.

Santa flew over in Jan and Jerry Chisum’s Gipsy Moth and dropped lollies near the clubhouse for the children to pick up.

Look out for the reindeer on the struts between the wings.

Santa landing.

You think going down a chimney’s hard enough….?!

Jan moving the plane round to give a better view of Santa’s sleigh.

Noel and Max.

Jan introduced us to Roland Norman, son of Desmond Norman who co-founded the Britten-Norman aviation company and nephew of Sir Torquil Norman, whom Jan and Jerry know as he is an aviation enthusiast. Roland is now a winemaker in NZ.

Noel swung the prop for Jan when she moved the plane.

It’s bad form to simply taxi it over to her hangar so one circuit is flown first with a long landing to minimise the taxi 🙂

Almost at her hangar, with the Minicab in the background.

The dinner was very convivial and relaxed.

While helping dry up the dishes I was chatting to a lady who taught at Southampton University this last summer and will be over again for next summer. She had been trying to find somewhere to fly so hopefully she will come to White Waltham Airfield as she now has my contact details.

Afterwards there was a quiz. Nuff said. Ho Hum. Sorry – Ho Ho. 🙂

All good fun and very friendly.