A couple of weeks ago, I got invited to spend a couple of hours up at Auckland Tower. That ended up happening today.
I drove up there with Dad, who was gonna do some work stuff, and then take the car back down.
Got to the airport about midday, and a little later up into the tower. It was a slow lift up so plenty of time for anticipation to build up
. Opened up, first thing I did was go to the loo 
. Then up a flight of stairs to the tower proper. Was about the same size as I imagined it would be.There was a sink, water cooler, fridge, bench etc. Along the airport side was a bench with four control stations along it. Tower, Ground, Clearance Delivery and Flight Research. And plenty of windows all the way around.
Unfortunately the weather was pretty bad. Twenty knot winds, gusting thirty knots from heading 030, and visi was about 2000-3000. But it was nice and warm in the tower.
Had a good chat to the controllers and asked a couple of questions. And learnt a whole lot more little fiddly things about the operating procs at NZAA. All in all they seemed a very friendly, relaxed bunch, and it looked like they were having a good time. Left the tower at about half past one to catch NZ2363 (dep. time was 1:55) to Rotorua, just before I checked in they said that the flight would be delayed ten minutes, ok, no worries there.
Mucked around for 20mins before boarding and sitting there for about 10mins. Took off into a cloudy, bumpy, Auckland sky. Levelled off at 12000ft and continued. I read the Air NZ magazine, must have been really desperate
. Soon we started out descent, and then it got really bumpy. Really felt just like a roller coaster, except in a roller coaster you can go down in one instant, and then leave your stomach on the floor as you shoot upwards in the next. Finally got through the bumps for the approach into runway 18 at Rotorua.
Got down to about 3000ft and caught glimpses of the city through the cloud.
Suddenly, pitch up, throttle up, gear up, flaps up, we went around. After a suitable (2 minute) wait to build up tension, the FO came on the PA (the FO was a woman). "Ladies and gentlemen, unfortunately the visibility on approach fell below minimas and we have had to divert, other nearby suitable airports have similar weather conditions so we will be returning to Auckland".
One word:
.Anyway, rode that roller coaster back up through to cruising alitude. Levelled out again. Bit of a bumpy arrival but other than that quite ordinary.
Had a nice chat to the Captain after we landed, apparently the minima is 600ft, so there must have been pretty damn near fog at NZRO. And the conditions were set to get worse so he thought there wasn't a lot of point trying it again.
Back in the terminal, feeling suitably queasy from the flight, we were told to wait by the check-in desks while they sorted something out. A while later a british Air NZ lady (had a really strong British accent) came over and told us that we would be going by road back down to Rotorua. The last thing I needed to hear after nearly an hour and a half of bumpy flight with my stomach up in arms.
Got a bit of drink and food into me and we were off on the road. Apart from the apalling weather it was a pretty boring trip back down.
All in all it was a great day though, really really enjoyed it.
Alex
Oh, and by the way, there are a few (40+) bad, low-res shots that you can see here.
(They seem to have uploaded backwards though, so thats a little weird...)
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