Inside the cockpit of an Air Chathams plane.
Chris Rudd flies on Air Chathams' flight 3C640 from Auckland to Kapiti.
The plane: A small one, Saab 340A.
Class: There is only one. One seat to the left, two to the right.
Price: $171 one way.
Flight time: the paperwork said 1hr 20m, but it felt like just over an hour.
My seat: I was in 5A.
Fellow passengers: A bit of a mixture of people returning home, the odd tourist and me heading to our Kapiti office — I work for NZME, you see; publishers of this Travel magazine.
How full: About half.
Entertainment: The view! I know it's a bit of a cliche but we sailed over some beautiful New Zealand coastline. There was also a very tatty magazine in the seat pocket. The great news is they are replacing the magazine with NZME's Spring/Summer Kapiti business and lifestyle magazine from this week!
The service: A lovely attendant and a Tim Tam which beat the usual Cookie Time from the other airline, (who stopped flying this route back in April). The plane is of the old-school variety but that was half the fun of the trip.
Food and drink: The usual, coffee, tea, water along with that very nice Tim Tam.
The toilets: I didn't use it, but it looked to be a pretty small space.
Luggage: I only took hand luggage and that easily fitted above my head. If not, it's the drop off as you pass heading to the plane.
The airport experience: I'd not travelled Air Chathams before so had to have a bit of a hunt at Auckland domestic to find the counter. But when I did it was great service and it felt good to try something a bit different.
The bottom line: Air Chathams do a great job plugging the gaps left by other airlines and the departure board acts a great advertisement to all the places they serve. It feels the regions know what a great job they do but Aucklanders are a bit unaware.
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