Flight Experiences in December

Queenstown has helicopter companies with direct access to Fiordland, Mount Cook, the Remarkables, and the Milford Sound valley. What makes it one of the better helicopter destinations in the world is the proximity of genuinely remote mountain and fiord terrain to a well-resourced tourist town. The Milford Sound flight landing is the classic program: 45 minutes of flying through fiord country, landing in the sound itself, before returning over the Divide. More ambitious programs set down on glaciers or the Tasman snowfields. The quality of the terrain and the professionalism of the operators are both consistently high.

Wanaka hosts New Zealand's most serious collection of vintage and warbird aviation, and the best access to aerobatic flight experiences in the Southern Hemisphere. The Warbirds and Wheels museum maintains a flying collection of WWII aircraft including Spitfires, Mustangs, and Kittyhawks. The biennial Warbirds Over Wanaka airshow (Easter weekend, even years) is one of the top five airshows in the world. But the everyday offering matters too: aerobatic companies based at Wanaka Airport run dual-control flights in Pitts and Extra-type aircraft over the Southern Alps, with instruction available for those who want to actually fly, not just ride.