New Zealand air force opens its doors to visitors

The mission of the Air Force Museum of New Zealand is to offer visitors a chance to enjoy and see firsthand the history of the Military Aviation in New Zealand. The collection housed inside of the museum offers millions of different items for visitors to see firsthand including weapons, medals, engines, aircraft, parachute wedding dresses, pin-ups, and hundreds of other pieces of memorabilia that tell the story of the evolution of the Air Force. In addition to this visitors get to see 28 different classic aircraft up close with open doors and engines so that you can really see what an Air Force plane looks like.

While the aircrafts are the major attraction housed within the museum for most visitors, and certainly for the children, there are plenty of other collections that are also worth spending some time looking through as well. For instance, the intricacy of the aircraft engines even though they date back to the 1940s is quite interesting to view and real life shanties set up to resemble what the soldiers actually lived in while at the Air Force area also quite fun to walk through and see firsthand.

In addition, there is a large art collection that features works that portray the Air Force in action and many portraits of pilots that bravely fought for the country. Of notable value is the collection of works by Maurice Conly which is the largest collection housed in New Zealand by the famous painter. Also offered in the art collection are a number of oil paintings and other canvas works and for those who enjoy looking at memorabilia style art the collection of cartoons, prints, and paper that was passed back and forth between pilots should also be of interest.

Those who want to see the medals up close will enjoy the chance to see a real Victoria Cross medal as well as over 200 more medals that were given to brave pilots throughout the history of the New Zealand Air Force. While visiting make sure to pass through the special exhibition ‘Horizon To Horizon which details the path of how the Air Force of New Zealand came to be and its evolution into the modern Air Force that the country maintains today. With contributions and stories from many different brave Air Forcemen it’s an exhibit that you should budget at least an hour for to see in full.