Tracey Curtis-Taylor has just begun a flight from the UK to Australia.

TRACEY CURTIS-TAYLOR became interested in flight when her father began to take her to airshows in Vancouver as a child. She had her first flying lesson in 1978 and the rest is history as she went on to gain her private pilot’s licence, commercial licence and instructor rating. This month sees her attempt a solo flight from Great Britain to Australia. 

In this exclusive interview Tracey talks to us about some of her most thrilling flights and passion for adventure in general.

Read on to find out more about her flight to Australia and the challenges and difficulties she may find herself up against.

What was it like growing up in Canada and when did you first become interested in flight?

Canada was a great early formative experience of my life. I remember crossing the Atlantic in the ship and crossing Canada by train… We lived in Toronto and Winnipeg but mostly Vancouver. So the North West Pacific was very significant to us as a family – huge landscapes, complete freedom and lots of camping! It has had a profound influence on my life.
In terms of flying, my father would take us to airshows in Abbotsford near Vancouver and I had my first flying lesson in Canada when I returned there for a holiday in 1978 with my twin sister.

Tracey pictured with a Boeing Dreamliner at Farnborough, UK in 2014. Photo Bird in a Biplane

When did you gain your pilot’s licence and what were your first challenges in flight?

I got my private pilot’s licence in New Zealand when I emigrated there in 1983, I finished it in 1985 but then I went on to do a commercial licence and an instructor rating as well.
 
My first challenges in flying were probably flying tail draggers which are vintage aeroplanes. You steer them with a joystick and they have very different controls and ground handling to a more ‘conventional’ type of plane that most people fly. And of course, these are the planes that I have been passionate about my whole career and that is all I fly now.

What have been some of your biggest adventures to date and where around the world have they taken you?

I have been really lucky to have done some amazing travelling and had some fantastic adventures. A few highlights: travelling through Africa in 1982 which involved coming back overland in a Bedford truck. A rafting expedition to Papua New Guinea with 15 guys in 1986, then the Peking to Paris rally in a vintage car in 2007 and my Africa flight in 2013. I actually did two Africa flights in 2013, one in an Antinov with a Russian crew and then my own flight in my Stearman from Cape Town back to the UK. Both Africa trips were, in their own way, very unique experiences.

Preparation is always an important part of Tracey’s aerial adventures. Photo Bird in a Biplane

Could you tell us more about your work as an instructor?

Working as an instructor was something of an anticlimax actually. I find I prefer teaching the ground theory (I specialise in meteorology) but the actual hands on flying is a bit frustrating and irritating. Honestly I don’t really have the temperament to teach people well so I just ended up doing that on a part time basis to keep my hand in – I didn’t really enjoy it.

How did your career in aerial photography begin and what have been some of your achievements in that area?

It was when I was working as an instructor that I got offered a fantastic marketing job for an aerial photography and mapping company which effectively tripled my salary and I got a company car (which at that stage was a big deal for me!) but I still got to fly. It took me all over New Zealand working on low level mapping, high level resource imagery, remote sensing and analysing satellite data. It was a great job that paid very well and helped fund my private flying in historic aeroplanes but I still instructed a couple of days a week.

Tracey is also passionate about motorcars and here is pictured filming at Brooklands in the UK in 2014. Photo Bird in a Biplane

Could you tell us more about your challenge to fly to Australia and where can our readers find out more about the flight?

It is all about to happen, it has been a year of intensive work to pull this together. I have a small but very focused team that have all worked incredibly hard to get us to the point where we are about to leave! There are 23 countries to get across and in the plane I am doing this in, from an engineering perspective, it is always a challenge to get what is effectively 1920s technology across the modern world. We are also going to face political issues, the bureaucratic issues and fuelling issues as well as just keeping this plane serviceable and in the air. So we have a great engineering team on board, a great PR team and tremendous support from all of our sponsors and partners. In the servicing and logistical support Boeing are helping plug us in around the world which is a huge help. It is their area of expertise so we are very lucky to have them on board with us. We are also building a whole community and outreach programme around the flight so as well as celebrating what Amy Johnson, and the pioneering aviators of the 1930s, achieved in opening up the civilian air route, and connecting the worlds, this is more than just a flight. It is about a much bigger journey telling an old story in the very modern context.

The biggest single challenge with the flight I suspect is going to be the weather. But we are also expecting to need to do some delicate political navigation from Turkey through to Burma really, then South of Burma we fly into the local monsoons. Then we will eventually need to pass through the monsoon line – the Inter Tropical Convergance zone that will be positioned over Northern Australia. So we are flying right into the cyclone season. In this sort of aeroplane I am very vulnerable, we will have to be very careful – I can only do visual flying (ie not with instruments) so we will have to look at our alternatives in terms of how to get round any given weather system or just wait on the ground for conditions to improve.

In terms of keeping up to date: My website is: www.birdinabiplane.com where we will be keeping people updated with our progress (as much as logistics and situations on the ground allow) and then also via social media: www.facebook.com/birdinabiplane, Twitter @biplanebird, #GBtoOz.

We have a partnership with the Mail on Sunday which will be running a series of pieces on the expedition and also we are working with ITN. In Australia we will be keeping people up to date with arrival times and progress via a number of news outlets and events – please check our various channels above for all the latest.

Tracey pictured flying in Africa. Photo Bird in a Biplane

What are your other passions in life and to what extent have you managed to pursue them?

My other great passion is gemology so stones, diamonds, that sort of thing. I am a qualified germologist and that is something I would like to return to at some stage. I am an avid collector (and wearer!) or jewellery but one of the lovely things about travelling around the world at ‘low level’ like I do you get these tremendous panorama of geology and geography. I always think about the stones and minerals as I go over these amazing vistas. Another great interest of mine is oil painting and reading – I love to read about history and biographies and I just haven’t had anything like the time to pursue these in the last three years with both the Africa and now the Australia expedition so it will be nice to pursue something of my normal life after 2016.