WONZ 343 – Flying Boat Month – Paul Dalley

Guest: Paul Dalley, aka Seaplane Paul

Hosts: Dave Homewood

Recorded: 10th of January 2026

Released: 1st of February 2026

Duration: 3 hour 52 minutes 49 seconds

In this extra-length Wings Over New Zealand Show “Flying Boat Month” episode Dave Homewood speaks with Paul Dalley, who grew up with aviation around him thanks to his grandfather Ian Henry, a well-known propeller maker.

Paul talks about learning to fly, his adventures flying his Piper Cub in Japan while running a language school there, and flying air displays there with fellow Kiwi pilot Robert Fry and others. He talks about flying in Australia where he’d planned to buy a tourism flying business and how things changed. And flying in Papua New Guinea.

And then he ended up purchasing a Lake Buccaneer in New Zealand and he took it up to Vanuatu and achieved his lifelong dream of becoming a flying boat pilot in the Pacific, just like Jake Cutter in one of his favourite childhood television shows, Tales of the Gold Monkey, and the 1992 film Porco Rosso.

Paul has some wonderful adventure stories and ells of some seriously scary moments in the air, in Japan and in the Pacific. He has real insight into the joys of flight too. So sit back and listen to the stories of Seaplane Paul.

Above: The golden sands of a tropical Pacific beach, and Paul Dalley’s Lake Buccaneer flying boat.

**Top:** Stephen Collins as Jake Cutter with Jack (played by Leo the Dog) in the 1982-82 American television series *Tales of the Gold Monkey*. **Bottom:** Jake’s classic Grumman flying boat, Cutter’s Goose. The series was a huge inspiration for Paul that led to his fulfilment of a childhood dream of flying his own flying boat on island adventures in the South Pacific.

Paul’s Lake Buccaneer photographed by Peter Lewis.

Paul with Meredith Caisley, left, and Peter Lewis, right, during their Vanuatu vacation flight. Photo Peter Lewis.

More recently when Paul returned to New Zealand and flew for Auckland Seaplanes. He now lives in Picton.

The trailer for the 1992 film Porco Rosso, which Paul discusses.

WONZ 343 – Flying Boat Month – Paul Dalley

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