I was recently in China and was able to visit the China National Aviation Museum. This is the most amazing display of aircraft I have ever seen in one place and the display area in itself is unique. It is housed was once a Cold War airforce base, a hanger shaped tunnel, two aircraft wide, dug into the side of a mountain and curving through a distance of at least 600 metres, to another entance/exit and another taxiway.

An unexpected sight was a Chinese Shenyang glider made in 1977.

Aircraft on display, all beautifully presented, include Chinese (Nanchang, Changdu, Shengyen),and Russian (Ilyushin,Lavochkin, Mig, Poliparkov, Tupolev, Yakovlev) types. I did not expect to see other makes and WW2 and pre WW2 aircraft. I saw Curtis Hawk (used 1937 against the Japanese), Curtis P40, Kawasaki bomber (Ki-48 ?) Tachikawa trainer, Ilyushin IL-2, Tupolev TU-4, Polikarpov I-16, a "Lenin" biplane from 1930 and two DH Mosquito replicas from one only wing. My best estimate would be 60 to 80 aircraft in this display.

Before entering this main area you walk past an honour guard of about 20 Migs 9 to 27 just parked outside. When exiting you pass another honour guard of 30 or so Migs, plus various DC3, Ilyushin, Tupolev etc before you get to an area of many hectares with at least another 50 plus aircraft.Among these are DH Beaver, three C-47 in WW2 colors, two Curtis Condors and some Russian licence built B29s with four turbo prop engines.

This museum is about 65 Km north of Beijing, not on the tourist route and no English was spoken there. I had instructions written in Chinese characters (and English for me) and did not have any problems getting there and back. Take bus 644 from Anding Men, about 8 Km NE of Tianmen Square, and it stops outside the Museum about one hour journey. Admission is about A$8.00 and if you want to walk through Chaiman Mao's aircraft it is a whole A$1.00 more. I went there on my own and there were two other visitors (locals) in the two hours I was there (not long enough).

If you have seen Hendon, Duxford and the Shuttleworth collection you "ain't seen anything yet".

Regards - Bruce Nally