Steve H Flying Diary: December 2005

Had the plane booked and as chance would have it, the weather at Gloucester was great - a few, high clouds with lots of blue sky. Great - maybe today is the day I can try for Haverfordwest and Pembrey. Yes, the 215 looks good so I call them for an update.

'It's overcast at 2000' and the cloud is on the hills to the east. It's OK for circuits but if you really want to get here today, I'd drive!'

OK - so not west, how about east? Never been to Denham, being on the edge of the London zone and all that so lets try there. Oh yes, much more encouraging. I check the NOTAM's - better and better! Brize is closed, give three calls then if no response you are free to zone transit giving calls on the frequency. Denham it is.

I turn up at the airfield and my regular passenger is a bit late, so prep the plane. By this time he turns up and off we go. Winds are about 230/07 on the ground, so we have a fair old tailwind pushing us east. The turbulence well past the ridge of the Cotswolds is quite choppy and surprised me, but it smooths out soon enough. I start to descend to stay below London airspace and contact Denham. OK, call at Maple Cross, then follow the lake in on base to 24. We spot the VRP, lakes and airfield easily and make a nice approach.

The landing is OK and commendably short, but there are no marked taxiways, so off the runway and park up in front of the tower. The jolly chap on frequency admires the paint job on the Arrow as we shut down.

I pay the fee of £15 but oh no! No airfield cafe, just vending machines in Cabair! But look - just outside, there is a posh restaurant so we try there.

It is virtually empty and staffed by Spaniards. We both feel seriously under-dressed, but they are fine and happy to seat us in the posh restaurant despite the fact we only wany soup and rolls. Dan of course splashes out on whitebait and clownsaround with the christmas crackers.

Back to the plane. Checked the noise abatement and special departure routines, started up and took off. Holding it below 1000' on the QNH, straight ahead, the NNW along the train line. Didn't spot the train line until I had passed it so ooops! hard turn to the right to regain track. We cleared to zone to the NNW the set course direct to Gloucester. Got some good height eventuually up to 3000' as the weather was much better to the west. Heard traffic giving blind calls in Brize Zone - so people do read NOTAM's after all!

Back to Gloucester for one touch and go then a landing - probably a mistake as the circuit was very active. Had to orbit on my landing circuit. Got down and shut off. Dan had to shoot back to work, so I tidied up.

Actually, seemed a very busy day, certainly at Gloucester, although Denham was a lot quieter. Oh well, another airfield visited and now up to 52. It gives you a focus to these short hops which is about all I can manage with this iffy weather and low freezing levels. Maybe Fairoaks for January - never been there before and again a bit of a trickier approach sitting as it does on the edge of the London Zone (and a free landing voucher - bonus).

Next flight, weather permitting, is Enstone on the 27th to discuss dates and routes for the round Europe trip planned in 2006.

Just managed to upload and convert the 'in-cockpit' video tapes that were taken on my recent trip to Air Combat in the USA.

It was hard work struggling with firewire, different bit rates, different format etc., but I now have them in good old PAL and burned into two DVD ready for playback at my mates house over several beers with lots of swagger on my part :-)

AND!!! Took some stills off the film which I thought I would post here. Had a fantastic time and these brought it back to me.