I wandered down to the airfield early, about 08:50 to find the terminal closed, so I used the side gate. Opened up the hangar and pulled the plane out. I gave her a decent walkaround check and prepared her for flight. I saw that my fellow groupie had taken her to Dinard during the week and she had plenty enough fuel for a local.
I spot a lovely De Havilland Dove aircraft parked outside one of the hangars and cannot resist having a look and taking some photos – God! Am I turning into a spotter??!!
I wandered back to the terminal to book out only to find it brimming with people (looks like a charter for the KingAir on stand 1). The very harassed receptionist takes my details and back I trek.
She starts up easily, I take the ATIS and taxi to A2 for 27. Quite a few aircraft are on the move now and I am No 2. After power checks, I get clearance and take-off on 27 with a 10 degree right noise abatement turn.
The weather is very good. Scattered cumulus with bottoms at 2500’ and tops at 4500’. The visibility is superb. All of the terrible recent weather has cleared the air and visibility is about as unlimited as it gets in the UK.
I climb to 2400’ and head SW along the Severn and along the ‘bends in the river’. The river is at low tide, exposing large mud flats. I decide to check out Upfield Farm near Newport, so head to the Severn bridges. Past that and I spot the cream coloured concrete runway from distance away. I will land there one day, it is plenty long enough, just a bit narrow for me personally to try it in anything other than conditions of light wind.
I spot what looks like a biplane landing underneath me as I give the airfield one orbit before tracking back to Chepstow for a trip along the Wye Valley.
The Wye Valley looks lovely and I am seized with a desire to descend and fly along it at 500’ with the valley side towering above me. But I resist and wimp along at 2400’ instead!
I follow the river as it twists and turns, craning in steep-ish turns just for the sheer joy of it. I start to fantasize about doing a slow roll – but as neither I nor the aircraft is cleared for aerobatics, perhaps not! I am not sure how much longer I can resist the lure of doing a basic aerobatics rating.
I head up to Hereford, taking care to avoid the restricted areas to the north west – certain gentlemen in barracks there might not like it – and I wouldn’t want to p*ss them off!
I head on over to the Malvern ridge aiming for North Camp on the northern tip of the ridge. For the fun of it, I fly down the western edge of the ridge at 2000’ for Midsummer Hill near the southern end, then for the joy of it, I crank in a steep turn over the iron-age hill fort there.
I do another circuit of the Malverns then dial in the Gloucester ATIS and call for a rejoin.
I am given a standard overhead join for 27 as they are busy. Descending deadside, I spot an aircraft rolling for take-off and keep a good eye on him to make sure I avoid him on the crosswind. I call mid-downwind and am told I am No 4! I spot the diminutive Robin ATL in front, but quickly lose him again while I am doing the downwind checks.
I try to spot him but fail, so turn base and call for a traffic update. He must have cut a much closer base leg than me as he is now on 1 mile final. I turn final and bring the plane under control for height and airspeed.
Reasonable approach, with minimal wind and no crosswind. I flare a try to hold off for as long as I can. I am surprised at how slow it seems to fly when the stall warner chirps and we touch. I manage to brake sensibly and again the plane is well under control by the first intersection. For a plane that runs the approach at 80 kts, it is surprising how short you can land it when you want to (I wasn’t particularly trying, but it beats the TB10 and the Arrow).
I taxi in and shut down. The chief mechanic at Aeros is kind enough to help me put her back in the hangar – she is a heavier aircraft than the TB10 and the Arrow and does tend to leave me puffing!
It was such a lovely day and I felt so good and carefree about flying that even something as tame as a local along the Wye Valley made me feel quite uplifted and satisfied.
I mooch along to Transair and pick up the two maps I am missing for my Europe trip at the end of the month.
I spot some of the crowd I went to Italy with last year coming out of the terminal for the Flyer Bash and say hello. I was planning on staying around the airfield and taxi people to the hotel for the Flyer bash, but I see that the Flyer people have laid on a mini-bus, so I head home instead.
The rest of the afternoon is still spent on aviation related activities though! I put my unexpected free time to good use by detailed planning, plate printing and map marking for the trip at the end of July with Canada Dan. The trip is:
GLOSTER – KOBLENZ – LAUSANNE – BLOIS – ABBEVILLE – GLOSTER.
We will see my erstwhile next door neighbour in Lausanne (he lives there as he works for the Olympic committee). The timing is good as 1st August is Swiss national day and there will be some great fireworks over Lake Geneva.
So a great trip in the offing – if only the weather will play ball!
The Flyer Bash in the evening went well as I met a number of people I flew out to Italy with as well as some new faces (but familiar forum names). Always nice to put faces to the names!
Manuel Querioz was the guest speaker. This guy flew around the world in an RV7 from Gloucester trying for the world record for that class of aircraft. He didn’t managed to break the record, held by very poor weather in Hawaii.
Having seen both Polly Vacher recently and now listened to Manuel, I am stuck by the fact that the most amazing thing about them both is that there is nothing amazing about them! I know they would agree. They are just ordinary pilots who started the same way as the rest of us, and certainly for Manuel, has the same ratings as many of us. But they are extraordinary in that they were driven to do something quite amazing.
We could all do what they did. I don’t mean in any way to detract from their achievements, quite the contrary, because in reality very few will ever do anything remotely close to their achievements. But you know what? That’s OK if it’s OK with you. The crime would be to look back and say ‘you know, I wanted to fly around the world but…..’. As Manuel so aptly said – ‘life is not a rehearsal!’.
Personally, I don’t yearn to fly around the world. My flying dreams are limited to far more mundane activities - learning aeros and doing solo aerobatics and flying floatplanes in Canada (no – not doing both at the same time!) and the way I see it, I am well on my way.
