I have had a bit of a break in my taildragger training. Last time I flew was the end of January. Then I went on a one week holiday in Canada and wrestled with Transport Canada to get one of their PPL’s issued on the back of my FAA ticket.
Following all of this, after my return from Canada, I got a nasty cold and have only now shaken it – probably not a good idea to get into taildragger circuits with a snotty nose.
So I had a lesson on Saturday. Check the plane out and of course it needed fuel. That and the ground tug unit had been left bolted to the towbar connected to the Citation jet in the hangar and blocking the exit so I couldn’t pull out the diminutive RV6. So I asked the firecrew if they knew how to move it and they obliged.
The weather wasn’t great. Started off as I was driving to the airfield at about 900’ cloudbase with I would guess 5km visibility and a breeze. By the time I was ready for start-up, the cloudbase had ‘solidified’ and apart from visible shower patches, was now 1200’ with 10km visibility.
So I started up and taxied to the pumps. My instructor met me there and as I started to taxi in, he indicated that I went around the other way – then it dawned on me why – always point the nose into the wind with taildragger, regardless of how they are lined up at the pumps. Lesson well learned.
I filled up and we practiced synchronised breathing to get in the cramped confines of the cockpit and get strapped in.
We were given good old 22 with right hand circuits, so off I trundled, taking great care to keep the stick at the opposite side to the wind (i.e. if the wind is blowing from the front left quarter, stick back at bottom right quarter etc. Especially important to push it fully forward when the wind is coming from behind to try to stop the wind lifting the tail and dumping it on its nose.
We lined up and took off. The wind was about 200/10, not particularly gusty, but keep an eye on the showers as they would be preceded by gusty conditions and variable wind direction.
In summary, the first few landings went pretty well. I still need to anticipate and get right rudder in when lifting the tail on take-off, but I was getting there. The last few were still OK, but I was tending to flare a bit too high (Roly said nothing to worry about, probably only three feet or so too high.
On one occasion, I noted we were descending rather quickly, so I tried to arrest the rate of descent with a pull back on the stick, but of course the powerful pitch control of the RV caught me out and I over-cooked it so that we ballooned a bit. But I just set myself up gain for a second landing and flare and made an OK landing. Roly was impressed, not that I had screwed it up but how I recovered and still did a good landing.
On the last landing, I touched down, got the tail nailed then next thing I knew, we were back up into the air. Handled the second landing and asked Roly what I had done wrong. ‘Nothing’ he said, ‘you got hit by a gust just after you got the tail nailed which sent you up again’. Almost certainly wouldn’t have happened on a nosewheel aircraft because of the level attitude, whereas of course with a taildragger, there is a very nose-high attitude.
There really is a lot to get used to landing and particularly ground-handling a taildragger. My bad habits of ‘switching off’ in a tricycle gear aircraft once the nosewheel is down and ‘driving it like a car’ with perfunctory attention to wind direction and strength (other than in a howling gale) have now been well and truly excised. Don’t get me wrong – I am not trying to say that it requires super-human skill to learn to fly, land and ground handle a taildragger, but it does show up any bad habits you may have acquired flying tricycle gear aircraft. Tricycle gear must have revolutionised crosswind landings and ground handling when it was introduced in the 1940’s.
The thing it has taught me is to have an obsession for wind strength and direction ALL OF THE TIME, especially on the ground. Always check the windsock, don’t just rely on the tower reported wind, check it with your own eyes.
Anyway, Roly now confirms that I have ‘partial sign-off’ and can fly without an instructor, but only with a wind of less than 10kts and wind direction no more than 30 degrees off the runway. Basically, get comfortable with the plane and do a few landings until I fell that I have got it pegged, then come back to him for crosswind landing training and full sign-off.
So next week, solo general handling in the local area. Play with the avionics and back for maybe three or four circuits. I suspect I will repeat this for a few flights, then go back to Roly in April for some really sweaty crosswind landings then full sign off in time for the ‘season’. A few weekends in France now ‘backed-up’ and in need of flying!
Monday, February 25, 2008
Monday, February 11, 2008
Canadian licence based on FAA PPL
I asked about on Flyer Forum how best to go about getting a Canadian licence. They do provide temporary and time limited licences for JAA licences, but I wanted a permanent Canadian licence as I plan to fly there a few time in the next few years.
Given that I have both a JAA and a full FAA licence (i.e. NOT an FAA licence issued on the back of the JAA one), the responses indicated that there was a ‘simple’ way if getting a full Canadian licence issued on the basis of a FULL FAA licence (i.e. you can’t get a Canadian licence issued on the strength of an FAA licence which was issued linked to a JAA licence).
Apparently, this was a relatively new arrangement which involved taking a Canadian air law ‘difference’ exam and completing an application form. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Of course nothing is as simple as it sounds, especially not with Canadian red tape!
FAA Licence
As already mentioned, this has to be a full and independent FAA licence (i.e. not one issued via the paper validation route ‘on the back of’ a JAA or CAA licence). Mine was an independent licence that I got by going five hours flight training on an ‘N’ registered aircraft with an FAA instructor, then doing the full FAA multi-choice written exam and a full FAA flight test with an FAA examiner. I did this in Florida in 2004 as I planned to fly in the USA at some point and thought I may as well get the full licence while I was over there. Good decision as it turns out.
The Canadian paperwork was all on the internet, including guidelines and forms. These stated that it must be a full FAA licence with a current FAA medical. I have a current FAA medical. With the FAA, the licence does not expire, but you need to have completed a Biannual Flight Review (BFR) within the last two years in order to fly. The Canadian application didn’t say anything about having a current BFR, but I assumed that is what they would need. Of course, I am one year out of date, so I decided to arrange for a BFR in the UK before I went to Canada in February. I did this with Bill Tollett in Oxford where I rented a PA28 from a flying school in Oxford. All very straightforward and my logbook was suitably endorsed in January.
Canadian Medical
The application said that I needed a Canadian medical (of course Canadian humans are completed different from FAA and JAA humans, so of course a separate examination is required – Grrrr!). I decided that although it would be very much cheaper to have the exam in Canada, it would eat too much into my planned one week holiday and made it all a bit too much of a rush, so I decided to have the medical with a Canadian qualified doctor in the UK – good job that I did as it turned out! There is an internet search facility for Transport Canada authorised doctors and I found the list for the UK. The nearest to me was in Leamington Spa – one hours drive, so not too bad. I arranged the medical for 23rd December.
It was the same as all the other medicals and I passed. I was expecting the Doctor to tear off the top of the multi-part sheet he was completing and give it to me as my medical certificate there and then (like they do for the FAA medical, or a separate form that they give you for JAA). OH NO!!!! That would be far too easy wouldn’t it! The Canadian system is different. First, I couldn’t actually apply for anything in Canada without a number that was only allocated on receipt of a valid medical. For the first Canadian medical, he had to send all the forms off to Ottawa in Canada, where they would process them and send me back a medical ‘card’ with this precious number and room for AME stamps for subsequent medicals.
How long would all this take? He said 6-8 weeks! Great, its now just before Christmas (and we know how prompt the post office and government departments are over the Christmas and New Years break) and I plan to be in Canada on 1st February – tight given that I needed this precious medical card back in my hand before I went.
I gave it until 19th January before I chased then. I spoke to a very helpful lady in the end who seemed to know what she was talking about. She said the card had been printed and mailed on 16th January and should be with me within two weeks. If not, it was all on their system and all they had to do at the Ottawa exam centre was print one off locally. In the event, the medical certificate arrived on 23rd January, so just in time.
Transport Canada Application Form
This is a PDF that is readily available on the internet for local completion and printing- so far I am impressed! Of course it must have the precious number from the Canadian medical. The form was one page and very easy to complete. I summarised my flying times to date with the breakdown they required.
It does state that I need to hand it in in person at the nearest Transport Canada aviation centre. In my case as I was visiting Ottawa, it was the one in Ottawa near the international airport in Nepean. I also stated that I needed to provide:
• Proof of id, name and age (passport),
• Proof of flying experience (logbook),
• Proof of FAA licence (the FAA credit card style licence)
• Current FAA medical (how many medicals do you need)
• Current Canadian medical certificate.
To do both this and my Air Law ‘difference’ exam, I had to book an appointment. I did this in early November and was given 10:00 Monday 4th February. Here the saga really starts, but see below.
Transport Canada Difference Examination
I knew they wanted you to take a multi-choice test of 20 questions on areas of difference between the FAA and Canada. Seems reasonable. Although when I spoke to Transport Canada in Nepean they seemed vague and said ‘oh no, its 25 questions’. When I pointed them to the relevant entry on their own web site, they said ‘oh, that wrong, its 25’. Now I couldn’t care less if it’s 20 or 50, but it does worry you that Transport Canada didn’t seem to know!
Of course I thought I could do the exam at a flying club, like you can with both JAA and FAA. But oh no! In Canada, it must be done in one of the regional Transport Canada centres by appointment only (why oh why can’t we all do the same thing!). On the up side, I could do this in the same office I needed to hand the application form in t and it could all be one appointment. So far so good, if a pain.
The appointment
Here is where the fun started. When I booked the appointment in November, they confirmed it, but said they needed the precious number allocated on the medical for their system. I called them back with this on 24th January. They immediately said ‘Oh Mr H, haven’t you got any of our messages? We’ve been trying to contact you’. They said they couldn’t do Monday anymore as the person who would oversee the exam wasn’t in. I wasn’t happy at all and explained that I had arranged my entire one week holiday around this date and unless they could make the weekend, I didn’t have a spare day. They reluctantly agreed to get someone in from another office to cover so I could keep the original appointment. I was amazed, was I dealing with a Canadian government department or a Mom and Pop hardware store in Medicine Bend?
Then on the day before I was due to leave on the flight to Canada, I got another call saying again that they had been trying to contact me and they definitely couldn’t make Monday. I was even less happy than before and said you had already agreed to leave it on Monday. They said yes, but that now the relief person wasn’t available. They eventually escalated the story to say that now the entire office would be closed on both Monday and Tuesday. Of course there were no alternatives in Ottawa and the nearest alternative centres were in either Montreal or Toronto. I left it that I would speak with my buddy when I got to Canada and see where we could make a hole in the schedule. They agreed that I could call and make an appointment anytime on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday that week and they would fit me in. They said they felt bad about it, but nowhere near as bad as I did.
I spoke to Dan and he agreed that we could make it Thursday morning and leave for the hockey game in Montreal later in the day (it was on that evening). So I called and left a message on the answerphone on Monday asking for a 10:00 Thursday appointment. I called again on Wednesday morning once we got a signal on the mobile (I was in the wilds of Quebec on a snowmobile trip at the time) and they confirmed the date and time were OK.
On the day
I handed over the completed application form and all the documents they specified. They wanted to keep my logbook and said I could pick it up in a week. I explained I lived in the UK and couldn’t very well pick it up. They offered to mail it. I explained how valuable to books was and that I would not trust it to the mail. The lady disappeared and confirmed they could photocopy all of the pages there and then and work from copies – some element of sanity at last!
I asked them to confirm that they had seen everything they wanted as I would not be able to come back later on if they forgot anything. I suggested they take photocopies of everything just in case. When she saw the credit card style FAA licence she asked where the rest of the licence was. I had to spend some time assuring here that that was all there was. It seemed clear to me that she had not seen one before, a fact that she later confirmed when she said ‘we don’t do many of these’ – why am I not surprised!
I paid the fees for both the application itself ($CAN55) and the multi-choice examination ($CAN35), of course they had to put these through as two separate amounts – at least they took credit cards.
Paperwork formalities dealt with, she set me up for my exam. It is basically an abbreviated air law exam based on the differences between FAA and Canadian air law. And yes, it turned out to be 20 multi-choice questions in 1.5 hours (not the 25 they insisted earlier). They showed me into a separate room set up with about six desks and computer screens. My time started when I hit the OK button at my allotted screen.
Well I had revised for this. When I was last in Canada (March 2007) I bought the Canadian equivalent of the PPL confuser. It was on a CD and I answered the 163 question bank for Canadian air law many times over and very recently. I was regularly getting 98 – 100%. I knew every question and answer pretty much by heart so I was pretty confident.
Needless to say, my timing was my undoing. A new question set had been released since then but was not available on CD yet. So I was faced with a completely different set of questions and as I hadn’t actually studied the base material, a number of them I simply didn’t understand (I still don’t know what an ‘MF Area’ is!). That’ll teach me to try to take the short cut and not read the base material!
Well, I did the best I could. Some of them were obvious and easy, others not so much and some I simply didn’t get at all. Well, you either know the answer of you don’t, no amount of going through them for hours on end would make that any different. I ended up ‘belting’ through the exam in 18 minutes flat. I left the room with a feeling of dread – had I really come this far and gone to this much trouble to flunk a silly exam? What was their policy on re-takes and was I about to discover some silly rule saying that I had to wait a week before I could do a re-take?
I asked the lady how I did. She was astonished that I was so quick, but confirmed that I had passed – PHEW! I made the mistake of asking her my score – 65%! Well, the Canadian pass mark is 60% so I passed, but I felt really bad and embarrassed about it – what an idiot! Anyway, she printed off the exam results and gave me a copy. My advice? Read the f*cking source book and don't try the short cut!
That’s it. All done. Now all I have to do is wait while the red tape grinds into action and Canada liaises with the USA regarding my FAA licence etc. The form says it will take 90 days and the lady behind the desk didn’t hold out much hope that it would be any quicker. Not that this bothers me as I don’t plan to fly in Canada until August, so hopefully all will be OK.
So now I am keeping my fingers crossed that they didn’t forget or overlook anything.
For something that was meant to be an easy route, I found it far from easy and very frustrating. I never cease to be hacked off by the stupid differences between every country and their licensing authorities. You can present an English licence and drive a car anywhere in the world – why on earth can’t you do the same with flying? Why does each countries aviation authority have a different way of doing things and insist on their own medicals? Maybe to keep civil servants in jobs – surely not!
Flying is easy – it’s all the paperwork that’s hard!
Given that I have both a JAA and a full FAA licence (i.e. NOT an FAA licence issued on the back of the JAA one), the responses indicated that there was a ‘simple’ way if getting a full Canadian licence issued on the basis of a FULL FAA licence (i.e. you can’t get a Canadian licence issued on the strength of an FAA licence which was issued linked to a JAA licence).
Apparently, this was a relatively new arrangement which involved taking a Canadian air law ‘difference’ exam and completing an application form. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Of course nothing is as simple as it sounds, especially not with Canadian red tape!
FAA Licence
As already mentioned, this has to be a full and independent FAA licence (i.e. not one issued via the paper validation route ‘on the back of’ a JAA or CAA licence). Mine was an independent licence that I got by going five hours flight training on an ‘N’ registered aircraft with an FAA instructor, then doing the full FAA multi-choice written exam and a full FAA flight test with an FAA examiner. I did this in Florida in 2004 as I planned to fly in the USA at some point and thought I may as well get the full licence while I was over there. Good decision as it turns out.
The Canadian paperwork was all on the internet, including guidelines and forms. These stated that it must be a full FAA licence with a current FAA medical. I have a current FAA medical. With the FAA, the licence does not expire, but you need to have completed a Biannual Flight Review (BFR) within the last two years in order to fly. The Canadian application didn’t say anything about having a current BFR, but I assumed that is what they would need. Of course, I am one year out of date, so I decided to arrange for a BFR in the UK before I went to Canada in February. I did this with Bill Tollett in Oxford where I rented a PA28 from a flying school in Oxford. All very straightforward and my logbook was suitably endorsed in January.
Canadian Medical
The application said that I needed a Canadian medical (of course Canadian humans are completed different from FAA and JAA humans, so of course a separate examination is required – Grrrr!). I decided that although it would be very much cheaper to have the exam in Canada, it would eat too much into my planned one week holiday and made it all a bit too much of a rush, so I decided to have the medical with a Canadian qualified doctor in the UK – good job that I did as it turned out! There is an internet search facility for Transport Canada authorised doctors and I found the list for the UK. The nearest to me was in Leamington Spa – one hours drive, so not too bad. I arranged the medical for 23rd December.
It was the same as all the other medicals and I passed. I was expecting the Doctor to tear off the top of the multi-part sheet he was completing and give it to me as my medical certificate there and then (like they do for the FAA medical, or a separate form that they give you for JAA). OH NO!!!! That would be far too easy wouldn’t it! The Canadian system is different. First, I couldn’t actually apply for anything in Canada without a number that was only allocated on receipt of a valid medical. For the first Canadian medical, he had to send all the forms off to Ottawa in Canada, where they would process them and send me back a medical ‘card’ with this precious number and room for AME stamps for subsequent medicals.
How long would all this take? He said 6-8 weeks! Great, its now just before Christmas (and we know how prompt the post office and government departments are over the Christmas and New Years break) and I plan to be in Canada on 1st February – tight given that I needed this precious medical card back in my hand before I went.
I gave it until 19th January before I chased then. I spoke to a very helpful lady in the end who seemed to know what she was talking about. She said the card had been printed and mailed on 16th January and should be with me within two weeks. If not, it was all on their system and all they had to do at the Ottawa exam centre was print one off locally. In the event, the medical certificate arrived on 23rd January, so just in time.
Transport Canada Application Form
This is a PDF that is readily available on the internet for local completion and printing- so far I am impressed! Of course it must have the precious number from the Canadian medical. The form was one page and very easy to complete. I summarised my flying times to date with the breakdown they required.
It does state that I need to hand it in in person at the nearest Transport Canada aviation centre. In my case as I was visiting Ottawa, it was the one in Ottawa near the international airport in Nepean. I also stated that I needed to provide:
• Proof of id, name and age (passport),
• Proof of flying experience (logbook),
• Proof of FAA licence (the FAA credit card style licence)
• Current FAA medical (how many medicals do you need)
• Current Canadian medical certificate.
To do both this and my Air Law ‘difference’ exam, I had to book an appointment. I did this in early November and was given 10:00 Monday 4th February. Here the saga really starts, but see below.
Transport Canada Difference Examination
I knew they wanted you to take a multi-choice test of 20 questions on areas of difference between the FAA and Canada. Seems reasonable. Although when I spoke to Transport Canada in Nepean they seemed vague and said ‘oh no, its 25 questions’. When I pointed them to the relevant entry on their own web site, they said ‘oh, that wrong, its 25’. Now I couldn’t care less if it’s 20 or 50, but it does worry you that Transport Canada didn’t seem to know!
Of course I thought I could do the exam at a flying club, like you can with both JAA and FAA. But oh no! In Canada, it must be done in one of the regional Transport Canada centres by appointment only (why oh why can’t we all do the same thing!). On the up side, I could do this in the same office I needed to hand the application form in t and it could all be one appointment. So far so good, if a pain.
The appointment
Here is where the fun started. When I booked the appointment in November, they confirmed it, but said they needed the precious number allocated on the medical for their system. I called them back with this on 24th January. They immediately said ‘Oh Mr H, haven’t you got any of our messages? We’ve been trying to contact you’. They said they couldn’t do Monday anymore as the person who would oversee the exam wasn’t in. I wasn’t happy at all and explained that I had arranged my entire one week holiday around this date and unless they could make the weekend, I didn’t have a spare day. They reluctantly agreed to get someone in from another office to cover so I could keep the original appointment. I was amazed, was I dealing with a Canadian government department or a Mom and Pop hardware store in Medicine Bend?
Then on the day before I was due to leave on the flight to Canada, I got another call saying again that they had been trying to contact me and they definitely couldn’t make Monday. I was even less happy than before and said you had already agreed to leave it on Monday. They said yes, but that now the relief person wasn’t available. They eventually escalated the story to say that now the entire office would be closed on both Monday and Tuesday. Of course there were no alternatives in Ottawa and the nearest alternative centres were in either Montreal or Toronto. I left it that I would speak with my buddy when I got to Canada and see where we could make a hole in the schedule. They agreed that I could call and make an appointment anytime on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday that week and they would fit me in. They said they felt bad about it, but nowhere near as bad as I did.
I spoke to Dan and he agreed that we could make it Thursday morning and leave for the hockey game in Montreal later in the day (it was on that evening). So I called and left a message on the answerphone on Monday asking for a 10:00 Thursday appointment. I called again on Wednesday morning once we got a signal on the mobile (I was in the wilds of Quebec on a snowmobile trip at the time) and they confirmed the date and time were OK.
On the day
I handed over the completed application form and all the documents they specified. They wanted to keep my logbook and said I could pick it up in a week. I explained I lived in the UK and couldn’t very well pick it up. They offered to mail it. I explained how valuable to books was and that I would not trust it to the mail. The lady disappeared and confirmed they could photocopy all of the pages there and then and work from copies – some element of sanity at last!
I asked them to confirm that they had seen everything they wanted as I would not be able to come back later on if they forgot anything. I suggested they take photocopies of everything just in case. When she saw the credit card style FAA licence she asked where the rest of the licence was. I had to spend some time assuring here that that was all there was. It seemed clear to me that she had not seen one before, a fact that she later confirmed when she said ‘we don’t do many of these’ – why am I not surprised!
I paid the fees for both the application itself ($CAN55) and the multi-choice examination ($CAN35), of course they had to put these through as two separate amounts – at least they took credit cards.
Paperwork formalities dealt with, she set me up for my exam. It is basically an abbreviated air law exam based on the differences between FAA and Canadian air law. And yes, it turned out to be 20 multi-choice questions in 1.5 hours (not the 25 they insisted earlier). They showed me into a separate room set up with about six desks and computer screens. My time started when I hit the OK button at my allotted screen.
Well I had revised for this. When I was last in Canada (March 2007) I bought the Canadian equivalent of the PPL confuser. It was on a CD and I answered the 163 question bank for Canadian air law many times over and very recently. I was regularly getting 98 – 100%. I knew every question and answer pretty much by heart so I was pretty confident.
Needless to say, my timing was my undoing. A new question set had been released since then but was not available on CD yet. So I was faced with a completely different set of questions and as I hadn’t actually studied the base material, a number of them I simply didn’t understand (I still don’t know what an ‘MF Area’ is!). That’ll teach me to try to take the short cut and not read the base material!
Well, I did the best I could. Some of them were obvious and easy, others not so much and some I simply didn’t get at all. Well, you either know the answer of you don’t, no amount of going through them for hours on end would make that any different. I ended up ‘belting’ through the exam in 18 minutes flat. I left the room with a feeling of dread – had I really come this far and gone to this much trouble to flunk a silly exam? What was their policy on re-takes and was I about to discover some silly rule saying that I had to wait a week before I could do a re-take?
I asked the lady how I did. She was astonished that I was so quick, but confirmed that I had passed – PHEW! I made the mistake of asking her my score – 65%! Well, the Canadian pass mark is 60% so I passed, but I felt really bad and embarrassed about it – what an idiot! Anyway, she printed off the exam results and gave me a copy. My advice? Read the f*cking source book and don't try the short cut!
That’s it. All done. Now all I have to do is wait while the red tape grinds into action and Canada liaises with the USA regarding my FAA licence etc. The form says it will take 90 days and the lady behind the desk didn’t hold out much hope that it would be any quicker. Not that this bothers me as I don’t plan to fly in Canada until August, so hopefully all will be OK.
So now I am keeping my fingers crossed that they didn’t forget or overlook anything.
For something that was meant to be an easy route, I found it far from easy and very frustrating. I never cease to be hacked off by the stupid differences between every country and their licensing authorities. You can present an English licence and drive a car anywhere in the world – why on earth can’t you do the same with flying? Why does each countries aviation authority have a different way of doing things and insist on their own medicals? Maybe to keep civil servants in jobs – surely not!
Flying is easy – it’s all the paperwork that’s hard!
Saturday, February 09, 2008
Rockcliffe Airfield - Ottawa
On a recent trip to Ottawa, Canada to see my buddy, Dan, we wandered over to Rockcliffe Airfield to speak to the flying club about renting a plane for a mini-tour around Canada and the USA in the summer.
Spoke to the local club there - aptly named the Rockcliffe Flying Club. The airfield is based right next to the Outaouais River that runs through Ottawa. On the other side of the airfield is the excellent national aviation museum.
It was a typical, balmy Canadian winters day - snow, slight breeze and -8 degrees centigrade!
Couldn't resist the following photos. Write up on how my application for a Canadian licence based on my FAA licence went is to follow, when I get over my jet lag.
Rockcliffe Airfield is in this picture somewhere!
Runway boards barely visible above the snow drifts
Might be a good idea to check for snow and ice contamination before flying anywhere!
Well I haven't seen it before! A Citabria fitted with arctic tyres and skis. I had a chat with the owner who was getting ready for a flight with a destination on a frozen lake 400km north of Ottawa - If you know anything about Canadian geography, there is nothing 400km north of Ottawa!! Talk about living away from it all!! He also did a bit of mountain flying in France and Switzerland.
Spoke to the local club there - aptly named the Rockcliffe Flying Club. The airfield is based right next to the Outaouais River that runs through Ottawa. On the other side of the airfield is the excellent national aviation museum.
It was a typical, balmy Canadian winters day - snow, slight breeze and -8 degrees centigrade!
Couldn't resist the following photos. Write up on how my application for a Canadian licence based on my FAA licence went is to follow, when I get over my jet lag.
Rockcliffe Airfield is in this picture somewhere!
Runway boards barely visible above the snow drifts
Might be a good idea to check for snow and ice contamination before flying anywhere!
Well I haven't seen it before! A Citabria fitted with arctic tyres and skis. I had a chat with the owner who was getting ready for a flight with a destination on a frozen lake 400km north of Ottawa - If you know anything about Canadian geography, there is nothing 400km north of Ottawa!! Talk about living away from it all!! He also did a bit of mountain flying in France and Switzerland.
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