Departure was planned for June 2nd, a Thursday, and a public holiday in the Netherlands. To make the most of the time available, we wanted to depart from Rotterdam, so the weekend before this I flew to the UK to pick up the aircraft and return it to Rotterdam. On Saturday May 28th I collected the aircraft from Popham, and flew it to Biggin Hill. I landed just behind a Cessna Citation private jet. As it rolled out, the controller…
A major aim of the training was to ensure that I was fully ready for all the expected aspects of the trip that are outside the usual bounds of my flying. The longer legs, primarily over the Pacific near the end of the trip, would require flights of up to 16 hours (or even more, depending on winds), the first sections of which would be with the aircraft at a very heavy weight. Before departing I set out to practice…
Safety and training More so than any previous trip, a flight around the world requires thorough planning, training, and preparation. Pilot, aircraft, and support team all have to be ready to deal with the many and varied challenges that might arise. This second post covers some of the safety aspects and pilot training carried out in the run-up to the trip. Should the worst occur on an over-water leg, I don’t want to be learning about the art of sea…
More so than any previous trip, a flight around the world requires thorough planning, training, and preparation. Pilot, aircraft, and support team all have to be ready to deal with the many and varied challenges that might arise. This first post covers the initial preparation and upgrades carried out on the aircraft. Aircraft preparation Before setting off on a trip like this, where maintenance opportunities might be limited and long over-water legs are needed, the aircraft has to be in…
The return journey started well; although it would have been surprising to have bad weather in Tunisia in August. The controller directed us north along the low level IFR airways as is done with all VFR in these parts and after a couple of hours we were leaving the African coastline behind. A slowly lowering cloud-base had appeared across the water between Africa and Sardinia, and while it cleared up a little as we flew up across Sardinia, our destination…
On our “day off” in Tunis we had decided to visit the ruins of Carthage, and the well known seaside village of Sidi-Bou-Said. After breakfast on the balcony we secured the services of a local taxi driver for the day, at a very reasonable price, and set about visiting some of the better known locations around Carthage beginning with the Carthage museum. The museum itself was fairly small, mainly full of carved statues and pottery from the time of Carthage….
We left Rotterdam early on a Saturday morning. Juan had taken my advice to pack light to heart and turned up with only a small rucksack; with my flight gear, I probably had at least 3 times the amount of luggage! Fortunately, with only two light people on board, there was plenty of weight and space to spare. There was a light drizzle as we loaded the aircraft and took off, but after only a few minutes heading south the…
The next morning was cool, and looking out the tent we found that the airport was fogged in. After a couple of hours the fog burned off, so after breakfast it wasn’t too long before we could be on our way to our next stop, Shelter Cove. The flight to Shelter Cove was smooth, heading West above the hills over scattered cloud. The airport soon appeared over the hills and we descended into the circuit to land; the golf course…
The next morning we’d been joined by some other campers; an American RV the size of a coach. It didn’t take long before Hannah was inside having tea, so I dragged myself out of bed and went along to join in. It turned out that they were Pipistrel dealers, and here to support the microlight, the pilot of which turned up soon afterwards accompanied by a film crew from the History Channel and several scientific experts; they were here to…
We took the CalTrain back to the airport the next day, and headed southeast, almost exactly retracing our steps of the day before. We flew across the valley above a low carpet of overcast, with the hills poking up through it at either side. Our first destination for the day was Mojave Air and Spaceport; how could one fly past a spaceport and not stop for a look? As we settled onto final approach, the Virgin Galactic launch vehicle (White…