Post 21: Rescue Plane diverts to Maputo after wheel-up landing at Villancullo closes runway

I think I'll walk   (-:

Good night

Post 20: Help is on its way to Quelimane. Alpha Charlie in the footsteps of Vasco de Gama and Dr Livingstone



Dr Livingstone: " Alpha Charlie I presume"
"

Vasco de Gama: "Is that a PA 28 I see?" 

 Quelimane (pronounced "Ke-lee-ma-ne") has the feel of a ramshackle tropical Marxist town before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Its streets are named after Karl Marx and other fallen, communist idols. It's people are cheerful and sensual. The shops are bare. There are long queues to get into the two banks and their ATMs. The Flamingo hotel, run by the chaming and helpful Italian Roberto, has a pool where local kids come after school, a guard at the gate armed with a pump-action shotgun and does a nice lasagna. Quelimane stands 25 km from the mouth of the Rio dos Bons Sinais - "River of the Good Signs"-. named when the great exploring seafarer, on his way to India, reached it and saw "good signs" that he was on the right path. The town was also the end point of David Livingstones famous west-to-east crossing of south-central Africa in 1856.

The authorities in Mozambique have cleared the Cessna 207 carrying fuel for Alpha Charlie from South Africa and a safety pilot for me who knows this neck of the woods. They are airborne and due to reach here tomorrow (Tuesday March 1st). I shall push on to Kruger (game park) international airport tomorrow and hopefully be in Johannesburg on Wednesday, thunderstorms permitting. Steve has finally got on a flight to Maputo from Quelimane to connect with his flight home to the UK on Wednesday. We are on the home stretch of this remarkable southbound journey.

Post 19: First tropical storm; stuck in Quelimane, Mozambique; Laurie Kay rides to the rescue

Friday: Zanzibar to Pemba, in Mozambique. We encounter our first tropical storm. Our little Strikefinder lighting detector earns its keep. We fly at FL65 ( 6,500ft) and give the storm a wide berth. See pictures. The Strikefinder is a simple little gizmo, a simplified Stormscope weather radar which does not cost the eye-watering sums of its big daddy.  It picks up electrical activity at up to 200 nautical miles from the aircraft in a 360-degre arc. These ‘ strikes’ appear as illuminated dots around the aircraft symbol on a 3.5 inch screen. Once the dots form into chunky clusters you know you have a thunderstorm, you know roughly where it is and how far away.  This allows you to plot a safe course away from its jaws.  Thunderstorms and big CB clouds are beautiful to behold. But they can be deadly. They deliver up (and down) drafts from deep within their core, depending on what stage of development they are at. These drafts can spread for several miles either siide of their base. They can also swallow an aircraft and spit it out again in with menacing ease.  As we leave Zanzibar we can see at least one weather system building visually ahead. Small, scattered dots appear on the Strikefinder.As we approach the clouds ahead. The dots multiply into clusters. Game on. By the time we reach Mafia island there it is, the storm’s signature anvil-top spreading like a hammer-head shark. A mysterious (to me anyway) force of nature which, in this part of the world, can be short-lived and can dissipate in 30 or 40 minutes. But  they should be treated with the utmost respect and given the widest possible berth. We plot a course well out to sea but still within gliding distance of land should our engine fail and pass in between two systems about 70 miles apart. Richard, in the Grumman, who follows the other, faster and more powerful aircraft on an inland track is forced to make a 180-degree turn north then head back towards the coast before resuming his track south. He was in danger of being sucked up by the beast. When he and Wendy land at Quelemane, a little shaken, the paint on the leading edge of his wings has been pitted and scraped by hailstones. Gritty airmanship.

Saturday: Pemba to Quelemane but not, as planned, on to Villancullo or Bazaruto island. We are cleared for a straight-in approach for runway 18 at Quelimane. One of two DC3s behind us belonging to the South African Air Force with virtually brand new turbine engines, has to go round as we trundle down final approach. I nearly wet myself with excitement. The American Douglas DC3 was first built in 1935. Its speed and range at the time revolutionsied air transport and became a key troop and meteriel carrier in World War II. It was often known as the Dakota.  Over 400 are still in operation world-wide. In my book it’s up there with Concorde, the Spitfire, the Harrier and the Catalina Flying boat as enduring icons. I first flew in one as a kid from Alexandria to Cairo up the Nile Delta.

There is an No Avgas in Quelimani. We did not have enough endurance even to reach the port of Beira further south- where there was no Avgas anyway. Two aircraft ( Martin, the flying farmer and Richard  in the Grumman) decide to top up their tanks at Quelimane with Mogas (that’s unleaded car fuel) to get them to Villancullo. They trot off into town and come back with a couple of jerry cans from a local petrol station. I decide to stay at Quelemane and find a way of getting Avgas. Lycoming engines will, if push comes to shove, take a small amount of Mogas to blend with the higher-octane Avgas. But it’s not advised. I’m too cautious and inexperienced to try it. Alpha-Charlie has carried us this far with grace and strength. And she deserves to be treated with respect. Also,should the mixture cause piston detonation,  replacing my engine could cost US$30,000. Charly and Alistair set off in FP-SCB, which can go round the world on a thimbelfull, (I exaggerate but only slightly) with the others. Uber-piloten Hemut is probably by the pool at Bazaruto Island, our original destination, with Kiwi Adam. Bernard and Derek in the Mooney are...erm..not sure. But I’ll you know as soon as I find out.

I have a Plan A and a Plan B. Plan A is for Sam to truck Avgas to us from Villancullo, an 8-hour drive. Plan B, which is being formulated as I write, is to organise my own Avgas to be flown from South Africa, 6 hours away in a light aircraft. I turn for help to Laurie Kay, a recent friend and legendary South African pilot based in Johannesburg. Now retired, he flies Harvards for a hobby. I am in the best of hands. In less time than it takes to down a couple of Zambezi beers, Laurie gets a friend who runs a charter company, to organise ( at cost) for Avgas to be flown to us in a Cessna 207 by a young pilot. The young pilot will do it pro bono. He says he needs the hours. Actually he’s doing what most pilots would do, which is to help a fellow-flyer in a moment of need. The camaraderie among pilots is tangible. I am deeply grateful.  Here is a brief potted biography of Laurie Kay: ex-South African air force; retired chief 747 pilot and instructor for South African Airways; Laurie was at the controls of Boeing 747 Lebombo which flew low and slow  at 140 Knots over Ellis Field stadium in 1995 when Francois Pienaar led the Springbok rugby team to a famous victory against the All-Blacks in the World Cup. It had “ Go Boks” painted under its wings. The story is movingly told in the film Invictus, starring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela, and Matt Damon as Pienaar. I urge you to see it. It is about the power of sport as a universal language. And the power of forgiviness as a force for restraint.

Chris Briers, who runs the charter company, calls and promises to get me to Rand airport via Kruger by Tuesday. So we wait in Quelimane. Nothing can be done at the weekend. Hopefully it will all be sorted first thing Monday when offices open in Mozambique. I make the decision to go with Plan B and give him the green light. Past record suggests that Sam’s chances of getting Avgas to us in the required time are slim.

 What Strikefinder sees at 200 and 100 nautical miles ...

....and what we see as we pass safely by

 The South African Air Force Dakota DC3 with its new turbine engines at 
Quelimane dwarfs  Alpha Charlie in the background and below..

You've heard of the World War II Flying Tigers, the 1st Amerian Volunteer Group who fought with the Nationalist Chinese in 1941-42,,,well here is The Flying Tigger over the African bush...

Meanwhile, the ever-reliable Steve and I are going to have some grilled prawns and a few beers at a local dive where they’re playing the Bob Marley classic I Shot the Sherrif. There’s a carnival on in the streets of Quelimane tonight...not quite Rio but good enough,

Sunday: After a 3-hour wait Steve- he has to catch a flight back to the UK on Wednesday -we are told there is no room on the only flight to Maputo, the capital. We shall try again tomorrow. If that doesn''t work he will go back in the Cessna bringing fuel and I will head to Kruger and Johannesburg with a safety pilot. Meanwhile back to the pool and Piri Piri prawns.

Post 18: Zanzibar. Que sera sera....

Getting flight clearances to hop from country to country in Africa is proving more difficult than I had hoped and the ever-enthusiastic Sam had imagined. The more experienced pilots - such as Helmut- are now getting their own handlers back home to do it. Helmut uses a small German company which specialises in getting clearances for pilots who ferry small and not-so-small aircraft around to world: Africa, China, Asia, North America.

The group is solid and supportive of each other if a little dispirited. It's been disappointingly hard work even allowing for the revolutions which seem to follow us and the difficulties of grappling with Africa.

But there are worst places to be stuck.

Just William leads us in a jolly refrain at dinner over a fire at the beach which cheers everyone up:

Que Sera Sera
Whatever will be will be
The clearance will come... tomorrah
Que sera sera

Oi!

 Mobile Zanzibar

 Adam, Sam's helper, and Steve

 Just William somewhere else

 Pilot ditches. Steve drowning not waving

 Annette, Flying Farmer Chairman Martin's wife

Poolside View, Zanzibar

Post 17: Wonderful women in their Flying machines, Kilimanjaro and Zanzibar

Beryl Markham, aviatrice extraordinary

Wilson Airport, Nairobi

Latitude 01° 18’ 16” S, Longtitude 36° 48’ 48” E

Elevation above sea level: 5536ft

When I was learning to fly, aged 60, I devoured every flying book I could get my hands on in the misguided belief that the written word would make me a pilot. There's only way to learn. Get up there, with a long-suffering instructor; get on with it; make mistakes, 'feel' your plane and learn to trust it while you get on with the business of building hours towards your PPL. Mind you, although books don't teach you how to fly they do connect you with others who have. You become one, miniscule link in a long chain stretching back to the Wright Brothers, Bleriot ( first across the English Channel), Antoine de St Exupery and, of course, those who flew for their countries in combat. One of the first books I read was West with the Night by Beryl Markham just one of an extraordinary number of women flyers which included my wife's grandmother Lois Butler. Lois ferried Spitfires and bombers around Britain during World War II as part of the Air Auxilliary. She, and her husband Alan Butler who was Chairman of De Havilland Aircraft, ferried a Gloster AS31 from Hatfield, UK, to Capetown in 1931. Flying time: 74 hours 4 mins, using 3539 Imperial gallons of fuel and 218 galons of oil. I shall come back to her diary of the trip in a later blog.

Antoine de St Exupery’s, author of The Little Prince, wrote the poetic Sand, Wind and Stars. Anne Morrow Lindbergh the exquisite North to the Orient, describing the time when she co-piloted a single-engine 600hp radial-engine Sirius with her husband Charles in 1931 by the great circle route. Beryl Markham’s book stirs the soul. And she was here. At Wilson. She became involved with Denis Finch-Hatton, aviator, white hunter whose clients included the Prince of Wales, later the Duke of Windsor, bon vivant, (Robert Redford in Out of Africa with Meryl Streep playing Karen Blixen). He refused to teach her how to fly, presumably on the principle “Never mix business with Pleasure”. She turned to the dashing Tom Campbell Black. Campbell-Black was managing Director of Wilson Airways, named after Florence Kerr Wilson, the founder of commercial aviation in Kenya. Campbell Black told  Beryl Markham; " trust your instincts and your compass. If you can’t fly without looking at your speed indicator, your turn co-ordinator  and your altimeter, well then Beryl you can’t fly.“  Her first solo was in June 1931 in a Gypsy Moth. A month earlier  Denys Finch Hatton was killed, also in a Gipsy Moth, while scouting elephant over what is today Kenya’s Tsavo National Park with his Somali servant Hamisi. Beryl went on to become a safe, reliable and courageous bush pilot with exceptional navigation skills ferrying parts to farmers and settlers around Kenya.  

I had my first experience of a “ hot and high” take-off from Wilson routing to Zanzibar today. A delayed start due to voluminous paperwork meant we started our take-off roll on Runway 14 in Alpha-Charlie for the 3-hour leg to Zanzibar at 09:45 Zulu or just before 13:00 local. ( Pilots and air controllers world-wide invariable operate on UTC or Coordinated Universal Time aka Zulu) It was 25 degrees celcius. The field is at 5536ft above sea level. Back of an envelope told us density altitude - the "real altitude your aicraft has to lift off from- was 8000 feet. At our first attempt with full fuel and one stage of flap Steve nosed Alpha Charlie off the searing tarmac at 65 knots Indicated Airspeed before the stall warner sounded off, like a whining cat, and she settled gently back on the ground. Not this time boys. We aborted our take-off, were instructed to do a 180 degree turn by the nice lady in the tower , back-track up the runway, vacate and state our intentions. “ We’ll give it another go “ said Steve “ If that doesn’t work  we’ll pack it in, have a beer and try again first thing tomorrow”. Fair enough. We slotted in behind a twin-Otter. Full power, feet on the breaks, roll: we watched the speed build up, felt the ground effect give her a bit of lift and at around 75 knots I gently put in one stage of flap and Steve eased her away. Alpha Charlie, Bless her little spats, lifted like a bird, obedient, competent, solid. We were routed via the south-east access lane over bush and scattered Thorn trees and made for Zanzibar via waypoint LUDOL. Of course we should have gone earlier when it was cooler ( that’s why Beryl Markham often flew at night delivering parts to stranded farmers in bush) but wanted to meet the remaining Foxes in Zanzibar where I write this listening to the call to prayer from the many mosques in Stonetown.

Mount Kilimanajaro shrouded in cloud: dedicated to Belinda who has been there

We skirted Mount Kilimanjaro to our right, riding mild mountain-waves and landed 3 hours later dripping with sweat in Zanzibar. I’d just like to say that again: Zanzibar in Alpha Charlie: semi-autonomous part of Tanzanania, fomer Porruguese colony, later owned by Oman, famous for spices and slaves. In the mid 19th Century as many as 50,000 African slaves passed through its mainly Arab-controlled slave markets.

Abeam Zanzibar airport for runway 36 downwind left QNH 1008

Tomorrow: Mozambique

Post 16: The Main feature. True grit, airmanship of the highest quality and a dose of luck.

Downtown Ad Damazin, capital of the Blue Nile State

The turn around at Ad Damazin on the border between Sudan and Ethiopia was unusually swift and smooth. That should have set alarm bells ringing. The formation rule is :fastest off first. He reports back on the chat frequency: weather, airfields, frequencies for the tail-end charlies. Fox formation aircraft 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6, refuelled and took off for the climb up and over into Ethiopia without incident. Gruppenfuhrer Sam and William in the whisk had already gone ahead.

That left David, the Wing Commander, in Fox 1, the Cessna 303 twin, and Richard in Fox 7, the Grumman AA5 Traveller. Fox 1 was carrying Richard wife's Wendy, struck by Mubarak's Revenge in Khartoum. She was feeling grim - in an understated, Yorkshire sort of way. Adam, Sam's, Kiwi sidekick, had swapped places with Wendy and was now flying with Richard in the Grumman. He takes up the story: "We were at the runway threshold ready to line up and take off. David is cleared to enter the runway. He backtracks to the top, does a 180degree turn, full throttle and starts his take-off roll. Just as he passes us his nose-wheel collapses. It was like watching a slow-motion accident. He continued for about 1500 feet down the runway on his nose, tail high, the propellors and engines scraping the ground." Richard, in the Grumman, knows Wendy,his wife, is in there. The fire engine whines its way to the stricken aicraft and sprays it with foam. " We've got to get out. Now." says David"  Before she goes up". Wendy, Angela and David are helped out quickly by a swam of Sudanese airport workers and police. At the terminal, kind Sudanese women ply them with mint tea and towels. " Everybody was crying" says Wendy" more of out of relief than anything else. They were all so kind."

News is quickly relayed by the Tower to Sam in helicopter G-DKNY which turns back to Ad Damazin. Foxes 2,3,4,5 and 6 are asked to continue to Addis Ababa. The runway is blocked. A white UN, twin-engined turbo-prop is waiting to go back to Khartoum. It had brought - yes, you guessed it- HE the British Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary. He was somewhere in Damazin winning hearts and minds. 

The dazed group set off to a heavily-fortified, barbed -wire compound to try and find somewhere to stay. No luck. The group then sets off to the Police Guest House where the British Ambassador was staying. The genial Major-General, previously Sudanese military-attache in London, now the local chief of police, offered to put them up in his own guest house. Beds are found. Sam goes out to get grilled chicken. Everyone collapses. At 10pm HMG's Ambassador and his close protection squad ( Sudan is one of Al Qaeda's favourite playgrounds and scene of horrific atrocities against western interests) turns up. "What can I do to help?"

Next morning Wendy, Angela and David travel in the Ambassador's 4 x 4 motorcade - with outriders- on the 9-hour road trip back to Khartoum. David has to contact the UK Civil Aviation Authority about the accident. By this act of kindness HMG's ambassador in Khartoum makes up for the infifference of hs consular staff on the previous day.

Later that night Steve - who had flown over the mountains into Ethiopia- calls from Addis to say the mountain waves were too tough for the auto-pilot to handle. So he hand flies Alpa Charlie at FL110 with full power for over 2 hours. " It was like a roller-coaster" says Steve. Quite a feat of flying. See: http://www.pilotfriend.com/safe/safety/mountain_wave.htm

David and Angela are in Khartoum deciding what to do next. Steve and Alastair and Charly along with Bernard and Derek ( who leads flying tours in Africa), takes over leadership of the stragglers in Addis. The plan is to fuel up - somewhere- and be in Wilson, Nairobi tMonday night where Ken's engineering outfit CMC will carry out the obligatory ( sand necessary)  50-hour check on Alpha Charlie. The hope is that we then set off for Zanzibar on Tuesday.  

Tomorrow's blog: Wilson Airport Nairobi and the legendary East African Flying Club. Famous members, icons ( for once the noun is justified) include: Tom Campbell Black, Malcolm Gladwell, Florence Wilson, Denys Finch-Hatton ( Robert Redford in Out of Africa) and Beryl Markham whose West with the Night is one of the classic flying biographies. We are treading on hallowed ground.

Let's have a song: the Senaa Band, Sunday lunch at the East African Aero Club, Wilson Airport, Nairobi. It's leader does a terrific impression of Louis Armstrong singing Hello Dolly!

Post 15: THE TRAILER: Cessna N154DJ retires hurt; the British Ambassador makes amends;Fox Formation is scattered to the four winds but plans to regroup and push on

David, 'Wing Commander material if ever was, a man of authority, gravitas and exerience is forced to retire from the TransAfrica Rally after the nosewheel of his Cessna 303 collapses at the end of his take-off run at Ad Damazin's pot-holed runway in southern Sudan, capital of the Blue Nile state. He takes it stoically. But it is a big loss- not just to him and to Angela- but to the entire Fox formation. Fox 1 had become the group's doyen, Master Jedi. Obi Wan Kanobi to Sam's Luke Skywalker in his formative years. The part of Hans Solo ( Harrison Ford) goes to Uberpiloten Hemut, first off chocks, first to take off and probably first on the sun-loungers in Mozambique ( Eine scherz Helmut), David's aircraft is a probably a write-off. A gift to the Sudanese people and its sparts parts industry. Thankfully everyone walked away unharmed, if a little shaken. undoubtedly saved by David's calm professionalism under fire. The British Ambassador, who happened to be in Ad Damazin at the time, comes to the rescue and makes amends for the dozy behaviour of his staff in Khartoum yesterday,

Read the full story on Sunday

Post 14: A story in four parts. Mubarak's triangle; Dongola, Merowe and a sunset flight over the Nile on Valentine's Day dedicated to Victoria; Khartoum airport; and Siesta time comes before helping stranded Brits for the British Embassy

MUBARAK'S TRIANGLE
At the south-eastern tip of Libya, where the Libyan border meets Egypt, and Sudan (Chad is just to the south) the 3 frontiers make a corner. It is a one of the most desolate and beautiful places on earth, a vast emptiness. Readers of the last post will remember Sam warning us not to stray into Egyptian airspace. Itchy trigger fingers at a tricky time in the Middle East. We entered the spot as a user waypoint on our GPS systems before leaving Kufra and called it Dogleg. We stayed well clear of Egyptian airspace. It was also decision point for those of us with limited fuel endurance. As it turned out, Alpha Charlie was burning as little as 7.5 USgallons ph giving us a range of over 500nm and running sweetly. We had 3hr 14mins to run to Dongola, our refuelling point, and 4hrs 42mins worth of fuel left in our tanks. About 14.4 on the Exhaust Temperature Gauge and power back to around 2500 RPM.

I asked the other Foxes on our private chat frequency as we flew over it whether they could come up with something a bit more, well, pertinent for Dogleg. Just William came up with Mubarak's Moment because we wouldn't be here were it not for the uprising in Egypt which swept the old autocrat from power and diverted us to Libya. So Mubarak's Triangle it is, after the Golden Triangle where Cambodia, Thailand and Laos meet. Flying at 7,500 lends perspective to things: as a journalist on the FT I used to hear  a lot self-serving arguemnts couched in fancy languge - usually from big and small business and Foreign Office mandarins and US State Department officials- about how autocracy was better than democracy if it produced stability. Good for whom? The patronising assumption being that democracy was far too complex a concept to be entrusted to emerging countries. And dealing with thugs like Saddam in Iraq or autocrats like Mubarak in Egypt was more predictable.We shall see. The other thought that occurred to me was that this popular uprising calling for democracy was not inspired by the barrel of an American gun through regime change. That's western arrogance at its most puerile. This wind of change started with a vegetable seller in Tunisia who set fire to himself because he was being hounded by the local goons. It has swept away one of the most powerful dons in the Middle East and has started a second Arab revolt. Tanks on the streets of Bahrain. Anger in Yemen. Rioting in Benghazi, Libya where we have just flown from. Colonel Gadhaffi, Libya's boss has said he will join the demos- while his security forces are killing protestors. You have to hand it to him. He has a sense of humour even if it is warped.. But the genie is out of the bottle. The fear is gone. There will be unprecedented change and, no doubt, unforeseen consequences. We'll just have to deal with them. It's not a Berlin Wall moment. The Soviet block was monolithic so it fell like a line of dominoes when the Polish shipyard workers lit the spark. The Middle East is more complex. But, after decades of corruption and suppression there is hope and dignity for its people. The comon desire for freedom is in our genes.

DONGOLA, MEROWE, DOWNWIND LEFT FOR RUNWAY 02 OVER THE NILE
Dongola: scene of a victory by Kitchener over the Mahdist forces in 1896; built on the ruins of Old Dongola capital of the old Christian kingdom of Nubia; date palms, friendly Sudanese and our first glimpse of the life-giving Nile, the longest river in the world at over 4,130 miles. To the north Aswan and Luxor. To the south Khartoum. Our first refuelling stop where we have to pump Avgas by hand out of sealed barrels hauled here from somewhere under Sam's instructions. The rule is: if the seal is broken don't touch it. If you fill your tanks let the fuel settle before draining some of it off to test for impurities. We take off in formation just as the sun is slipping below the yardarm for the short flight to Merowe which is at the other end of a great bend in the Nile. We come in to land at Merowe about an hour later flying the downwind leg over the Nile. I'll say that again: we join downwind for Runway 02 Left downwind over the Nile. A long way from Cranfield airfield Alpha Chalie's home base. I have to pinch myself. The river runs parallel to a new and virtually empty airport with a 5000ft runway and a tower which looks like a modernist beer can.  A sunset flight over the Nile on Valentine's Day. I think of, my wife,Victoria and I wish she could be here to share this moment. At Merowe the officials get the hump. Who are we, what are doing there? It takes hours sort out. We have missed a day so the lovely Nubian Rest House we were due to stay at is full. Scattered tourists come here to see the small, kit-built pyramids which Egyptian architects flogged up and down the Nile after the great ones in Egypt got some good press. I sleep in a worker's dormitory in the small own on my own under a warm, starlit sky, humble but drenched in atmosphere and impeccable, gentle Sudanese hospitality.

KHARTOUM, CAPITAL OF SUDAN
On the flight to Khartoum we hear the big birds passing overhead and reporting in: Speedbird 46, Gulf Air 01, Ethiopian 194, Qatar 523. We are at 6000feet. Alastair, William and Richard fly low looking for camels. It's become an obsession. The descent into Khartoum is bumpy, ferocious thermals lifting and bumping Alpha Charlie. " This will make you a better pilot" says Steve. Thanks buddy. As we turn base a couple of irritated passenger jet skippers ask to push back and taxi only to be told by a slightly harrassed but helpful traffic controller that there's a formation of loons in light aircraft coming in and it's way above his paygrade to take any chances so would they bide their time. Khartoum airport must have more UN, Red Cross and World Food Programme aircraft than virtually anywhere in the world. Mostly crewed by jolly Russian and Ukranian pilots. I've always thought there was something iconic about Russian planes. Antonovs, Yaks, Bears, MiGs..there's something muscular and at the same time beautiful about them.

I go to bed wiped out. I wake in the middle of the night with ferocious stomach cramps. The next morning a charming Sudanese doctor tells me I have gastroenteritis. He gives me a couple of jabs and tells me to rest. I decide not to acompany Steve on the leg to Addis and fly, instead, straight to Nairobi, Kenya on a scheduled flight to meet the others there on Saturday at the legendary East African Aero Club. I'm disappointed. But Steve doesn't need an invalid in the cockpit asking " Can we land?" every few minutes. He is accompanied by Adam, Sam's cheerful and competent Kiwi side-kick.

Down in Damazin, capital of the Blue Nile state, David has damaged his nose-wheel on the way to Addis Ababa and has to overnight and wait for an engineer and/or spare parts.. More on that tomorrow.

MEMO TO WILLIAM HAGUE 
 Re: SIESTA TIME AT THE BRITISH EMBASSY KHARTOUM

" Hello. I'm a British citizen and I may need your help."

" Yes?"

" I flew in on Wednesday in my own aircraft as part of a formation but I got sick and they've had to leave Addis Ababa without me. The Sudanese want you to vouch for me. But my passport is at the airport and you will need to see it."

" We will need to see your passport"

" That's what I just said. I'm ringing in case I need to get in touch later. I hope you can help"

" It's the Sudanese weekend. We start our break at 2:30- in about 2 hours- so no consular officer will be available after that"

" Could I please speak to the vice-consul and maybe get a number I could call you on later?."

" I'll try and put you through. Sorry I can't get through to her"

" What's her name? Does she have a direct line/"

" Her name Sarah but you will have to ring back. Call the switchboard."

When I call back I get a recorded message - press option 2- which says consular queries are only dealt with on 3 days a week. Today is not one of them. Would I leave a recorded message? I do. But nobody gets back to me.
 I don't know what consular services are for but there's a jolly good quiz on the Foreign Office website about them which wins you an IPad if you get the answers right. Presumably one of the questions is NOT "Will we delay our weekend to help stranded Brits abroad ?"

Mubarak's Triangle

Refuelling by hand from drums at Dongola

OK. Just this one pic with my Akubra hat

The Nile !!!

Russian cargo planes carrying aidworkers and food to Sudan's troubled south including Darfur. 
Below Alastair "The Chopper" bonding with Russian UN helicopter pilots at Khartoum

Post 13: Fox formation at Kufra, Libya



Fox formation scrambling

GPS view of Alpha Charlie entering Africa..Crete

 to the south, Egypt to the left, Libya ahead

THE WORLD'S MOST AMBITIOUS IRRIGATION PROJECT: Libya's green circles are irrigated by deep aquifers from 'fossil water'. The man-made river cost US$20billion to create..grapes dangle from vines in the scorching desert. Libya has no lakes or rivers and virtually no rain. The 2,333 mile network of pipes - probably the biggest irrigation project on earth- carries water from four major aquifers which run deep under Libya, Egypt and Chad. They hold an estimated 480 cubic miles of ice-age water buried up to 600 metres underground. The water is carried to Libya's cities in the north and, along the way, farmers use the water to plant crops. The aim is to plant up 400,000 acres....

Refuelling courtesy of the Libyan Air Force at Kufra and ( below) first sight of the desert

Kufra is about as far south as you can get in Libya without being in Sudan (south) or Egypt (east). Just north of the Tropic of Cancer, it feels like a frontier town, a cross roads between countries. Which it is. Both on the ground and in the air. As we started our descent from 7500 feet into Kufra over a shimmering desert landscape British Airways Speedbird 65 was above us at 37000 feet asking Kufra tower to relay a message to Tripoli that they were on their way. I know not where from or to. Outside our little hotel (the only one), the Muslim call to prayer reverberates. Unusually both the muezzin's ( priest) call and the congregation's response is broadcast over loudspeakers echoing over the rooftops, like an Arab Gegorian chant. Kufra is a small, dusty, ramshackle town, an oasis in the Libyan desert. At midday it's 23 degrees in February. In high summer temperatures reach 50 degrees centigrade. The lip-smacking aroma of barbequed chicken mingles with more earthy smells.Virtually no women in the streets. At the airport I chat to a Sudanese man in a magnificent turban who was seeing his brother off to Khartoum on the only flight of the day. He seems genuinely ecstatic about the revolution in Egypt. Where next I ask? "Yemen" he says. Sudan maybe? He laughs and gives me the Arab equivelant of a High Five. I hope so. These people deserve better.


We've had to spend a second night here courtesy (not) of the Libyan air force, the only supplier of Avgas for our little fleet. Authorisation finally came through from Tripoli this morning so we all traipsed out to the airport. But by the time we'd refuelled it was too late to make Merowe and Sam the Man judged that Dongola, our first waypoint, a hefty 512nm away inside the Sudanese border, was OK to land and refuel but not secure enough to spend the night.


Crete to Kufra was the first time we worked as a team on the ground and in the air. There are 8 aircraft, Foxes 1-8. G-VAAC is 6. I'll be featuring all of the team over the next couple of weeks but this is how it works: Fox 1 (David in his twin-engined Cessna) leads the way and relays weather and other key flight information back down the line on our own chat frequency. Out here, in between airports, there is nobody to talk to for hundreds of miles. Which is a blessed relief from the UK and most of western Europe, where you have to change frequencies every few minutes. This system of aerial smoke signals is a vital part of getting safely from A to B and gives each Fox ( each aircraft has its own speeds, endurance and other limitations) the ability to make its own decisions about what level to fly at if, for example, they wish to avoid cloud, and whether to go all the way to our intended destination or divert to the nearest airfield. The two other fastest are Bernard in his turbo-charged Mooney and Helmut (Europe's most distinguished bush pilot) in his gobsmackinjg Cessna 206 with its 450hp Allison (Rolls-Royce) engine and a 5-blade prop which is so beautifully engineered it's almost a sculpture. At the back is the slowest, William and Sam in helicopter G-DINY. Fuel and endurance are critical on these mercifully few long legs. Thanks to some skilled leaning of our engine by Steve we managed the 4.6 hour,512nm flight from Benghazi to Kufra with an hour's fuel to spare. The helicopter had to put down in the desert about 100 miles from Kufra to fill up from the jerry can in the back. As we get deeper into the flight and the fastest and slowest aircraft get further apart messages are relayed down the line from the airfields at our destination to the tail-end Charlies. Example:


" Fox 8 ( William in the chopper) to Fox formation. Could someone ask Kufra tower whether they have runway lights? We're running a bit late">


" Fox 7 ( Richard with a Yorkshire accent so broad you can't see the other end) just use your torch William"


Half-way to Kufra we see Gaddafi's extraordinary crop fields in the desert: hundreds of perfect green circles set against the sand, each about 40 acres, irrigated from a central spout which draws water from the underground table and pivots around a central point. I have no idea what they do to the balance of nature but, seen from 7500 feet, they are make an unforgettable impression.

Tomorrow, Dongola to refuel and the ancient ruins of Merowe. Sam has given us strict orders to stay out of Egyptian airspace. "They might be a bit twitchy right now and use us as target practice". You can say that again Sam.

Post 12: Blog interrupted...

Runner with cleft stick has delivered following message from Slowflyer: After 800nm journey from Crete via Benghazi G-VAAC has arrived in Kufra, on the border between Libya, Egypt and Sudan. Regrets no post today or possibly tomorrow. Hope to file from Merowe(Sudan) tomorrow, if not, then Khartoum in 3 days, always assuming revolutionary fiesta has not travelled south across the border from Egypt. In which case I shall take refuge in the bar with the rest of the TransAfrica team. 

Post 11: Heraklion Crete and the story of a true British hero

Windy landing (or "sporty" as Peter the CFI at Bonus Aviation, Cranfield, would say) at Nikos Kazantzakis airport. Named after Greece's most celebrated 20th Century writer, author of Zorba the Greek and admirer of Lenin. Well, nobody's perfect are they? The TransAfrica team is all here now. William arrived today in his egg whisk from Paphos in Cyprus where he and Gruppenfuhrer Sam Rutherford had carefully positioned it before it became apparent that Egypt's admirable demonstrators meant business- as did Coolhand Steve and I from Corfu. Alpha Charlie has now brought us safely nearly 1800nm from the UK and we've covered around 25% of the southbound journey to South Africa.

You learn every day. Today's lesson was: Don't try and be too clever and land on the numbers on an airfield by the sea with a sheer drop just before the threshold in a gusting crosswind. We land on runway 27 with a 17kt wind from 340 degrees. Crab in then kick left rudder to straighten her over the centre-line. Keep the power on and, if the runway is long enough, use up as much as you need before touchdown. Then chop the power. Elementary I know but there we are. Steve saved the day. We make a good team. He's the more experienced pilot and I, erm, can speak a useful assortment of languages and have been around a few blocks.

I'm sorry about more pictures of mountains. But flying over the magnificent Taygetos range with their jagged snow-covered limestone and dolomite peaks, with Sparta in the plain below, warms the heart. Actually it's bloody marvellous. Airfield is LGPZ ( Greek military but also charter flights. That sounds like a sensible use of public resources. Instead of a 3rd runway at Heathrow - BAA can't even cope with 2 for Pete's sake- let's use Brize Norton or somesuch.

We flew over the Mani where Patrick Leigh-Fermor, the greatest travel writer since Herodotus the Greek (5th C BC) retired with his late wife Joan. At 18 he left home to walk the length of Europe; at 28 as an SOE agent in World War II ( pictured above in German uniform) he parachuted into Crete and kidnapped, General Kreipe, the German commander, (Film: based on the gripping book, Ill met by Moonlight,1957, starring Dirk Bogarde) and recounted in Leigh-Fermor's magnificent " A time of Gifts". The battle for Crete was brutal, neither Germans nor Cretans giving quarter. " Then Xekhasame" - we haven't forgotten- they still say in the mountains where the first wave of German airborne troops suffered appalling casualties from local resistance fighters and took terrible reprisals. Hitler forbade further large-scale paratroop drops after that. Leigh-Fermor, DSO, finally retired to the southern Peloponnese and his beloved Mani, subject of another great book. He was interviewed by William Dalrymple in the Telegraph in 2008. " You've got to bellow " Sir Patrick told Dalrymple, cupping his ear " He's become an economist you say? Well thank God for that..I thought you said he'd become a Communist". Victoria, my better half, and I drove round the winding coastal road to Kardamyli, Leigh-Fermor's village, which I could see from 7,500 feet, a few years ago. The Mani is a wild an uncluttered place, famous for (past) banditry and carpets of wild flowers in springtime. Fiercely resistant to occupiers Maniotis believe thenselves to be descendants of that greatest of all warrior races, guns for hire, the Spartans, and lived in their famous fortified towers from which wealthier villagers shot at each other( and intruders) to settle vendettas. More peaceful today. Beaches, village squares with whicker chairs, old men with handle-bar moustaches and widows in black, spit-roast lamb sizzling with rosemary and olive oil which  is liquid nectar. Happy days.

As we coasted out over The Mani, Athens Info was guiding Olympic40 south and said as an afterthought, in Greek, that there two " xenei" (foreigners) bimbling around. That was G-VAAC and the Bumble Bee which, irritatingly, is always 20 minutes ahead of us however much of a head-start we have. And it's kit-built in Chocolate Charly's shed in Toulouse.

Tomorrow is a rest day. Saturday Africa.

PS: William says there isn't enuff stuff about aeroplanes in these blogs so I willco in next.

Post 10: Corfu

I'll let the pics speak for themselves today. They include: the wild and wooly mountains of Albania; the sentinel GPS/display; crossing the border from Italy to Greece in superb visibility at 5500 feet; runway 17 at Corfu (LGKR); and Chocolate Charlie with the Greek flag in the background. Wonderfully helpful and relaxed flying. And Air Traffic Control and ground support in Greece couldn't be more helpful by the way. True, Avgas is limited and you have to fly special VFR routes or under airways but the sunny disposition of the Greeks makes it all very laid-back. Here's Greek AOPAs excellent FAQ:  http://www.aopa.gr/en/infosdetails.asp?NEWS_ID=1

Tomorrow 378nm to Heraklion in Crete. I'm off for a pizza and a glass of ouzo.

Post 9: The Chopper v The Iron Donna at Rome ATC

Some days, as a journalist, you just know what the splash is. Today has been such a day. Alastair (The Chopper) Moon in F-PSCB wrestling with The Iron Donna at Rome Air Traffic Control. She was determined to make the Bumble Bee (Visual Flight Rules only) fly at 1000ft through the Rome TMA - and beyond. Press the pause button now if you're not a pilot and find this a bit nerdy. Rome TMA ( airspace) extends an awfully long way out to sea, south and west of Fiumicino airport and the fact that this put Alastair and Chocolate Charly in the Bumble Bee smack in the middle of a cloud layer was neither here nor there. So 960ft it was for as long as it took. But not a nano-second longer if The Chopper (ex-RAF helicopter pilot and, like me, fully-paid up member of the Ackward Squad pictured below) had anything to do with it. Then up pops the Iron Donna to say that Naples ATC also wanted them to fly at 1000ft through their airspace. And if they didn't like it would they speak to Naples. No offer of a Special VFR clearance. Well they tried talking to Naples. But neither Approach nor Tower responded initially. " OK" says the Iron Donna" you stay on this frequency and report over Capri". Not a marriage made in heaven then. We got the same treatment and only after several tries did Steve patiently coax a response from Naples who seemed very busy dealing with EasyJet 425Foxtrot. Well The Chopper and Chocolate Charly were having none of it. Having consulted their chart they established that they were perfectly within their rights to fly over the cloud at 3,500 in that bit. " Naples we are within legal minima. Maintaining 3500 feet Foxtrot Charlie Bravo". No quarter asked for. No quarter given." Don't ever allow ATC to push you around" said The Chopper when we finally made into Salerno on the Amalfi coast. Quite.

Having said that flying from French into Italian airspace is a joy. Bonjour becomes Ciao for the locals, squawk turn into " squawcando" and " pass your message" into Avanti.  Just past Elba (where Napoleon was exiled after his abdication 1814) we saw a splendid black-hulled schooner at anchor. The Iron Donna informed a local helicopter that four Typhoon fighers were playing tag  at 2000ft at high speed" in the vicinity. Above, heavies, heading every which way, were tracing vapour trails across a crystalline blue sky. Capri lay below where Our Gracie (Fields) retired after World War II to open her hotel= Cansona del Mare (Song of the Sea). Bliss.

We didn't make it Corfu. Too late. Too much low cloud. The traffic in Salerno is as bad as London. But the people are lovely it's the Amalfi coast on the Tyrrenhian sea and 13 degrees centigrade in early February. Mustn't grumble.

Post 8: To Julian,my son.Happy Birthday Jules

This feels real. Steve and I and Alpha Charlie are finally on our way. Gaillac to Corsica. A fine day at Gaillac, fully laden ( and some) AC manages wheelsup in under 600 metres off a soggy grass runway. She lifts gently with two stages of flap ( respect.. Steve) and climbs easily. We bank left, head east south east and level off at FL55 (5500 feet), the Lycoming engine giving off a solid, satisfied growl. She's saying " This is OK. No worries guys". We both feel a load starting to lift (pun intended).

Soon we see the Pyrenees off to the south. Toulouse air traffic hand us over to Montpellier (oldest university in Europe, gateway to the spectacular Cevennes). French ATC are (almost) invariably helpful. They say 'Sir' and, if it's a lady, it's good form to say 'Madame'. And Bonjour. It feels like travelling Business Class, one ATC handing you over seemlessly to the next. They know you're coming, provided you've filed a flight plan otherwise there's lots of silent Gallic shrugging. Chapeau. Hats off.

Over Nice ( shrouded in cloud) a minor drama is being played out. A French rescue helicopter is cleared to cut through restricted airspace to reach a fire blazing somewhere in the Rhone valley. As we overfly St Tropez Steve and I exchange views on Brigitte Bardot, the actress, French Aphrodite and now animal rights activist, who lives there. I tell him I had an uncle who used to provide her with antique furniture at her house, La Madrague, where I was once taken as a teenager. He asks me a pertinent question about her anatomy which I can't answer with any accuracy. Way to the north we see the Alps, craggy, snow-capped summits lit up by the sun, contrasting vividly with the green and brown valleys and lower peaks of Provence below us. I am speechless, humbled and thrilled all at once. Who says men can't multi-task? All I can do is take pictures, like a gawping tourist.

Our newly-fitted fuel-flow meter is coming in very handy and tells us we're burning a satisfying 7.5-8.5 gallons per hour so if we do have to turn back because of poor weather at Corsica we have plenty in the tank to return to the mainland. Highly recommended. I have a new Honywell Bendix King Sentinel OB3000 display (the first to be fitted to a fixed-wing in the UK) with traffic alert. It's essentially a VFR tool,with a crystal clear screen and some nice features. But the jury ( that's Steve and I) is still out on its overall effectiveness. I shall report back.

Then there is Corsica, home of the Union Corse, France's Mafia, lovely beaches and a terrific soccer team. You can see why its called The Mountain In The Sea, its wild and craggy heights rising majestically out of carpet of cloud. We join the circuit for a left hand onto runway 34. On the apron we are met by the Gendarmerie in their smart blue uniforms and side-arms who record our details virtually down to our inside leg measurements. Flight time: 3.5 hours. Tomorrow Corfu.

Post 7: Fogged in

Fogged in. A High is moving in across France but Gaillac is in a valley. Charly ( who's grandfather DID own a chocolate factory and so might Charly such is his disposition) and Alastair can't take off in the bumble-bee as it is strictly limited to flying VFR(visually) and since you get guillotined in France for walking on la pelouse they (and we) are stuck. To be fair we wandered up to the airfield mid-morning and couldn't see the end of the runway.Soupe.But of course by the time we'd had our,erm, 2nd glass of rose at lunch the sky was crystal clear. Hoping to get to Bastia in Corsica tomorrow. I shall wear my moon (survival) suit. Sam has pushed the plan B button. We shall enter Libya via Benghazi and not Tobruk. But there's a couple of 500nm legs over Gaddafi's back yard to the Sudanese border. So 5 litres of water each ( which for those kindly following this on the Flyermag website) will know nearly stuffs our Weight and Balance numbers. One litre=Ikg, 10 litres.......Stayed tuned

Post 6: Real flying

After our chaotic start yesterday we did a bit better today. We filed an IFR (instrument) flight plan and left Tours in light drizzle and low cloud slotted in between several pairs of fast French air force jets taking off in close formation. Probably instructors and pupils learning the magic art of precision flying, so close their wingtips seemed almost to overlap. Thrilling to watch. Le Top Gun. Them not me. The operations staff at Tours were welcoming, friendly efficient and helpful. They downloaded the weather for us at various airfields we might land at (Memo to MetOffice UK: get with the programme and check out some of the software the FrenchMet guys have. For starters try http://www.orbifly.com/member/metmap.php?lang=ENG ) found us a hotel, gave us a cup of coffee " Sorry,no tea. We are French.". They then sent us on our way with warm wishes for our onward journey through Africa " Vous allez OU?"..and promised to follow the blog. Merci les gars.

After an initial climb through cloud to 4000 feet we were cleared to 7000 feet (FL70) and emerged in blue skies between two layers, white and puffy underneath and thin stratus on top. Outside temperature was zero degrees Celsius but we hadly picked up any ice on the airframe. Alpha Charlie behaved impeccably. No battery tantrums today. Leaned the mixture and got less than 8.5  US gallons an hour most of the way. Very frugal. As we sped south at around 110 knots with a 35kt cross-wind, the skies above and ahead cleared and we caught sight of the Pyrenees about 150 miles ahead shimmering in a blue haze. It took my breath away.

Limoges had cloud down to 300ft. We could hear frustrated airline pilots chattering away at machine-gun speed in French to the tower. Definately not cricket. L'Anglais est obligatoire. I could tell you a story about a German pilot who went ballistic for being ordered to speak English at a German airfield but I won't. We might need their money.The French, bless their little croissants, just won't accept they've lost the battle for La Francophonie..no direspect to Voltaire et al.

Toulouse radar, anticipating our needs and reading our minds, quickly cleared us to our destination: Gaillac. Nice little wine attached to a town, tannic, fresh with a hint of herbs and spices. Grass runway. "Will you land VFR (visually). Cloud base maybe 1000ft, maybe.." he asked implying that we were bonkers. We did, John skillfully taking over just as we broke through over a green and damp landscape dotted with vineyards and woods, executing a perfect hard bank to the left to line up and brought her down on well-drained French soil.

Alastair ( ex-RAF chopper pilot and Captain Bird's Eye look alike) met us in his stately little Renault van with the push-pull gear-stick. Alastair and his friend Charly are joining us on the trip in Charly's kit-built dinky toy( compared to our Tonka). It's actually fast, has a range of 1000kms, sups Avgas in thimbelfulls, a parachute ( for the plane not them) and almost certainly a small wine cellar. Alastair used to own a vineyard. It's a brilliant little aircraft.

Steve arrives tonight from the UK. We head to Corsica on Sunday, then Corfu, Crete and almost certainly entering Africa at Tobruk in Libya, Rommel and Monty and all that. Sam the Man appears to have finally accepted the inevitable and canned the route through Egypt.

Post 5, Fog in channel but continent not cut off

After a number of false starts and the odd not wholly kosher promise Alpha Charlie finally set off to get through a narrow window of grim but not disastrous February weather in France on the first leg of her 18,000nm trip to Africa and back.
I got up feeling as close to suicidal as someone as obdurate as me can feel when the phone rang. Deus ex machina. John McGwynne, a ferry pilot and Cirrus instructor I'd never met who'd seen my distress flare sent the previous midnight called at 8:30 am to say he was free. Pilots are like that. Well, most pilots. Apart from the ones with Very Big Watches. John has 2300 hours in the bank, an instrument rating and a nice, open manner which suggested caution and experience and nothing to prove. Sometimes you just go with your gut. And mine was telling me this meeting was what Karl Jung called Synchronisity.or good karma. John is one of the good guys. Not, as some pilots can be, serial willie-wavers.
We meet an hour and a half later at Cranfield,  Then everything that could go wrong did. Flat battery; jump start; flat again; another jump start; avionics died one by one and the piece of paper we'd scribbled the flight plan on in haste (Rule One broken) was spun away by a nearby King Air starting up. We eventually took off half an hour late, IFR flight plan shot anyway, but with nice egg and cress sarnies from Cafe Pacific and some refreshing Cranberry juice on board.

Layers of stratus cloud over the channel, more muscular stuff over France but not quite CBs, moderately helpful French traffic controllers who seem to need to be spoon fed flight plans and are thrown if you want to divert. Mustn't grumble though. They produced the goods, warming us off Limoges and Poitiers and Toulouse (our hoped-for destination) which we would have reached after dark anyway which I didn't fancy. Weaving and dodging cloud at between 6-7000 feet, auto-pilot behaving itself. Engine leaned to around 8.5US gallons an hour. Purring along. I love Alpha Charlie. And I think she loves me. Shucks.

We eventually plumped for Tours, a semi-military airport. John took her into the Instrument Landing glideslope (one day I too shall be a grown-up pilot who can do that) and handed her over on finals. Greaser of alanding  if I say so myself. As we stepped onto the Apron 4 fast jets..Mystere or Raffale or somesuch, played about over the airfield like over-excited puppies chasing each other. No doubt a fly-past in our honour. Incredibly helpful airport staff. Handshake, fuel, hotel at air crew rates, taxi. I was wearing my gardening/flying suit so maybe that helped. ( Tomorrow Toulouse then Corsica and Corfu where Sam, our gruppenfuehrer, I suspect (and hope) will announce that flying a bunch of over excited penioners and some of their wives into the jaws of a revolution in Egypt while everyone else is headed for the exit may not be such a good idea not least for his business. ATC of the day is a joint award : Farnborough Lars and Paris Information. Man of the match is John. Thank you. Merci. And good night.