A couple of trips over a couple of days in the good weather. First up, the RV6, for a flight down the east coast to Fishburn. Last time we were there was in the Sting, in 2017.
You can see from the airfield diagram below that there is a bit of a slope on the grass runway, which is nice and long. Note the parallel grass taxiway, more on that later…
The standard “Ho Chi Minh” trail down the east coast passes Holy Island:
Quite a lot of cloud buildup over The Cheviot…
Passing Tynemouth again, and the wreck of the Zephyros. Again. The cloud had become more of a high overcast, and this continued all the way to Fishburn.
Parked at Fishburn. The trouble with grass airfields is that you have to mow them. When I arrived the taxiway had been mown, but not the runway. That fresh mown strip looked so inviting that I initially lined up on it, but as we got closer it became obvious that the runway was the other bit.
Fishburn is a busy little place, with lots of hangarage:
The cafe was about two-thirds full, and by subtly eavesdropping I could make out that not all the patrons were flyers. It’s a good recommendation when the locals patronise the place. I got the standard coffee and cake:
On departure the wind had swung round to be exactly across the runway. I would have liked to take off downhill for the extra acceleration but everybody was still using runway 26 so that’s what we did. Uphill with a crosswind, but the RV made swift work of the take off and soon we were skirting the Newcastle zone to the west and setting course north…
I found out later that just after I departed the Vulture Squadron from Sleap had arrived. Just missed them…Glen, Paul and Pete who were at the VPAC fly-in in various Cubs. Glen and Paul were in a borrowed Grumman and had a puncture. Luckily Pete is an engineer and they got it sorted. They stayed the night. For me, the weather was glorious for the trip north…
The route was further inland than the outbound leg, and was planned to fly over the farm strip at Lempitlaw in the Borders…
You can just make out Lempitlaw airstrip in the centre of the picture, just beyond the small pond:
Next day the weather was still fine, so the Cub was dragged out…
…and half an hour later we found ourselves in Cumbernauld:
I had a meeting with Johnny of Phoenix Flight Training to sort out my two yearly instructor flight and licence sign-off, so walked along the edge of the apron to the Phoenix office. A German registered Pilatus PC-6 survey aircraft was just starting up. Noisy thing. I’ve jumped out of the same type of aircraft at Mmabatho in South Africa and Empuriabrava in Spain, they are great utility aircraft:
On start up, who should be preflighting the Tomahawk parked next to us? None other than Scott, who produced the Cub video last year. He was off on an hour-building trip with a friend, in between studying for ATPL exams and working as an air ambulance operations officer for Gama Aviation.
We were soon airborne and heading direct back to Perth. Here we are passing the Kincardine Bridges. Note the swinging centre section on the far bridge – this was to allow ships up the river to the old port at Alloa and also the ammunition storage facility in the loop of the river. The shipping no longer goes that far upstream, and the new bridge doesn’t have the ability to let ships through…
And finally back in the hangar, ready for all the adoring fans to visit…
Long may the good weather last!