Author: Russell

Time to catch up with posts as the weather isn’t conducive to much at the moment…

A nice trip down the east coast to Eshott for lunch. The cafe there is pretty good, and very popular with the locals who arrive in droves at the weekend to watch the aircraft while eating.

On the way down we passed Holy Island:

Eshott is a great destination for us; within an hour’s flying, great cafe as discussed and it’s even in a different country! Perfect for a flying lunch date…

The following week, some RVing with a former student along for a jolly on a really nice day…

Over the Kirriemuir area my phone dinged with a message along the lines of ”fancy a cuppa?”

So we dropped into Kirriemuir International for a flying vist:

Tea and biccies and the Cub in the sunshine. Not a bad way to spend the afternoon, my former student got to log the flight as tailwheel familiarisation AND farm strip familiarisation! With refreshments…

A week later, back in that same Cub for some teaching:

Can’t wait until my one is back in the air again. Things are progressing..!

A slightly belated report from early June in France. One of the first stops after getting off the ferry was this street in Cherbourg, with the big sign on the wall.

Pretty cool to see it in the flesh

It was there 82 years ago when German POWs were marched into captivity after the battle for the vital port town:

The invasion area of Normandy was a sea of green vehicles, re-enactments, parachute jumps and commemorations. We didn’t really have a plan but decided to base ourselves in Carentan in the centre of the US zone. We visited Sainte-Mere-Eglise to the re-enactment at Camp Geronimo. Camp Texas at Crasville Batterie and the “Longest Yarn” (again) where we met some veterans. In between road trips, we didn’t have to walk to far to come across something interesting…

Hundreds of photos so here’s a small selection.

Camp Geronimo “tent city”:

Three Sherman tanks and one Stuart light tank:

The Shermans parked up in the main square of Sainte-Mere-Eglise (SME to those in the know!):

Jeep and a Dodge Command Car in SME…

The convoy slowly grinding its way through the village on the way back to camp:

Random car park = three jeeps! Everywhere you turned there was another military vehicle.

The re-enactment guys getting ready for the parade in Carentan. French army and US Airborne troops also attended.

This could almost be a 1944 photo, apart from the shop front behind:

And finally…bonus aviation content, courtesy of the museum at the Batterie de Merville

Normal service will be resumed shortly…

First solo, Whiskey Kilo, Belfast Aldergrove.

Probably NOT on the day this picture was taken though…

Whiskey Kilo is no more, I hope I can keep going for a little bit longer!

Replica Eindecker pilots are an elite bunch. There’s not a lot of us about. One who has flown G-FOKR is Paul, who recently flew up to Perth from Eshott on a tour of seven Scottish airfields. As he left for Balado we got in a minute or two of impromptu formation flying which produced the great shot above.

Fired up with enthusiasm for formation flying again I paired up with Des in his Falco (lovely Italian design) for a bit more:

The sleek Italian lines of the Falco as Des hangs in echelon starboard:

After a change of lead, I’m now Number 2 in echelon port:

And I’d like to think this is what Des saw as I slid over into echelon starboard…

Great fun – we need to do more!

Later that evening – time to jump into the yellow L18 Cub to be checked out…I’ve been asked to help the group with checkouts, tailwheel conversions and so on.

It was great to be back in a Cub, even if Aaron’s head and shoulders blocked my view of the instrument panel. This L18 version has a simpler electrical system than my L4, as I have a starter motor. Echo India needs to be hand propped. It’s a little scary the first few times, but with the correct application of prime, throttle position, prayer and human sacrifices, it usually starts on the first blade. Aaron has developed a technique which works really well…

Thumbs up for the L18 Cub:

I’m used to flying from the backseat as my L4 Grasshopper is flown solo from the rear. So the instructors position on the L18 feels natural.

It has been cool to see to world through the struts again…and I can teach others the joy of Cubbing now:

And in other good news…the L4 wings are due back later in the summer after repair. Finally! Maybe we’ll make the D-Day L-Birds meet in 2027…

Formation flying, Cub flying and news about my wings…some days are better than others!

A couple of months ago our Norwegian friend Klaus landed his Lancair on the temporary ice airfield in Sweden:

A few weeks ago we visited the same lake. It was still cold in the wind but all the ice had gone:

Back home and it was time for yet another RV oil change so we went looking for the last remnants of snow while at the same time warming the oil…

A good indication of the surface wind direction!

After flying around at 90 knots in the training aircraft the speed of the RV was refreshing:

Floating around over the hills to the north of the home ‘drome we came across this valley where the River Tilt flows down to join the River Garry at Blair Atholl.

Known in RAF circles as “Star Wars Valley” ( after the trench on the Death Star which Luke Skywalker flew along on his bombing run in the final battle ) it runs perfectly straight for over 5 miles. It is regularly used for fast jet training and is one-way for safety…

I was tempted to go lower and have a look but down there the wind and turbulence would have much more of an effect on the 140kt RV than a 420kt fighter…

…and it wouldn’t be the done thing to get run over from behind by one of His Majesty’s finest!

After landing all the warm oil was drained, filter removed and new filter installed. Inspection of the old filter element showed no surprises…a little bit of a messy job but worth it…

Spotted out and about by one of my students:

Somebody has an aviation background!

Nice weather for a few days in a row. While instructing navigation there’s time to sit back and enjoy the view:

Dunkeld and Birnam from the mighty Cessna 152. Nice…

It stands for “Back in the saddle” – Brenda hadn’t flown for a while so we decided to get her up for 20 minutes or so to see how she got on.

“Or so” turned out to be about an hour…

…and as you can see, everything was OK.

We did Montrose and back, then a wee detour to overfly Errol before heading back in. We’re already planning longer trips…

Meanwhile back at work I had no idea why my student (*) was flying towards the only cloud in the sky…

* Names redacted to protect the guilty (Mr S)!

I had to take some lifejackets for servicing in South Queensferry, right underneath the bridges from the previous post…

I think they are even more impressive from underneath, but I still prefer the view from above…

Almost 10 years ago I wrote about flying over the Queensferry Crossing, which was under construction at the time.

The Bridges

Hard to believe that the Queensferry Crossing will have been open for nine years in August 2026!

A couple of days ago a student wanted to practice a zone transit of Edinburgh airspace for a second time to gain confidence talking to “adult” air traffic control, so we got the clearance and entered controlled airspace again.

It was a lovely day as we came overhead the bridges:

The marina at Port Edgar lies between the two road bridges where they reach the south bank of the Forth at South Queensferry. At this point the aircraft is directly above the iconic Forth Rail Bridge…

After the bridges we proceeded west past the old ordnance depot and the newer bonded warehouses near Alloa:

…then back over Perth city on the way in to land: ( more bridges! Two road, one rail – just like Edinburgh ) :

A lovely winter’s day of flying. And it’s slowly starting to warm up…can’t wait for better weather for longer trips over the summer.

The price of Avgas is not allowed to rise – we have plans!

I was saddened to learn of the death last month of Richard Starks. Dick was a larger than life figure, one of the stalwarts of the replica World War One fighter movement in the US.

He bought a Cessna 120 and learnt to fly, then with a friend built two replica Nieuport fighters at home. These became the nucleus of the Kansas City Dawn Patrol. Wife Sharon was a little bit left out so she eventually learned to fly too and they built her an aircraft…

A high school mathematics teacher, Dick turned his hand to language and authored two books and numerous articles in the aviation press:

I read his first book ( on the left ) many moons ago and reread it before acquiring the replica Eindecker. I had to buy it again as I had leant it out and lost track of it. At the same time I bought his second book which was just as good as the first.

His books inspired the Walter Mitty in me and helped make the Eindecker purchase decision a lot easier. Great reads – recommended!

Condolences to Sharon and the family, RIP and blue skies Dick.

Nice obituary here with more details:

Richard Starks Obituary (1943 – 2026) – Weatherby Lake, MO – Kansas City Star

A little bit of snow at the home ‘drome – it lasted for a day or two:

Meanwhile in Sweden the snow lasts for months. Here’s Siljansnäs (ESVS) from the air:

Just after the snowfall. Andreas in the plough clears the way for Andreas and Sven in the aircraft…

The snow clearance width on the taxiway does look a little tight. But one good thing about snow at minus 10 degrees is that it tends to stay powdery, so if the wingtip does run across the top of the pile there’s no damage…

…although the pitot tube looks like it collected some:

Frozen lake Siljan in the background (lake in lower case as it is just Siljan, not Lake Siljan). The airfield is quite close to the water as it’s on the peninsula called Siljans nose – Siljans näs in Swedish, hence Siljansnäs. Place names are cool…

In January in our part of the UK we’ve only had a handful of nice days in the gaps between the wind and the rain…

The amount of rain led to several flood warnings for the usual suspects. Here’s the River Isla north-west of the airfield:

Meanwhile back in Sweden at Malung airfield – a beautiful day; cold, calm and crisp. Malung is where Robert and I had a fractured english/german/swedish conversation with an airport geezer about potatoes at the other airfield at Dala-Järna…

(See https://www.sigurdmartin.se/2019/08/27/kvallsflyg/ for Malung airfield in the summer…should open a new tab if I’ve got it right 🤞)

Another Sweden pic, another airfield:

This is Älvdalen to the north of (lake) Siljan. If you fly up the river and put the island on your left you will be lined up with the runway. The straight cut out of the trees is quite distinctive.

Älvdalen airfield in the summer can be seen at about the 3:00 mark here:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OLlM3j-CQSU&pp=ygUKU2lsamFuc25hc9gG1gE%3D

Flying in Sweden. Great fun, summer or winter. Can’t wait to go back.

Stop Press!

Finally found a use for AI…!

Here’s the original Malung picture: