Well....
What a tornado of activity here. Arrived Monday night at Helsinki on
a flight that had the view under the plane broadcast onto the monitors,
there are a lot of houses straight under the flight out of Heathrow.
Then on landing the monitors where switched back on and compelling
viewing it was even though a little nauseating, watching the view on the
monitor change and feeling it, except it was all 90 degrees out. But
then the view changed to the front and we could see the runway. We
landed onto the centre-line but then drifted to the left by what seemed
like a couple of feet. Absolutely compelling.
Then at the airfield got a hire car and then off on the adventure to
Joensuu. Finland is pretty flat, and full of trees. And that's about it.
It's clean, little traffic, no graffiti, pretty much all single track
roads with passing points and the odd section of motorway. No adverts to
distract, and the main road did not go through any
 towns.
There were though every kilometre speed cameras! With the road so clear
and little traffic, it is very difficult to keep to the predominately
80, 100km per hour speed limit and I am sure that I have gone through at
least 10 cameras at a speed more than the limit, the whole journey,
Helsinki to Joensuu, is about 400 kms!
I meet Peter, Stephen, Julian and Alan at the hotel
and get briefed by Peter on the goings on. After briefing I sleep in
Peters room, in separate beds.
Tuesday, no flying, but we spent most of the day
waiting around for briefings, getting to the hotel in the afternoon for
some sauna and swimming. 'Cept that Alan arrives with news that we were
to meet at reception for a summer house party with Pettri the Finnish
CAP-231 pilot. And we head off following a Volvo into the evening
arriving at a lakeside collection of buildings, the sleeping quarters
are away from the main partying house where there is a kitchen, sauna
and sitting room, and a barbeque place that was modelled on the
Flintstones. Three motorbikes at the front and an Icarus Ultralight
float plane on the lake out back. We talked and then it was sauna time.
All clothes off and in we go. After an amount of time that is described
as very close to uncomfortable, we bare-foot it to the lake and jump in,
swim around and then back in the sauna. On the second round trip whilst
still in the water, a float plane Cub comes in to land over our heads,
side slipping about 10 feet above the trees to land 100 yards away,
turns around and parks next to the Icarus. Julian, Alan and myself being
in the sauna cycle (in the lake) means that Stephen is ready and able to
go in the Cub to fly, after which we all get a go. It is a flight of
takeoff, touch and go on another lake (we fly close to the shore so that
it is near if we need to swim) and then up and finals onto just outside
the house, the logbook entry will
 read
20mins bad fish lake, Finland, 2 landings OH-CUB. What a blast. And it
was raining but we didn't notice. Then a barbeque with wine, beer,
salad, cheese and good company. And we learn some naughty phrases in
Finnish, although we don't know what they mean.
Then today Alan suggested we go back to the national
park for a foray. Walking, picking mushrooms and getting bitten by
mosquitoes was fun. And then at 15.00hrs back at the hotel we went to
the surprise aero do, which consisted of 30mins in a church listening to
a pilot organist playing and then to a marquee sort of setup where we
had fish soup (whole headless fish in erm... a soup sort of thing) and
chicken paella and a shooting comp. We won !
We met an Army Captain unmanned airplane pilot at the
do yesterday evening and today he was at the marquee do. He was picked
up by the float cub in the middle of town just down from the hotel. The
cub landed on the stretch of river running through the centre of town,
parked, picked him up, he waved to the gathered crowd and then took off.
There seems to be little stopping flying in Finland, the lake landings
are determined by if motor boats are allowed on the lake, if they are
then it is OK to come and go as you please. 99.99 percent of lakes allow
motorboats and the ones that don't are not marked on the map as such, so
its pretty much fly as you want to. What a great way to live.
So, in essence, been here two days. Not seen any
aerobat'ing. Hopefully will see some tomorrow. 3,000 square metres of
lake side property is 20,000 quid. Calculating financing and reassessing
work life balance......
Briefing at 9.30hrs tomorrow morning.
space cadet
Hello again,
As you probably picked up, flying was abandoned yesterday after just the
warm-up pilot. In the afternoon we walked a little in the town and
bought a few souvenirs. About tea-time we received a very welcome and
gracious invitation to join the Finnish pilots at a sauna/barbecue at
Petteri Tarma's summer house which is beside a local lake. We had just
leapt into the lake after the second round of the sauna when the
technical director Olli turned up in his Cub-on-Floats. So between
swimming and eating, we all had a quick couple of
 water
circuits. If only we could have practised the Unknown figures.....
Today was a rest day, based on a lousy weather
forecast. It turned out lovely and sunny!! The feared anti-cyclone
turned East and sped off to Leningrad instead of heading North into the
Gulf of Bothnia. So now tomorrow looks good and Friday/Saturday bad-ish.
The plan now is to fly Unknown 2 tomorrow, starting after an 0930
briefing. Fingers crossed.
For lunch today we went trekking up to Koli, see top
of page for proof....
In the afternoon/evening the organisers held a social
event including more food, saunas and floatplanes, AND... A shooting
competition using laser pistols and rifles over a 25 yard range. They
organised an "International" event among the competing Teams and I am
pleased to announce that the GBR Team took gold with 108.8 points ahead
of the Irish on 99.8 and the French on 97 point who cares. So we have
been on a prize-winners podium, just not exactly for our flying... There
may be piccies of that later, from Graham perhaps.
Toodle pip
Alan |
