There were 4 aircraft available for a navigation exercise around Kent in the SE of England. I was fortunate to have a navigator onboard, thanks Bart
and also to be the rear aircraft in the formation.In good weather we took off and flew from just outside London down to RAF Eastchurch, on the Isle of Sheppey, and landed there, after taxiing back to the runway we were up again and off to RAF Manston, right by the coast, there we all landed again and after a short delay where I had to get a new aircraft, I have no idea how the back wheel fell off! we were back up again and this time a low level section around the Kent coast to Folkestone, looking up at the White cliffs of Dover and watching seagulls go past as we were about 50 - 100 feet, was great fun in a close Vic formation with the slipstream. At Folkestone we picked up the railway line and at treetop height we were on our way WNW to RAF High Halden where we landed again, getting plenty of take-off and landing practice, great. Then my navigator has to leave, I'm also informed I shall be leading the next short hop, "if that's OK" of course.... Well, I signed up so no-one to blame but myself
To add to my "fun" we are also, apparently, going to see how the Mossie take's off and lands with 1000lb's of bombs and extra fuel tanks. Well maybe it's the extra weight, but that take-off was my best, of course no navigator to confirm that, she lifted off smooth with full power and no yawing or nose porpoising, get the "tricky" gear up and raise the flaps, I used 10-15% and I was up to 270mph pretty quick, it was only 12 mile NNW to RAF Detling but the narrow grass field was spotted and I overflew it in a wide left hand circuit keeping no slower than 130mph on the approach as I was pretty heavy, again with no witnesses, I had a "greaser" of a landing and taxied off the runway to relax after the enjoyable "pressure" of being out in front.
It was a cracking hour and a half to 2 hours and we didn't even see the enemy! Hopefully the aircraft familiarisation carries on frequently and before long we will be off over to the "sausage side" of the channel and give the Bosche some what for!
Thanks to everyone last night especially for making the mission and being so helpful in sorting out SRS etc.
Cheers
Witch