Old year, new year

[Deleted]

Well here we are already half-way through the first month of the new year. Doesn't time fly eh... I know, when we were young we said that that's what all the old folks say, and now we're finding out for ourselves that it's true!

You blokes down in the southern hemisphere and you lot down in the sunny 'boneyard' (how are you Vin!) are all still sunning yourselves but we here in the Dordogne have been going through a cold snap (OK, only down to a measly minus 2 or 3 degrees Celsius, but cold for us) so I've been staying indoors burning lots of wood on my stove and getting ready for going off to Egypt again as I did last year for a few days of winter sun at the end of the month.

While I've been cloistered indoors I've been keeping myself amused finishing off the last of my 2018 videos. I didn't get to fly as much as I'd have liked last year because of the time it was taking for me to get over the effects of 8 months of chemo but what I lacked in hours I made up for in quality. I did a link to a flight I did on the 15th of September in a previous post (Why I fly) and here are links if anyone's interested to the last two of 2018.

The first was on the 16th of September when I flew in the Weedhopper that I acquired as a wreck and repaired, with my pal Wim who has a single-seat Weedhopper, to a fly-in and barbecue at Ste-Foy-la-Grande in the Gironde. We landed on the way at a tiny, recently opened private airfield at Campsegret and this was the only time that I've known Wim's usually impeccable dead-reckoning navigation to let him down, as shown in the video, and I found the field before he did. Usually it's the other way round!



The second video is of my last flight of the year on the 28th December on a cold, murky day, with Wim's grandaughter, who is an aspiring pilot. Because of the conditions, it wasn't a day that I'd normally have flown on, but she was leaving for home the next day with her family and was really keen to go. It turned out that she enjoyed it very much and so did I.



So that's the final page of the old year now turned over and it's time to look ahead to the new one. I doubt that I'll fly again before going off to the sunshine but I'm hoping that this year I'll get a bit more time in the air and a few more half-decent videos made. Only time will tell

Best wishes to all,

Roger

[bhk]

Roger....happy new year to you.

You are most welcome to take a lot of the sun that we are experiencing...and have put up with over the past month or so.
One extreme to the other, I s'pose....we are in the grip of a heatwave across most of the country - and I'm talking temps of 40+ in places like Adelaide, Canberra and even on the coast where temps that high are unusual.
So you Europeans can send a boatload of snow this way, mate!

All the best.
Bruce

[Deleted]

Hi Bruce, happy new year to you and Shirley. Hope that she's back as good as new now. Yup, I've been reading about your heatwave. I understand that temperatures have touched new record levels which must be a bit worrying in a way should it continue year on year. We haven't had any snow yet and none is forecast at the moment but apart from Jan 2012 when I drove down from the UK to buy my house when it went down to an exceptional -30 or so as I recall, we've had almost nothing since.

Back in the UK they're forecasting an icy blast with snow down to -10 for next week but I doubt it'll extend anywhere near this far south. In fact as I type this at lunch time outside it's a glorious winter flying day with clear blue sky, little or no wind and a temp at ground level of +9 degrees when I drove back home half an hour or so ago. I checked our airfield earlier which someone told me was too wet to use but in fact it's quite firm enough and easily flyable. Not that I have plans to fly today though although I may try and get an hour or so in before I swan off to Egypt for 10 days of sunshine at the end of the month.

Best wishes to all