Towing the line

Posted on November 11, 2013 by John

I’m at a gliding club at Piper’s Field near Bathurst learning how to be a tuggie! That is a pilot who flies the tow plane that pulls the gliders into the air. It’s going well despite very windy weather.

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We’re having fun here – there are six people on an ab initio gliding course and I’m pulling them into the air flying the Piper Pawnee tug plane. I had a day flying with the instructor alongside me telling me what to do. The next couple of days I’ve been working hard getting the gliders aloft.

The weather is not ideal, but at least it has not been rainy during the day.

The whole region has been having rain and thunderstorms, we had lots here during last night. Nice people, a real mix.

(Yes I know it should be toeing, it’s what we call a joke!)

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Underwater exploration with new hi-tech equipment

Posted on October 31, 2013 by John

For my birthday I got a GoPro 3+ Black camera. It’s a tiny POV (point-of-view) camera with a wide-angle lens designed for adventure sports lovers like myself. I want it mainly to shoot videos from inside the glider but it will be good for lots of other things as well.

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It comes with a waterproof housing, so I decided to try that out. Here’s a photo.

Yes, I went swimming in the Amazon River to get this amazing shot. You can just see all the deadly flesh-eating piranha fish if you look carefully.

Well, no. It was taken inside a bowl filled with water lilies in our back garden! I’ll put up a video when I get a chance.

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The little camera is brilliant and I’ll have fun with it.

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Call that old? THIS is old!

Posted on October 28, 2013 by John

Yes, I’m an old-age pensioner. Today was my 65th birthday and I’m getting a (very small) pension from England. Despite my 35 years away from the UK, I qualify for a pension because I paid my (quaintly-named) National Insurance contributions all those years.

I haven’t got a walking frame yet, but my hair is very grey and I do forget things a lot of the time. Also I tend to groan quietly when getting up from a chair or bending over. But everyone I know does that as well!

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I celebrated by having lunch at the Bather’s Pavilion Restaurant at Balmoral with Jan, Viv and Chris. It’s a fabulous place, right on the water.

They had a special deal for Good Food Month, thank goodness, because otherwise it’s very expensive.

We had confit pork belly with zucchini flower, ricotta, asparagus and sorrel. We added sides of creamy mash and vegetable, plus a little salad. The food and wine were fantastic, service good and atmosphere great. A very enjoyable lunch. (Great iPhone picture by Chris!)

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Soaring with the eagles

Posted on October 28, 2013 by John

Another great day of gliding on Saturday. I hadn’t been in the air for a while because the bushfires in the Blue Mountains have been covering Sydney with smoky haze. They’ve been cautioning people with asthma not to go outside.

But the Saturday forecast was good, and so it proved. I flew the Astir and managed a flight of 2 hours 20 minutes in blue thermals (no clouds) It was fun because I flew west, managed to get away from the 4500 foot height limit over Camden and soared up to 7500 feet, the height limit over The Oaks airfield. (The limits are to stop little aircraft bumping into the streams of jumbo jets going to and from Sydney airport.)

The thermals were very rough in parts, so it was a little uncomfortable, but great fun. I was guided to one thermal by a couple of huge birds who were climbing together in the rising air without a single wing-beat. I’m pretty sure they were wedge-tailed eagles, magnificent creatures who glared at me as I came within a few metres of them and then turned away.

A birding website notes about these eagles:

They are known to attack intruding model airplanes, hang gliders, gliders, fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters.

Next time I’ll be more wary! (Sorry, no eagles in the video clip)

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Brush with fame, and chips

Posted on October 16, 2013 by John

Today we ventured to Woollahra for lunch at the Bistro Moncur. It’s a famous one-hat restaurant, but they were doing lunch specials as part of the Sydney Morning Herald‘s Good Food Month at a bargain (for Sydney!) $38 for a main course and glass of wine.

Driving through town to get there was a slow crawl because a huge fire in a building being demolished forced the police to close off Bathurst Street.

When we arrived, we chose to sit outside on their little terrace. I was hailed from the next table by a former Herald colleague, Jon Casimir, who has made a big career in television. He is co-creator of The Gruen Transfer, which he writes and produces for Zapruder’s Other Films. Gruen is a very funny critique of the advertising and PR industries. He was sitting with the show’s stars – comedian Wil Anderson and advertising gurus Todd Sampson and Russel Howcroft. I (of course) told them I loved the show – which I do!

They were discussing the future direction of the program, but I was much too polite to eavesdrop.

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Foodwise we both chose the “minute steak with wine merchants sauce and chips” with a side salad. The food was simple, but very good indeed. It was a very pleasant experience. Note the interior has a fine mural, painted by another former Herald colleague, Michael Fitzjames.

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