St Patricks Day Flying

Took Dad flying on St Patricks Day. 1hr 50 over to Athlone and then up to Roscommon, back to Longford and then the whole way home. After waiting till the plane arrived for us an hour or 2 late and stopping the slight drip from the fuel valve we were off. Door stayed closed this time (just as well) and the whole flight was quite nice on a pretty perfect day tho we seemed to miss all the parades. Also remembered to turn my GPS on and log the whole thing so i have a record of exactly where we went. Have been trying to get it to embed on this but its being a taste awkward. Little bit of fun with another aircraft getting in my way on the way back in but round the circuit again, extending the downwind on towards celbridge a bit and we got down. All good roll up the next one.



The 2 of us
Athlone Lough Ree

View Larger Map


View Larger Map

Dunno why i cant get it on one map but hey you get the idea!!

My First Passenger

Robs got the honour of being my first official passenger on friday. We had planned to head up towards kells and then over to slane to have a look at where he'd been canoeing up and down the boyne. Also figured we could go sightseeing and find newgrange and possibly even the hill of tara on the way back. However when we got to the field reports of the clouds getting lower out west and coming from the south scared me off a little and in the end decided to play it safe and jus play in the circuit for a while. Actually it was probably the first time i'd done circuits off 07 so adds to the experience.

Important thing is rob survived and even survived his door popping open as we headed off down the runway - Probs wuda been better if i didnt have to roll over towards his side pushing him towards his open door before getting the chance to slam it shut - but thats the way the man told me to go - and he did at least have his seat belt on :P Well there you go memo to self check doors are closed!!

Had 6 trips round the circuit with 5 pretty decent landings and 1 go-around cus the radio was busy and i cudn't get my call in! only annoyed cus it wuda been a good landing too - I think rob liked it tho and im sure he'll come again to go sightseeing!!

Hour Build Day 1

Went Flying today - first time on my own - and with my own licence. So was all planned for a simple trip out from kilkock up to kells then over to castlepollard, down past mullingar to kilbeggin and then back over to enfield and kilcock again. Now i wont say it went perfectly wasnt really on my heading on the way up to kells and it sort of messed me up and resulted in me being "temporarily uncertain of my position" but after a little time i noticed one of the big lakes in the distance and figured out which way to head from it - after that the whole flight went pretty perfect with regard to headings and timings, so the thing i learnt from the day was to trust the headings i'd worked out and most importantly fly them. I did have to duck below a few spots of cloud along the way home but still enough room to squeeze through. The final bit of excitment came as i caught up with a nice big rain cloud on the way back to the airfield from kilcock. Vis got less and less and the rain got heavier and heavier but could still see the airfield and hence direction to go, so i lit up all my lights to be seen and headed on in through it to touch down ahead of the shower. Theres a picture below of my chariot of the day (an english reg for the clever ones of you) and i have a few others enroute on another puter that i'll try upload 2mo. Good to be back up tho - so hopefully were flying now 1:32 down nother 68 odd to go methinks!!

View Larger Map