It’s 4 AM. We wake up in preparation for a LONG day of flying. We need to head to southern England to arrive in Belgium on time tomorrow.
We take off from Keflavik at 6 AM. Interestingly, in Iceland as well as in many airports around the world, air traffic controllers in the control towers handle small planes the same way as airliners. So, we have to request permission from the controllers to start the engines – in our case, the engine!
The first flight will have lasted 7 hours. But with the time change, we arrive in Wick at 2:15 PM. Very happy to be on the ground, I take some time to breathe fresh air for about ten minutes while we refuel the plane with Jet A1. I then help my co-pilot carry equipment to Far North Aviation where Adrienne serves me excellent coffee with delicious English biscuits. I chat with her for a few minutes, taking the opportunity to use the restroom (7 hours is a long time! ;-)).
And quite frankly, with her stoic British demeanor, she says to me, “You do know the airport closes at 1400Z (3 PM local time), don’t you?” I look at her in astonishment because my watch reads 1:43 PM local time!!! We have just 17 minutes left to leave the building, board the plane, perform our usual checks, and take off!
With quick steps, we bid her goodbye and within minutes, I’m seated in the cockpit with my checklist completed. We take off right at 2:00 PM!
We fly over water for about an hour at 2500 feet. As far as the eye can see, we spot wind turbines. The British and several European countries have chosen this method of electricity production. In aviation, these “wind farms” can be somewhat dangerous, especially near airports. Fortunately, they pose no issue for this crossing. Personally, while I understand their purpose, I find they somewhat spoil the landscape.
Here are a few photos of the British landscape, in all its splendor. We fly at 3500 feet, as requested by the air traffic controller to avoid controlled airspace near Dundee (EGPN), Leuchars (EGQL), and later Edinburgh (EGPH) airports.
After 5 hours of flight without incident, except for a few deviations requested by air traffic controllers, we land at Stones Farm, a small grass runway of exceptional quality. This runway belongs to a friend of our boss.
Funny story, during landing, as we gently roll on the runway to lose momentum, we nearly hit a hare that decided to cross right in front of our propeller. At that moment, I wasn’t sure if I was happy it was so quick or not. A little hare stew would have been quite delicious! Here’s the runway and the private property. Absolutely beautiful.
