Croc Visit
Yesterday, I flew around a great deal of South Florida. 8.2 hours flying time via 9 airfields and 25 landings. You probably realise from the maths that I landed at some of them more than once.
The types of airfields that we fly to vary immensely. Some have a control tower and parallel runways where I might be landing next to turboprops and the odd airliner. Most are uncontrolled, it basically means that you must communicate with all the other planes in the circuit and let each other know where you are. Less confusing than it sounds. Some airfields are really small. One that I stopped at yesterday for fuel, had a man in a caravan and a dog. Knocking on the caravan door, I had images of it being opened by a guy with a shotgun. The door opened and the guy was holding a cat. Ahhh.
Marco Island was another that I stopped at yesterday. The guy there told me about the crocs that they had there(most of florida has freshwater 'gators). He didn't actually say 'Isn't this one a beaut' but he was pretty keen on them and took me in his Gator(4x4 thing not the animal) to see a croc that was sitting by the runway. 'Ahh, it's just a little male' he said. At 8 foot it looked plenty big enough to me though. I said as much, so he took me back to the office and like a new father with baby photos showed me pictures of the 15 foot male they have there. 'Crikey'. Apparently planes often have to go around because they like to bask on the runway and no-one feels like moving them. Fair enough.
There are only 1000 crocs in florida and they have 20 living at the airfield. He feels pretty blessed.
I have also an American cellphone. The number for which is 004 073 347 015. Normal text prices for you and it costs me 10c to text back as opposed to 50p if I were to use my UK SIM.
Going to go plan a flight now, so till next time........
The types of airfields that we fly to vary immensely. Some have a control tower and parallel runways where I might be landing next to turboprops and the odd airliner. Most are uncontrolled, it basically means that you must communicate with all the other planes in the circuit and let each other know where you are. Less confusing than it sounds. Some airfields are really small. One that I stopped at yesterday for fuel, had a man in a caravan and a dog. Knocking on the caravan door, I had images of it being opened by a guy with a shotgun. The door opened and the guy was holding a cat. Ahhh.
Marco Island was another that I stopped at yesterday. The guy there told me about the crocs that they had there(most of florida has freshwater 'gators). He didn't actually say 'Isn't this one a beaut' but he was pretty keen on them and took me in his Gator(4x4 thing not the animal) to see a croc that was sitting by the runway. 'Ahh, it's just a little male' he said. At 8 foot it looked plenty big enough to me though. I said as much, so he took me back to the office and like a new father with baby photos showed me pictures of the 15 foot male they have there. 'Crikey'. Apparently planes often have to go around because they like to bask on the runway and no-one feels like moving them. Fair enough.
There are only 1000 crocs in florida and they have 20 living at the airfield. He feels pretty blessed.
I have also an American cellphone. The number for which is 004 073 347 015. Normal text prices for you and it costs me 10c to text back as opposed to 50p if I were to use my UK SIM.
Going to go plan a flight now, so till next time........
posted by > Ed at
1:23 pm
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