Its months since I felt like writing a blog, today I find myself on a plane heading back to Sint Maarten thinking why not? Its been a very varied few months, as a sense of normal lifestyle emerged, John went into full-time work, we rented an apartment in Sint Maarten, I set off on a flying mission and we took apart our boat! Maybe it doesn’t feel like adventuring but it has been an experience.
Having bought Joline in Spain and done the necessary upgrades and repairs to get us across the Atlantic, we knew we needed to have her out of the water and set about some serious work to enable us to be confident in her fulfilling our globetrotting ambitions.
An opportunity that we created two years ago emerged in Sint Maarten for John to lead the installation of a Baggage Handling system. This involved recruiting a team of 15, motivating them to work well and six to eight months over the hurricane season in Sint Maarten. Where better to do a major refit.
After a project delay of six months it kicked off in June 2023 and John was in ‘boy paradise’: -problem-solving daily, constructing baggage conveyors, thriving in the heat overseeing a team doing electrical and mechanical work, – it was impressive. It was also funny, as he returned home every day, describing his day working with…. ‘Muppets’, and with a woeful rant about airport inefficiency or incompetence or pure lack of common sense. My only responsibility was to get the boat out of the water, dismantled and keep John robustly managing the workforce tracking progress and profit.
Time for a mission:
Since sailing around the Bahamas, and watching light aircraft hop from island to island, John had very intuitively picked up I had growing embers emerging; - to return to flying. For my birthday, ( with great difficulty and to my surprise), he arranged a flight with an instructor in a Cessna 172 that was used to fly Lobsters around the islands. That ignited the flame, - mission set; while the boat was out of the water and the humid hurricane season made working on the boat between 11am and 4pm intolerable – I was going to get my pilots license back.
Since it was over 30 years since I last flew under my own license, that was no small mission. I needed to get some practice in, return to the UK to do an ‘approved course’, and pass a practical skills test. Thanks to Colin on Anguilla who owned a Cessna 172, and Areil, a guy living locally who was a FAA instructor, I took to the sky’s over Anguilla and Sint Maarten. Oh my goodness; – a combination of total fear and heart beating adrenaline, as I yet again wanged in too much left rudder during a climbing stall scenario only to find the sea spiraling rapidly towards me, – to complete exhilaration as I finally managed to land smoothly, ( not in the sea!). After about three flights of stalling, steep turns, forced landing practice, and some rather hairy cross wind landings etc, – I nearly walked away, were my reactions now to slow?, was I to old? was I struggling to react fast enough?? Ariel was not at all perturbed, despite nearly making him throw up one day he just said – ‘it will click’. It did.
I crammed in the ground school, all nine subjects!, some came easy, in others a bit of change since I last studied UK aviation law. (The exit from Brexit has left a mix of UK and European law), fortunately, all aligned to ICAO so relatively familiar once I got my brain coggs working again.
Armed with ground school certificates and some recent flying experience I headed to ACS aviation, in Perth, who embraced my mission. There I had the most pleasurable experience flying around eastern Scotland in a PA28 -161. The CFI Andrew McMillian took me for the first flight, he was excellent, a real gentlemen who quickly gave me top tips, sorted out my circuits, sounded very positive, and set objectives around the skills test which formed the approved course, all very sensible. Surprisingly I really enjoyed the flying despite having to practice all the unusual maneuvers and two weeks later I past my skills test, after waiting days to get a good weather day. Its along time since I have been that nervous and it wasn’t my best flying however good enough and Iam sure it is good to put yourself under pressure every know and again. Unfortunately I had to wait another 10 days before the license came through from the CAA, but on my lst day in Scotland I walked away with a huge grin on my face - first solo flight in over 30 years with a full license.
The time in Scotland was a great opportunity to catch up with family. Christopher(my son), flew up from Bristol and it was fabulous spending time with him, walking in the Perthshire countryside, catching up on his views on work, people, life etc and some good food. He also went flying a few times, which he loved and it is now on the bucket list but he will have to wait a while until finances catch up!.
For two weeks I had mum ( aged 92), up in Scotland with me. Every day we would venture out somewhere: a lot of castles, gardens and lunches out. She does really well physically, she just gets frustrated she cannot do a 10k walk at her age! Going back and forth from the Lakes with Mum gave me a great opportunity for a few lovely days with my Sister and her family.
Time with the Willis clan is aways fun, hubby is great cook and Sue has the ability to just make my laugh, I so enjoy their company and she is a wonderful sister and person.
With the flying mission sorted, and I head back to the Caribbean, its now time to turn my attention to Joline. We have had the mast, boom, davits , trampoline housing and cross beams painted. These all need putting back together with new wiring, fixings, cleats, ropes winches etc. New generator, new watermaker, new whole/portlight in the hull to make more light below decks, new through hull fittings and the bottom completely sand blasted back, epoxyed and antifouled. We have three weeks till she goes in the water……..yikes, at least I will work off the slight podge the good Scottish food caused.
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