Bertie's Travelogue Part 1 - Farnborough to Marseilles

Well, as you peruse this, dear reader, I am cruising gently southwards towards Marseilles, having just passed Avignon (and yes, I did sing it!). My flight from Farnborough to Paris was not without incident, however, as part of the simulation involves pre-flight checks involving switching magnetos, heating pitots, darning the parachute and other sundry tasks. Sadly, there is no documentation so there followed several scenes variously involving total inaction, take off followed by an ominous silence as the engines died or a strangely beautiful ballet as I corkscrewed through the air before splatting into the ground.

After some frantic research and armed with a full list of pre-start, startup, taxiing, take-off, climb-out ....yawn .... cruise, descent...zzzzzzz..., approach, landing etc etc checklists, I finally soared off into the wild blue yonder. Pootling off southwards, the nice man at Air Traffic Control passed me onto Shoreham ATC where I was admonished for being at the wrong height as I dropped down to see where I was born. Up I rose and said a fond farewell to Blighty whilst playing "We'll Meet Again" on my Dansette Junior.


I got a bit muddled for a while and ended up over Deauville but finally saw the gleaming dome of the Basilica of Sacré Coeur and, more importantly, the lights of Orly airport. Feeling rather smug at my navigational prowess, I decided to video my landing as part of this blog (another clever part of Flight Simulator X) and post my triumphant touchdown. Needless to say, my landing was roughly similar to a kangaroo on a trampoline which is why I will just show you a nice picture of Paris!


I refilled my trusty Electra and filed my next flight plan before once more taking to the skies en route to Marseille - a city pretty high on my list of must-visit places.

Incidentally, by sheer coincidence, after I mentioned Amelia Earhart in the last blog there was a Sky documentary on the lady that very same day! How spooky was that? Apparently, there was a very strong rumour that she didn't actually disappear whilst circumnavigating the globe through aircraft failure but was captured by the Japanese and accused of conspiring with the US government by using her flight as an excuse to spy on the strength of the Japanese military forces. The contention was that, eventually, she was summarily executed. If you want a read - yer tiz!

Toodle pip!