Born To Fly Page 18

  I had little time to absorb all this before Greenland disappeared just as quickly as it had appeared. I passed the far eastern point of the island and turned right to align with Reykjavik. Next stop was Iceland.

  The weather ahead looked okay. As the hours slipped by I decided to climb higher to 11,000 feet to avoid the cloud below. I knew at some point I would need to descend and hoped to do that ahead where the cloud had cleared. I had no wish to be sandwiched between cloud and the North Atlantic Ocean.

  The top fastening of the immersion suit was unbelievably tight; suffocating at this point was not especially appealing, and I held my hand between it and my neck. I contacted Iceland Radio on the standard aircraft VHF radio, and after a few attempts and some patience I was able to hear them. They gave me clearance into their air space and told me to keep tracking towards Reykjavik. There was still cloud, but it was not so thick above the airport and I could track for a landing visually. I reached top of descent, calculated as the distance from the destination airport, and knew I needed to descend now to make sure I arrived over the airport at the correct altitude.

  Cloud was still a problem. As I sat and delayed the descent I stared out the front window, watching conditions worsen to the point where even at this altitude I would enter cloud shortly. I had to descend through the cloud layer and I hoped it was thin: a frightening thought. I nosed down and slowed the aircraft as it entered cloud and watched the outside air temperature indicator drop even further.

  It was cold, minus twenty degrees Celsius cold. The ice started to build and I watched very carefully. Ice makes the aircraft slow down due to the extra drag but the descent was causing the aircraft to increase speed; due to the simple laws of gravity, we were heading well and truly downhill. I was confident that with the current weather report I would break free into clear air very soon and therefore be free of the worst of the icing conditions. I needed to do that; after all, I couldn’t go back up. The ice had formed on the wings and windscreen and there was little doubt it had also formed around other parts of the aircraft including the propeller. At least it didn’t seem to be getting worse.

  But then I spotted the biggest problem of all. The long wire HF radio aerial was strung between the wingtip and the tail of the Cirrus. The air was warming and the ice was beginning to break off the aerial, creating an unbalanced piece of steel wire that began to swing like a skipping rope. I was worried that the wire would break, something I had been warned about if ice formed on it. If it broke from the wingtip it could swing back towards the tail, catching somewhere and potentially causing all manner of serious issues. With the ice nearly gone from the wings I began to slow down, hoping to stop the swinging wire. I was scared.

  I wished I had more experience in dealing with icy conditions, but as I went through the checks in my mind I did feel I had made all the right decisions. If I couldn’t reach Reykjavik, however, I had no option in the middle of the North Atlantic but to divert to another aerodrome. But where? And how much fuel would I need? Could I refuel with avgas somewhere else? What about clearances? And weather?

  The air temperature was climbing, the swinging aerial slowing down and eventually – to my massive relief – the nose of the Cirrus finally found clear blue sky. I was within minutes of Reykjavik airport and my knowledge of routine kicked in: I joined a final approach onto the runway. It sat on the edge of a town that looked interesting, all uniform, small, colourful houses like something from a postcard.

  I touched down and breathed out for what felt like the first time in a while. I had made it and resolved never to fly a single-engine aeroplane from Canada to Iceland without icing protection ever again.

  I parked between a bunch of other aircraft, and climbed out as best I could in the immersion suit. My handler was nearby, and we said hello. He seemed really nice, but his English was not good. I waddled inside with my passport and bags to complete Customs and noticed that the cumbersome suit felt a little strange, sticking to me so that I looked like a cryovaced piece of steak. It took a few moments before I realised what had happened. At 11,000 feet I had pulled the tight neck seal away from my body but when everything became busy I had let go and flown the aircraft to the ground. On the ground the air pressure within the suit was still the same as at 11,000 feet above. With a swift movement I broke the neck seal and let the air rush into the suit. It sounded like a semitrailer letting off the air brakes.

  I unpacked and spent twenty minutes fixing the HF radio aerial. The metal wire had well and truly been stretched after its impersonation of a skipping rope and it needed tightening. I slipped the Cirrus into a hangar and found a taxi to the centre of Reykjavik, desperately needing food and sleep.

  I placed my bags in the back of the taxi, hopped in the front passenger seat and said hello, but the driver’s response was nothing but a smile. I had no idea how to speak Icelandic; I think I may have accidentally skipped over that option in high school. Instead I held up the address for the motel: Spítalastígur 1, Amtmannstígur 5, Reykjavik, Iceland. I could have attempted to pronounce it but it would have only complicated the situation. He hesitantly nodded and we set off. I assumed Iceland was only a small country and therefore we could only get so lost and having just confirmed the amount of water surrounding Iceland in the North Atlantic, I knew we weren’t going far.

  The conversation was hardly riveting. I sat and watched as the little colourful houses zipped by like illustrations in a geography textbook. Even the motel wasn’t a typical one, more like a little unit for a family. I checked in and soon found myself sitting on the couch of a unit, still wearing the flight suit. Before long I threw the bags into a pile just inside the door and the lifeless body of the orange immersion suit lay across the floor. I was tired and it was already 9:30pm, but I was hungry and it was still broad daylight outside.

  My body clock had already been diagnosed as clinically insane, it had been through so many changes and I think it was beginning to just take things as they came. I quickly changed and walked to the centre of town to find something to eat before bed. The town was a hive of activity, the sort that could make me assume it was lunchtime, whatever else my watch was telling me. I walked along the strip of restaurants, stopping to read each menu, but there was no English in sight. Anything that had been translated into English still had Icelandic words hidden here and there. I’m a fussy eater and there was no way I was taking any chances on an Icelandic delicacy.

  Just as I was about to give up at 10:30pm, I walked around a corner to find a familiar coloured sign – Subway. It might have been in Icelandic and the girl behind the counter might have only spoken a little English, but I had been to Subway a time or two and I had the pointing to what you want through the glass thing well and truly down. I pointed and she laughed at me while making my contraption of a meal, which thankfully looked like one prepared back at home, no surprises there. I paid with a credit card as I had no Icelandic kroners and headed back to the unit. This was the first time I had been in a country where the language spoken was not predominantly English.

  Iceland lacked a little in this department but as a country it really interested me, partly because I had never really thought about it before. I had never imagined travelling to Reykjavik in the same way I had longed to visit to England or Italy. I figured that while I was there, with two full days before my next leg, I would make an effort to see as much as I possibly could.

  I planned to tackle the aircraft on day one, it needed to be repacked, refuelled and readied for the flight to Scotland, the next step. Customs, the departure details, weather and specific times had to be organised with my handler, BIRK Flight Services. If I could squeeze all of this into one day then I could relax and have a look around before taking off again. It would be a challenge, but all I could do was try.

  I set off for the airport and began working away. In most cases we used a fuel truck for refuelling but on this particular day the trucks were delayed, so I chose to taxi the aircraft to the fuel bowser. My h
andler was a young guy who I discovered did speak English; it was just his accent – and my Aussie one – that made communication a little more complicated than usual. Within an hour we had the ferry tank filled and we had thrown all the equipment that lay around the aircraft into a little car. Once back from the bowser I slipped the plane back into the hangar where it was slightly warmer, then took the time to carefully repack and give the plane a quick clean. I double-checked the little adjustment on the HF aerial, spoke to a few interested passers-by who knew enough English to chat away, then finally hopped into the car for a ride back to town. The Spirit of the Sapphire Coast was once again ready to go.

  I was excited to have a few hours left in the day and impressed at just how quickly the plane had been prepared. BIRK Flight Services were used to private international flights and had everything worked out pretty well. I decided to spend the evening walking around Reykjavik township as the unit was fairly close to the centre. Good booking, Mum!

  I found a church sitting on the top of a hill and decided to wander in and have a look around. There was a lift that took you up to a viewing deck, so I handed over a few newly acquired Icelandic kroners and walked inside. I think the lift used to be a refrigerator and they had painted it silver and tied a rope to the roof, it was tiny. I was crammed inside with a French couple and in typically awkward fashion we stood silently watching the numbers increase as we made our way to the viewing deck. Suddenly the lift stopped and my now close acquaintances said something in French. We weren’t at the top and whatever they said was a bit more alarming than bonjour.

  We picked up the emergency phone and spoke with the operator. It turned out that the French couple spoke English also, which was great as we were going to be spending the next little while cementing our friendship. Up to this point, along with flying and all the other jobs, I had shared experiences via social media using photos, videos and blogs. I was due to film a video blog on my phone soon anyway and with time to spare, why not now?

  There’s nothing like breaking the ice by asking, ‘I know we’re stuck in a lift, but can you film me, please?’ As the Frenchman held my camera phone I started to chat away, explaining my experience of the leg from Canada to Iceland, only to have the lights in the lift shut off in mid speech. Very quickly and swiftly the French lady pulled out her phone, switched on the flash to create some impromptu stage lighting, her husband kept filming and I kept talking. I had only just met these people but we were a gun team!

  The lift finally moved and I took in Reykjavik from above before risking my wellbeing in the lift once again. That evening I booked a back-to-back tour for the next day. I decided to take a trip to the Blue Lagoons hot spring and the popular Golden Circle. I went to bed at about eleven, and was surprised to see how light the sky still was. It was never really dark; the sky always had a glow about it.

  Next morning I woke early, unpacked my carefully structured backpack and filled it with a towel and spare clothes. My camera was charged and the blogs, emails and updates had been done the night before. I walked into town and hopped on a bus. First stop was the Blue Lagoons, a hot spa located in the Grindavik lava field in southwestern Iceland. There were a few tourists who had come there in order to swim in the warm silica- and sulphur-enriched waters. I joined in the fun and spent an hour swimming around the volcanic rocks. Nearly two years before I had seen a ferry pilot’s blog describing his visit to the lagoon on the stopover in Iceland. Now here I was in the exact same situation, which was very cool.

  Soon afterwards I was back on the bus and we arrived in the centre of Reykjavik after a drive through the countryside. I hopped off, grabbed something visibly safe to eat and jumped on another bus. We set off this time with a tour guide to the Golden Circle, a tourist route that extends 300 kilometres from Reykjavik into central Iceland and back. We stopped at a phenomenal waterfall, the Gullfoss, before watching geysers erupt from the geothermal ground. As well as looking between two meeting tectonic plates and towards a far-off glacier, I sat back and took in the history of Iceland from a very local tour guide. Wow. Iceland was a phenomenal place.

  I arrived back into Reykjavik late, but while it had been a huge day it was worth it in every way. Whilst other people were being dropped at the door of their motels, I was let out at the front gate of the Reykjavik airport. Under my towel and camera was the handwritten flight plan for the following day, I had to drop into the FBO office and have the plan faxed through to an air traffic control centre. With this out of the way and the plan approved, I made my way to the unit to pack and head for bed.

  Reykjavik is cold, even colder early in the morning. I was up early and busily packing the last of my clothes. The one-knee-on-my-bag manoeuvre hadn’t become any easier since the first time I tried it back in Wollongong, and the poor zipper was holding on for dear life. I phoned a cab driver and asked to be picked up, holding the address of the unit in my hand and proceeded to tell him where I was.

  ‘Spítalastígur Street, you know, Spit-a-lass-ss-ss-ss-tigger Street’. Nothing. The cab driver had no idea at all. I also had no idea and we couldn’t even piece together a normal conversation, let alone define a distinct position on planet Earth. I gave up. Even though it was very early in the morning I said thank you and decided to walk to a main road where I could hail a cab. Hopefully the ridiculous flight suit would then provide a hint as to where I needed to be.

  I had a sleeping-bag-sized clothes bag, a flight bag, a backpack, the immersion suit and a bunch of other little things to carry. It took forty-five minutes to find a main road and besides my usual clothes and number of duffel bags, I had a bright orange suit draped over my back. I looked like the latest circus act to grace the shores of Iceland. Everything was heavy and for the first time in my life I wished I knew the local language. If I had, I could have been sitting patiently on the steps of my unit waiting for the cab to arrive.

  I found a cab. The driver actually understood me, which was phenomenal, and in no time we were on our way to the airport. I hopped out, handed over the last of my kroners and headed to the aircraft. I had the weather forecast in hand, a folder full of all sorts of goodies and had spoken with the handler in detail as to the day’s flight. Although he wasn’t a pilot he had dealt with this type of flying a lot. He mentioned another light aircraft that would be departing for my next destination, Wick in Scotland, also. Not only would they be heading for the same destination but also be flying at a similar time. I recognised the registration. TAD was a little red aircraft on its way around the world. The two guys who were flying the plane had also been at the Oshkosh AirVenture show and though I hadn’t spoken with them directly I had naturally taken a keen interest in the aircraft and what they were attempting to do.

  After another painstaking pre-flight, I somehow squeezed into my favourite immersion suit and took to the clear blue sky. Although it was cold it was clear; the risk of icing at this point was nil. All I was required to do was take in the view, and what a spectacular view it proved to be. As I passed 5000 feet on my climb to 9000 feet, I tracked directly overhead a glacier, an unforgettable sight, a solid layer of ice extending in a circular shape and extending miles ahead of the aircraft. I remember asking myself the question we were taught to ask ourselves from the beginning of our flight training: ‘Where would I land the plane if I had an engine failure right now?’ I had asked myself that question thousands of times before, but I had never had the answer of, ‘Oh, that glacier over there will do.’

  I overheard TAD speaking with air traffic control, quickly said hello and asked to speak with them on the frequency 123.45, a ‘common chatter’ radio station where the strict structure of aviation radio was left behind. They had departed from Reykjavik just behind me and had also begun the flight to Scotland. We spoke about my journey in comparison to theirs and even exchanged contact details as we flew. I did have to have a chuckle to myself; networking above Iceland between two single-engine aircraft is not your usual social interaction. They sounded like g
reat guys, I let them go as I began to transfer fuel, wished them well and thought that maybe we would see each other in Wick.

  When I levelled off at 9000 feet the sky was clear and I was smiling. Yes I was over the North Atlantic in a light aircraft, a place where swimming was highly frowned upon, but it was completely different to the previous leg.

  The tailwinds pushed me towards Scotland and I kept thinking about the land mass known as Europe. Once I was in Scotland I wouldn’t have to look at this much water for quite some time, and that was a nice thought. A wisp of cloud appeared ahead but it was so thin it was nearly transparent. The Cirrus skipped through it but within a fraction of a second the leading edge of the wing had become extremely frosty. That was a little wake-up call, a reminder of where I was and the need to keep my wits about me.

  I was handed over to the air traffic controllers in the UK and started my descent into what had become a warmer yet very cloudy sky, a scene typical of UK weather. I entered cloud and stayed there for quite some time, mostly speaking with a lady in the control tower at Wick airport located in far northeastern Scotland and up against the water’s edge. I broke visual and descended quickly to avoid having to fly an approach using the instruments through the cloud. Just as I was clear I looked down to see patchwork-quilt-like fields with a small castle in the centre. Yep, I had found Scotland.

  After the five-hour flight I landed in very gusty conditions, taxied from the runway and around in circles for five minutes while trying to sort out where to park. Although I was tired I was actually more relieved than anything. I had crossed the North Atlantic Ocean and I never had to do it again.

  I met my handler Andrew and for an hour we shuffled around paperwork in a very basic-looking building. It was a tiny airport and the Customs requirements for my entry into Europe were nowhere near as strict as I had imagined. The most strenuous question I was asked was whether I wanted a cup of tea. Considering this would be the only Customs engagement until leaving Greece, I had to say I was surprised at how casual it was, but I was cool with that.