Old year, new year

So here we are, in 2019. Having made the decision to defer the big work on my house for 12 months, I’m now allowing myself to think ahead to the pleasures that 2019 has to offer. We’re now in a spell of bright but cold weather which is much preferable to dull and wet as far as I’m concerned, but I’m not that much fussed about getting airborne again for the moment. If I get a couple of hours in this month that’ll be fine by me and then I’ll be happy to wait until I get back from my dose of winter sun in Egypt.

Like I said before, I didn’t fly as much as I’d expected to last year, only just over 23 hours in total, which was a bit disappointing. This was mainly due to the time it took for me to start feeling well enough again once my chemo finished and when I pushed things and tried to do too much too soon, with the result that I banged the Savannah’s wingtip on the ground while taxying, I got the message and eased off.

But what I did do was great. Wim and I went to a fly-in together at Ste-Foy-la-Grande on September 16 in our Weedhoppers. I did a video but am re-editing it as I wasn’t happy with my initial finished product and will put the new version up later. However, I dropped into Ste-Foy the day before in 77ASY on what was a fantastic day for flying. I did a video of that too which says everything about why I fly, so that’s what I called it and I’ve linked it below.

The final highlight of the year for me was the flight I did on December 28 with Dani, Wim’s young granddaughter. It was a cold and murky winter’s day but it gave me a great deal of pleasure as she enjoyed it so much. I did a video of it too and have linked to it also below.

Now that I’ve mentally freed myself from the onus of preparing myself for the work on my house, I’m allowing myself to make tentative flying plans for the rest of the year. I’m determined this year to fly to see new and old English contacts here in France over in the Charente so not that far away in the Savannah and I’m looking forward very much to doing so. I would also like to make a couple of trips to the UK to see family and friends, which I’ve not been able to do for the last couple of years.

Prospects to savour, and I’ll bet that there’ll be many more pleasures to come that as yet I don’t have any inkling about. Bring it on, I say 😉