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The message I posted previously was sent to the person I believe to be the scammer at the legitimate company I believe he works at and the replies I received seemed to indicate to me that he’s confident that he’s got away with it. So I’ve not replied and that may have rattled him a bit.

The email address of the fraudulent company with which I’ve been corresponding has, not surprisingly, now gone completely dead but I came across another account to which I sent a message a day or so ago and left it at that.

I don’t think the scammer realises how clear a trail he has left and in the meantime I’ve put together a detailed document detailing the string of emails and events involved in the fraudulent transaction and the identity of the person responsible for the fraud. That document is now complete and my intention is to send copies to the legitimate company he works for and its legal representative, Alibaba and Aliexpress and the minister responsible for trade in the Chinese embassy in London.

But this morning I received a reply to the email I sent to the ‘other’ email address mentioned above. This may also have come from the scammer, I don’t know, who may be rattled because I left clues in the messages I sent to what I believe to be his legitimate employer indicating that I know his identity.

The emails I have since received imply that they are from a colleague of the person with whom I was originally dealing and that the latter has resigned from the company. They said that nobody has yet looked at his sales records and they would see if they could and come back to me. I said make it quick because wheels are in motion.

So what do you know. Now all I can do is see what pans out over the next few hours. In the meantime, Credit Agricole, my bank, have been absolutely amateurish and pathetic. Despite my instructing them to make a reclamation on the J P Morgan bank account into which I transferred funds over two weeks ago on the instructions of a J P Morgan Vice President in London they have done absolutely nothing, complaining they can’t get in touch with the Luxembourg bank. Credit Agricole is not a competent, professional banking organisation on the evidence of my experience.

My predictions as to what will now transpire are as follows. I believe the stuff about the colleague resigning etc is false as the company’s address is fake and the company doesn’t exist. So what the scammer will do is get access to ‘his colleague’s’ sales information and ‘discover’ the funds I transferred. He will then offer to repay them.

That way if he does he makes his (fake) company look legitimate and gets himself off the hook. And with me then not pursuing him he’s able, if he’s so inclined, to continue his activities later on when the dust has settled, as I mentioned in a previous message that if I got my money back I had neither the time nor the inclination to take things any further.

If that does happen I, of course, will be delighted. If it doesn’t and even if I continue with my present course of action I’m resigned to not seeing my money again, but just doing what I can to mess him up will be enough for me.

Have you tried it? It’ll make you smile.

Three images I created in minutes on my first attempt.

Sadly, it’s about the mini excavator I ordered from China. Despite my best endeavours to avoid such a thing happening, it looks as though I’ve been scammed and I’ll not be seeing either the excavator or my money again. I’ve spent the last couple of weeks chasing the ‘supplier’, investigating their address and their bank account but without success.

I’ve alerted my bank, Credit Agricole, after contacting the bank of the party into which I transferred my money, J P Morgan in Luxembourg, who suggested that my bank commences a funds recovery procedure. I’m awaiting to hear what their findings are, but I doubt I’ll get my money back as these scammers don’t usually leave any loopholes that make that possible.

Two things mystify me. Firstly, how did a scammer manage to open up a J P Morgan international bank account? This is not like your High Street branch which you can go into with an electricity bill and a proof of ID and just open an account. It specialises in the wealth management of international clients. Secondly, how did a scammer manage to line up the excavator and the exact accessories I ordered on the factory floor and take a photograph?

I may find out the answer to the first question but I doubt I will to the second as the factory could be anywhere in China. I’ll report the matter to Aliexpress but I won’t get any support from them as the order was not placed strictly according to their system. However, the scammer must be removed from their system and prevented from scamming other clients, not that that will stop them from restarting under a different name.

I’ll be licking my wounds and having another go with delivery late this year or in the new year after I return from Australia, although this time placing the order rigidly according to the Aliexpress system so as to guarantee my money. I’ve been scammed before when I was in business and it’s a painful lesson to have to relearn 🙁

Our second heatwave. Temperatures have been around the 40 degrees mark with almost windless clear blue skies for several days. Yesterday it got up to 39 degrees inside my house and as I type this at around 5.30 am, although it’s 23 degrees outside (forecast 17) it’s still an almost unbearable 32 degrees inside. So I can’t sleep and my electric fans are just moving hot air around.

And there will be no respite for several more days to come. The forecast for today is 42 degrees, Wednesday 37 degrees, Thursday 38 degrees, Friday and Saturday 41 degrees, Sunday 40 degrees and then a slow fall to the mid 30s. It’s almost impossible to do anything, especially outside. I need to paint my shutters but it’s too hot for that and working indoors tiling my kitchen and utility room walls would be unbearable.

Even the insects are suffering. I have thick curtains on my living room doors which I’ve had to pull as the sun has moved round to keep as much heat out as possible but when I’ve been able to open my living room doors to get a bit of air circulating I’ve been getting swarms of insects flying in, presumably attracted by the relative shade.

Two days ago I had a couple of bees flying around the tap on my kitchen sink searching for water and I keep the bowl of water I put out for my doggie visitor topped up as it’s being constantly visited by all manner of flying insects. Large grasshoppers keep coming indoors including giant green ones seeking shade from the hot sun and one little black one which I picked up to throw back outside had the temerity to bite me, which I’ve never come across before.

It’s all a bit too much now and I’ll be glad when it ends, but it looks as though we’ll have to put up with it for at least another week before it subsides.

Back to say…

It’s not long after 8.00 am and there’s been a sudden change! Evidently a cold front has come in, the temperature has dropped and because of the high humidity, we’ve now got thick mist! But it doesn’t matter. The temperature relief is wonderful and I’ve got all my windows and doors wide open with electric fans pulling the cooler air through the house.

My indoor temperature has now dropped to 26 degrees, which is a relief, and it could fall further as it’s cooler than that outside. How long it will last though, is anyone’s guess 😕

A clash of cultures. Or bureaucracies?

My mini-excavator purchase is proceeding. It began with my making an initial down-payment of 30% of the quoted cif price of the machine and its accessories delivered to Marseilles after which the various items were put into manufacturing according to the details I specified in my order. Then I had to pay the balance, 70% of the cif price, after which they were packed and shipped to the port in China for export to France.

But it actually began long before that when I did many days of detailed research into what is involved in such a transaction and what demands would be made of me as the buyer. I’ve had some experience of such matters while I was running my own business. For example, I exported an industrial shredder worth over £30k at that time from the UK to Abu Dhabi and handled all of the export paperwork and the formalities for an export finance guarantee, transport and shipping myself.

But doing so from within a business framework is different to doing it as a private individual, which is what I now am since I sold my business and retired. Then I was running a company that was registered for company tax and VAT and now I’m not, so the first thing I had to do was find out whether I could import the machine from China into France as a private individual.

The French customs authorities were extremely helpful and confirmed that I could do so, and also without employing the services of an agent so long as I was capable of dealing with the customs import procedures myself. This was good news and a great relief as although the use of an agent facilitates the processes involved it also considerably inflates the cost, in the case of a machine like mine by the best part of 100% or even more depending on what services they carry out.

So only when I knew all of this and had established the bona fides of the supplier to the best of my abilities by carrying out my own searches on them did I go ahead and place my order. After that I just expected to hear that the machine had been transported from the factory and shipped and after a delay of 30-40 days, that it was ready for customs clearance at Marseilles.

But not so. While it was on its way from the factory I was asked by the supplier for my EORI number which they said was required by their forwarder before the machine could be loaded on board the freighter. This came out of the blue and was something completely new to me. The supplier said that I could easily obtain one at no cost by applying to French customs but that I needed to do it quickly as otherwise the machine would be stuck at the port in China.

So I set to the task. A bit more research revealed that there is an on line system in France, known as SOPRANO, into which I entered my details only to find there’s no provision within it for a private individual. It asked for my SIRET or SIREN which are the registration numbers for different types of French businesses and if, like me, you have neither it only gave the alternative of registering as an ‘entrepreneur individuel’, a person in business on your own account who does not have to be registered, much the same as for small businesses in the UK.

So although I am not in business and certainly have no intention of using my mini-excavator for business purposes as and when I can get my hands on it, this is how I made my application for an EORI number. And was promptly rejected by the system, which insisted that to get one I had to provide either a SIRET or SIREN in order to be approved. So time for some more research.

Luckily although far from perfect, my French is good enough to allow me to do this and quite quickly I established that not only as a private individual am I not entitled to have an EORI number, the regulations actually forbid me from having one*. Instead I found that the export paperwork for goods imported into France by private individuals does not carry an EORI but in its place has entered the code ‘OCCASIONNEL’, meaning ‘occasional’.

I could well understand that for, for example, personal or household goods of someone relocating from say China to France, but would it also be good for items like my mini-excavator I wondered? So time to call up French customs once more who were very helpful once again. Yes they confirmed, that is how it has to be done. So time to get back to my supplier in China with the news.

And that’s when the problems arose. The supplier, or more likely the supplier’s forwarding company, was adamant that whenever they ship goods, they always have to enter an EORI number. And so a dialogue began, backwards and fowards between us. I said that it had been specificfally confirmed to me by French customs that their forwarder is incorrect, the information they are using is wrong, this is not the case for private individuals and the code mentioned above is used instead.

But they would not have it. I have sent them copies of statements made on the French customs ‘gouv.fr’ web site together with specific links to the sections in question and although at the time of writing I’ve been told that the paperwork is being processed I still have not had it confirmed that my excavator is physically being loaded for shipment.

On Friday I asked for French customs to let me have confirmation in writing of the procedure for me to forward to China but as this will not be forthcoming until this coming Monday at the earliest, I am still on tenterhooks.

The question is, what will happen if the supplier’s forwarding company stands its ground, despite being in the wrong? The problem is that with a freighter standing by, time is of the essence and there isn’t much time left for a tit-for-tat dialogue going backwards and forwards between France and China.

Luckily there is an alternative that will break the impasse – namely using the EORI number of a close friend’s French registered company. I would rather not do this unless I’m forced to by circumstances because it will introduce further complications. If their company is registered for VAT, which I think it is, it will be exempt from paying VAT on arrival of the machine at Marseilles, which is what I want to do.

Instead they might have to account for and pay the VAT in their next company VAT return which is how I would have done it if I’d still been in business. This could make things rather messy and is something I’d like to avoid. Hopefully all will be revealed on Monday and the logjam which currently exists will be broken.

Incidentally, readers might like to know out of interest how such a rapid dialogue can be conducted between speakers of two disparate languages like English (or French) and Chinese. The answer is AI. I type a message in English and it’s immediately converted into Chinese at the other end. The supplier types a reply in Chinese and I get it in either English or French, it varies. The process is amazing, very impressive and based on my current experience, works well.

*Further research has revealed that the reason for this is that an EORI number in part contains the organisation’s SIRET or SIREN, which is why private individuals, and even ‘entrepreneurs individuels’ can’t have one, despite the SOPRANO web site suggesting otherwise.

As he had promised, my contact in the Chinese supplier duly sent through the pictures of my machine and accessories out of manufacturing and ready for shipping. As well as the auger for drilling fence post holes and the 400mm bucket that it comes with I’ve also ordered a 200mm bucket, both of which are laid out on the factory floor in front of the machine.

The larger bucket will be fine for digging out for concrete bases and shoving earth around but the smaller bucket will be needed for digging out wall foundations and the trench for an electricity cable that I want to run down to the bottom of my land. I toyed with the idea of adding a ‘thumb’ to the order which is used for picking up logs, rocks and other large objects but I’m still undecided and will need to make up my mind before I do the transfer of funds for the balance of the purchase price.

The addition of a ‘thumb’ will make for a very attractive total package when I come to sell the machine when I’ve finished with it although I don’t really need it for now. However, if I buy it now it comes at a very attractive price, far less than it will be worth when I sell it later with the machine, so I need to think seriously about it.

I think my machine might be a bit smaller than the one I’ve previously received pictures of, which from the vents in the side panels was the version standing behind my machine. Is it worth making a fuss over? Probably not because I may be wrong. The different side panels may just be because my machine is a diesel as it’s difficult to make an exact size comparison and I’m told my machine is a ’12’ which is as previously pictured and ordered.

Since paying the initial deposit I’ve done further due diligence on the Chinese supplier as you can never be too careful, as I found out with my Chinese electric bike. Although I found the supplier on Aliexpress, the Chinese equivalent of Amazon, subsequent contacts have revealed a connection with Alibaba, the more ‘pro’ parent arm dealing in wholesale and multiple orders.

When I contacted Aliexpress customer services in order to get more information on the supplier they couldn’t help and referred me to Alibaba. Its customer services also couldn’t help very much, mainly I think because the transaction wasn’t done via their platform so they didn’t earn any commission out of it, and I was referred back to Aliexpress.

So I had to do more searching myself and I found links for both the company’s Aliexpress web store and also its Alibaba outlet where it is referred to as a ‘verified’ supplier. I also found the company’s own web site showing contact information where it describes its 30 year history and mentions the success it has achieved with its Aliexpress store which it established in November of last year. This ties in with what it says on Aliexpress, and I’ve also received other material eg official approval certificates in which names, addresses etc also tie up.

So I’ve done all I can really and now it’s time to press the final button, transfer the balance of the purchase price and wait for the machine and its accessories to arrive in Marseilles. And before I do, decide what I’m going to do about that ‘thumb’…

I came back to say it’s entirely paid for now. I thought it would be a false economy not to include a mechanical (as opposed to the more expensive hydraulic) thumb as it’ll allow me to clear the undergrowth out of the copse of trees next to my house. Apparently there’s a regulation that says you have to do it up to 50 metres from the building because of the fire risk. So another job to be added to the list. I was also assured that the machine is ‘as ordered’.

When I flew up to la Rochelle on France’s Atlantic coast at the end of June to get my Savannah’s avionics recertified, not only was the visit unsuccessful because the testing station unfortunately damaged my transponder but I also therefore had to fly back to Malbec without it. That in itself wasn’t a big deal. What was more so was that by the time I took off the air temperature was over 35 degrees C and the turbulence I endured during the flight was brutal.

Although I started it up, the GoPro in my cabin let me down yet again and the only video that was recorded was from outside on the starboard wing. The video I made from that footage is shown below.

This is the hardest and longest to edit video that I’ve ever made and I’m glad to see the back of it! Editing the video was fraught with as many problems as the flight itself – more actually as my video editing software, Corel Videostudio Ultimate, kept constantly throwing up sound errors. I think it’s time to move on to another package, but that’s for later.

I mention the problems, none of them insurmountable, that occurred during the flight in the video itself. I made the flight to have the six-yearly test done on my Savannah’s avionics but in the end that didn’t happen because the testing station unfortunately somehow damaged my transponder and removed it for repair. That means that when it’s been fixed I’ll have to return and do the whole flight over again.

?

I had to fly back to Malbec without my transponder but that was no big deal. I made a video of the return flight which appears in a follow-up post.

Well, it’s either the most elaborate scam that I’ve ever come across or I’ve managed to snag the best mini-excavator deal ever. I think it’s the latter but I’ll not know until I’m told that the machine is ready to be cleared through customs at Marseilles.

In either case this morning I jumped right in and transferred an initial 30% deposit into an account in Luxemburg in order to trigger production and now it will just be a waiting game.

I received another picture of the machine I’ve ordered which I’ve posted below and it’s a handsome little brute (if you like this kind of thing).

It’s not a toy. Far from it. It’s a commercial grade machine that if I was a contractor I’d be buying to use on small contracts – for digging trenches and foundations on site, for light landscape work, for general light work on farms and so on. To say that it’ll do what I want it to is a considerable understatement.

Production should take 20-30 days after which I’ll be set up to do a video inspection. I’ll then be asked to pay the remaining 70% of the agreed purchase price and then it’ll be packed up and taken to the port to be shipped, which should take up to 50 days.

So I should get the machine in around the middle of October and only then will I know that everything has gone according to plan. I’ve done all the due diligence that I can and I’m pretty confident things will work out 😉

I asked for more images of the mini excavator I’ve ordered to do the work I’m planning around my house and garden and received another video this morning. I’m very impressed. It looks to be a high quality, well made machine and compares very favourably with others I’ve seen by researching on Youtube etc.

I’m sure that it’ll be more than adequate for the work I want to do with it and when I’m finished in a year or so’s time it’ll be very easy to move on, probably for not much less than I’ll have paid for it if nothing major goes wrong. I think it will be a good investment.

I’ve had quite a few things to deal with recently one of which has been deciding what to do about getting underway with work on my garden and installing my new little swimming pool. The latter’s kit has been standing outside my house since May but other things have taken priority and it’s now fully evident that it won’t be in for this summer as I didn’t receive the official approval to go ahead anyway until early this month.

I’ve decided how I want to install it as shown in the following image. I want to kill two birds with one stone. The ‘terrasse’ at the rear of my house and the path surrounding it were never properly created and stabilised by the builder when my house was built and that now has to be done and the process of doing so will involve the use of equipment to shift soil and stone around. Stabilisation of the ground will involve the construction of a retaining wall on two sides which will also serve to enclose the pool as shown in the image.

The wall will need stepped foundations down one side because of the land’s downward slope and the pool will also need a fairly substantial reinforced concrete base because of its weight and the weight of the water it will contain. Both of these will need to be dug out using an excavator.

But thinking ahead, that’s not all. I need to relocate the ‘abri’ that I placed in front of my house before it was built down to the bottom of my land where I originally located my caravan during its construction and that will involve excavating another concrete base and after that I’ll need to extend the original ‘abri’ base in the front of the house to build a nice garage-cum-workshop. I also intend to shift the black stone that the builder laid in my driveway and around the house with white stone which again can’t be done by hand.

But it won’t end there. When the work at the rear has been completed I’ll need to complete the fencing around my house and land. That will involve removing a few posts that were originally banged into the ground, one of which was recently broken by a tractor mowing the adjacent land , and inserting quite a few more to complete the ‘cloture’ at the side and the front, which again will require the use of equipment.

You can see where I’m going with this. I recently contacted one ‘trusted’ contractor to get going on all this but he hasn’t bothered to come and see the job and I’m utterly fed up with this attitude that is so prevalent among such people here in France. Hiring an excavator costs around 200€ per day plus delivery and at that rate I’ll probably end up paying 2000€ or more just for that given the jobs that need doing. So I’ve decided to go it alone.

Fortunately I’ve found someone who’s happy to come in and give me a hand whenever I need him and that is all I’ll need – apart from the equipment. I’ve already got a motor-driven concrete mixer (I sold my electric one for a good price when I took it out of storage) so all I’ll need is an excavator and a post hole driller – an auger – and those are what I’ve been searching for for the last few days to source from, you’ve guessed it, China.

Checking the prices of second-hand mini excavators on Le Bon Coin, the hugely popular free ads web site here in France, they seem to be in the range of 4000€ plus depending on the size of the machine. However, by importing the kind of machine I need direct from China, a smallish 1 tonne machine with a 400mm bucket, I can get it for much less. Much less!

So that’s what I’m doing and while I’m at it, I’m also importing an auger that can be attached to the machine so I can complete my fence work.

I’ve posted below a couple of videos of Chinese mini-excavators. The first shows a machine with a pivoting boom in order to show this feature. It’s quite elaborate with tracks that can be made wider or narrower and other features I won’t need.

The next is the one I’m importing but with a pivoting boom. It’s less elaborate than the one shown above but will do all that I’ll need it to do. It’s also less expensive.

Finally, here’s a video of the kind of auger I’ll also be importing.

I’ve already discussed the import procedure with the French customs. The machine will be custom made to my order in 2-3 weeks with a Euro 5 diesel engine and will then be shipped to Marseilles. All I’ll then need to do is hire a heavy vehicle recovery type trailer and go down to pick it up. I’m quite excited

In aviation we have what are called TAFs – Terminal Aerodrome Forecasts, which are produced every few hours for larger airports and tell us what the weather is expected to be doing there at any particular time in the following 24 hours or so. They are useful when planning a flight not only to see what conditions will probably be like at your destination but also at any airfields along your route if they produce their own TAFS.

For me, not only is the TAF for La Rochelle useful but en route I also pass Cognac, an ‘armée de l’air’ air base conveniently half way between Malbec, my starting point and La Rochelle, which also produces a TAF. So I use both in my flight planning and they are important in influencing my decisions about the flight including whether I should even go or not.

As seems to be becoming more and more usual whenever I rely on other people for something to happen, I was let down. I didn’t make it to La Rochelle yesterday. The testing station there that was responsible for damaging my transponder said that they have received it back from repair but that they were unable to refit it yesterday and carry out the testing on my Savannah’s avionics they were originally supposed to do.

I told them that I had to fly up yesterday because otherwise the weather was going to become unsuitable for an indefinite period but they said they couldn’t accommodate me but that they could maybe fit me in today. But sure enough the TAFS yesterday for Cognac and La Rochelle looked to be ruling the flight out so at the end of the afternoon I told them I’d not be coming and indeed, although the Cognac TAF has marginally improved, the TAF for La Rochelle is still indicating a high probability of thunderstorms at about the time I’d be arriving.

Cognac TAF

From Friday 5:00 till Saturday 5:00:
Wind 300° 5kt. Ceiling and visibility OK.
Becoming from Friday 6:00 till 7:00:
Clouds broken 14000ft towering cumulus.
Temporarily from Friday 6:00 till 8:00: Visibility 3000m. light thunderstorm rain. Clouds broken 14000ft cumulonimbus.
Becoming from Friday 9:00 till 11:00:
Ceiling and visibility OK.
With 40% probability, temporarily from Friday 14:00 till 16:00: Clouds scattered 9000ft towering cumulus

La Rochelle TAF

From Friday 8:00 till Saturday 8:00:
Wind 340° 8kt. Ceiling and visibility OK.
Temporarily from Friday 8:00 till 12:00: Visibility 2500m. thunderstorm rain. Clouds broken 7000ft cumulonimbus.
Temporarily from Friday 15:00 till 22:00: Wind 290° 15kt, gusting 25kt.
With 30% probability, temporarily from Friday 22:00 till Saturday 5:00: Visibility 4000m. light shower rain. Clouds broken 7000ft towering cumulus.
With 40% probability from Saturday 2:00 till 8:00: Clouds broken 900ft.

So that looks like it and for some time to come from the weather forecasts that are currently available. That’s really annoying as it wasn’t my fault that I’ve got to make a second trip up to La Rochelle but yet again I’m the one being subjected to the maximum inconvenience and disruption because of it. 🙁

I’ve been informed that my Savannah’s transponder has now been repaired and that I can therefore return to La Rochelle for it to be refitted and the Savannah’s 6-yearly avionics check to be completed. I’ve checked the weather and it looks as though the best day for the flight will be this coming Thursday 17th July as after that the weather looks as though it will become more unpredictable.

Both of the times I’ve been into La Rochelle the wind has been off the sea making for a straightforward approach and landing on runway 27. However, it looks as though the wind will be fairly light on Thursday but from the opposite direction. The primary ILS (instrument landing system) for the commercials going into La Rochelle (eg Ryanair) is on runway 27 and it’s likely that they might still use that runway despite there being a small tailwind for them but I don’t know whether that will apply for me doing a VFR approach which is published to be to 09 to the north on a left hand circuit over the sea.

The VFR departure to the south on 09 is also slightly more complex as it takes a similar but reverse route to the approach to runway 27 following the main road out to reporting point E (Echo) before then turning to head south. It therefore looks as though Thursday’s flight could be quite interesting especially as I’ll also be entering controlled airspace without a transponder this time.

But it’s taken time, effort and not a little money as I’ll go on to explain.

This Autumn I’ve planned to travel to Australia to meet with my cousin who’s the same age as me but who I haven’t seen since her family emigrated from the UK to Aus when we were about five years old. My family planned to go as well at the same time and we’d started to make all of the necessary arrangements but my dad got what he thought was a plum new job just beforehand and we stayed behind. Up until my last house move I still had a couple of 1950’s tea chests (wooden boxes about 1 metre cubed in which tea was shipped from Ceylon as it was then to the UK) with traces of tea still in them that my dad had got hold of to pack things in for the voyage.

But I digress. A few months ago I suddenly got the urge to get in contact with Denise, my cousin, but with little to go on I thought it would be a pretty hopeless task after so long but my brother in law came across some old correspondence from 30 or more years ago with a telephone number and when I phoned it was Denise who answered. Who’d have thought it. We’ve been in touch ever since and after a while I decided that as we are nearly the last of our generation in our two families, I’d make the trip to Aus to see each other for what might at our age be the first and last time.

I set to the task of making all of the necessary arrangements with enthusiasm. I figured on travelling this coming Autumn as that would coincide with Springtime in Australia and as this was around the turn of this year I was able to snag some pretty good prices for the air fare and car hire in Australia by booking and paying months in advance. Similarly for a hotel in Melbourne which I planned to explore for a few days before then continuing my journey to my cousin’s place in Victoria, but what I totally neglected to think about was my visitor visa.

After all, what could possibly go wrong? All I’ll need to do, I reasoned, was apply for one, probably on line, pay whatever fee is demanded, provide proof of identity etc and wait for it to plop into my letter box. What? Convicts used to be transported there from England back in the day, for goodness sake, I’m not an international criminal, terrorist or gun-runner so surely it should be just a formality? Well, no actually. This could not be further from the truth and in reality I had no idea how difficult it would be to get into Australia. Here’s how it went.

First step, of course, was to make the application on line, but not so fast. This required the submission of page after page of information, not just about oneself but also, indirectly, about one’s family, one’s health, finances, reason(s) for visiting Australia, what one’s intentions were once there, who one would be visiting together their details and much, much more. The process was mind-bending and seemingly endless and it didn’t end with the payment of a fairly hefty non-refundable fee of $200AU. That was just the start of the application process.

First I was required to submit copies of various documents that went some way beyond proof of identity and passport. I had to show evidence that if I had travelled internationally previously I had conformed to visa requirements and left the country or countries concerned according to the required timescales. I also had to provide evidence that I had the means and permission to return to my country of origin or departure and the means to finance my intended period of stay in Australia in the form of official bank statements and it should also be added that all copies of documents submitted had to be officially confirmed and verified.

All of the above was tedious, time consuming but was at least under my control, but there was more in the form of two, non-negotiable additional requirements. The first was the provision of my biometrics in the form of fingerprints and a photograph taken by an Australian government approved agency, usually a local Australian consulate. There is no Australian consulate in France however, that can perform this role – the closest one is in London – so an official agent has been appointed to do so. This agent happens to be in Paris so I had no choice but to make the journey to their office to accomplish the task. The only problem was that the Australian immigration authorities only allow 14 days from the date of application for biometrics submission beyond which one’s visa application would be summarily cancelled unless one had a very good reason – and the emphasis was placed on ‘very good’.

So in double-quick time I had to make an appointment with the approved agent, book a train fare and work out how to get the agent’s office once in Paris. Luckily the agent had an available appointment within the 14 day period and I booked a convenient inter-city train from Brive to take me there. I thought it sensible to buy a senior’s rail card as part of the fare as this gave a 30% discount for a year’s travel and only cost a bit more than the saving on this one fare alone but I was still just over 100€ out of pocket. I then had to pay for the Metro in Paris, another 7,90€, plus all-day parking at Brive, 9,70€ on top of that plus the cost of the biometric procedure, another 45€, so the cost of my visitor visa was beginning to mount up.

But there was another requirement, namely to undergo a medical examination by an approved medical examiner. Very generously, in comparison with the demand for biometrics, 28 days was allowed for this but the problem was that the medical examiners have been appointed by region and the one covering south-west France is in Bordeaux ie almost the geometrically opposite direction to Paris, meaning that during my visa application process I’d be travelling almost the whole length of France. But that wasn’t the most painful bit. The medical exam itself would be costing another hefty 200€!

I thought about taking the train from Périgueux to Bordeaux but in the end decided to go by car as I found that there was quite a bit of parking around the medical examiner’s office and that would avoid having to take a bus, or more likely a tram, there from the station. My plan worked out pretty well although not knowing how long the medical exam would take, I overpaid a few euros at the machine for on-street parking. Plus I also had to fork out a further 12,30€ at the lab just up the road for a blood test.

By now by my estimation my visa application had cost me in the realm of an additional 500€ over and above the actual cost of my Australian visit which I have to say I was not expecting and which came as quite a shock both physically and to my finances. However, at least I didn’t have to wait too long for what came next. The biometrics agent submitted their dossier to the Australian authorities over a week ago but the medical examiner only submitted his results one day ago, or two days on the day of my examination at most. Nevertheless, after being advised that applications could take some time to be processed, I received notification by email this morning that my visa had been approved.

This came as a considerable relief. I’d spent quite a considerable sum on air fares, car hire and hotel accommodation, all of which was at stake, before even considering my visitor visa and it would have been painful in every sense if for some reason I’d been turned down. But luckily I haven’t and I can now look forward to packing my bags and flying off to the other side of the world in the Autumn and getting to know my cousin who I’ve only spoken to on the phone and exchanged emails with in recent months and not seen face to face in over 70 years. I can’t wait and I’m sure it’ll all be worth it.

Sorry for the awful mis-spelling of Paris in the title of this post. But I’ll continue…

I had to go to Paris on 2nd July to provide my biometrics in the form of a photo and fingerprints to the Australian immigration authorities in support of my visitor visa application. This was not the best thing to be doing in the middle of ‘la Canicule’, the hottest heatwave for many years that had been dominating the French news for several days, but having made the necessary appointment and travel arrangements I had no choice.

So I was up at 5.30 am and after a cold shower and a quick breakfast I was off to Brive to catch the 7.56 am train to Paris Austerlitz. As is usually the case, the train arrived and departed dead on time and I was able to purchase a ‘café au lait’ and a quick snack during the 4 1/2 hour journey, with the train also arriving dead on time at Austerlitz.

So so far, so good. I’d already worked out and written down my itinerary so as to avoid any unnecessary mistakes and delays – Metro Line C at Austerlitz, four stops to Les Invalides, then change to RER Line 13 Direction St Denis Université and nine stops to Porte de Saint-Ouen in Clichy. I then had a 1 1/2km walk to my final destination, the office of VFS Global on the Boulevard du Général Leclerc.

Usually walking such a distance wouldn’t have bothered me – I’ve been doing much longer distances in Istanbul for example – but I knew that it was going to be challenging in the temperature and even more so on the way back, but off I went using my Waze satnav on my phone in order to get to my 2.20 pm appointment. I had about 1 hour and 50 minutes in total following my arrival in Paris so I had plenty of time to get to my destination, but it sure was hot and there was not a lot of shade.

Is the next shot of the highest graffiti in Paris, if not the whole of France?

I arrived at my destination with time to spare albeit by that time suffering rather in the heat. After taking the lift to the sixth floor I was greeted by a message on VFS’s office door saying that the office was closed for the whole of July and I and an Iraqi gentlemen were both bemused by this as we both had appointments within the coming few minutes.

Luckily, an attractive, tall, blonde young lady in a short skirt and on towering heels then turned up to open the door that we’d been banging on and took us with her into the office. I then received some bad news. She told me that as well as bringing my passport I should also have brought the letter I’d received from the Australian immigration authorities by email confirming their demand for biometrics. Without it she said that she could not process my application and I’d have to return with it.

It was my own fault as I should have read the letter more thoroughly but she said that I should search for it in my email or try to download another copy from the Australian web site while she processed the Iraqi. I was unsuccessful on both counts but as the office was closed to the general public and therefore not busy, she said she’d see what she could do by searching out my details on the immigration authority’s system.

By now, following my walk from the station I felt as though I was in a sauna and my shirt was becoming wringing wet. She offered me a drink of water from their machine which turned out not to be cooled (yuck!) and after several minutes she returned beaming. She said that she’d found my details and would be able to take my biometrics after all which was a great relief to me given how far I’d come and how much the trip had cost me.

She turned out to be Russian with a father in Crimea who has terminal cancer and became a bit tearful when she told me about it and how difficult it was finding a way to get back to see him, possibly for the last time. After she’d finished I gave her a hug and a ‘bissous’ which she didn’t object to before giving my face a splash of cold water in the toilet and departing back into the heat of the afternoon.

The next two shots were taken at Porte de Vincennes on my walk back to the Metro at Porte de Sain-Ouen (the final image) from where I returned to Austerlitz via the same route on which I’d come.

Once again, the 4.28 pm from Austerlitz left dead on time and despite receiving a message that it would be delayed by at least 20 minutes en route, also arrived dead on time at 9.03 pm at Brive. It only took a minute or two to pick up my car from the station car park (for what I thought was a very reasonable 9.70€ for the day) and another hour to get home again. So mission accomplished and what a relief to throw all of my clothes into the washing machine and myself under a cold shower. Now just Bordeaux next week for a medical.

I made it up to La Rochelle in my Savannah yesterday but it didn’t turn out to be the flight I’d hoped it would be. It started off really well. I left at 8.30 am and as I’d prepared the aircraft the day before I left myself plenty of time and, unusually for me, there was no pressure. The sky at Malbec was bright and almost bereft of cloud and with it still being cool, I was looking forward to a calm, very pleasant flight for a change.

I’d also checked both of my GoPros, one in the cabin and the other under the right wing, had left both running while I did my pre-take off walk round and it looked as though this time I might end up getting material from both of them for a video of the flight. The take off went well and after climbing out quite steeply and avoiding Fleurac I was soon thinking to myself what a pleasure it was flying in such cool, calm conditions. Until, that is, I came to my first waypoint to the south-west of Périgueux.

It was at this point when I last did the trip that I spotted low cloud up ahead and I think something, or someone must have it in for me, because after making the right turn over the waypoint I could again see a band of low cloud dead ahead of me topping a powerful inversion.

As I approached the cloud it was soon clear that I would be flying right into it and so it was time to make a decision – over or under. The last time I’d done the trip I could see that for some way ahead there were breaks in the cloud through which the sun was shining, so I’d decided to climb over it. This time however, I didn’t like the look of it.

So this time I decided to go under. I couldn’t see any evidence of any gaps in the layer and I had no idea how far it would extend or how thick it might become. Ahead of me was Cognac airspace in which I’d have to descend to under 1500 feet to stay legal without contacting Cognac and getting clearance which I didn’t really want to do. And what if I did and the cloud extended as far as La Rochelle? Then I’d have to descend through IMC in order to land which itself would be illegal, so I made a quick but what I thought was a reasoned decision to go under this time.

And what a wise decision that turned out to be because the cloud layer extended way past Cognac airspace and it was evident as it became darker as I flew along my route that it also became a lot thicker. I never had to fly below 1200 feet, so I was always legal as the terrain, buildings etc below were never at much more than sea level, and although it did become a bit more bumpy as I was below the cloud base, it wasn’t much of a problem.

Eventually as I got closer to La Rochelle I did emerge into bright sunshine with just a few clouds so my decision proved to be the right one. I then called up La Rochelle Approach, received a squawk code to go into my transponder and was cleared as requested to reporting point Echo (E) which is to the east of the airport and visible in the chart, below, which shows my track in red superimposed over my planned route in blue.

And then came my next surprise. I was told by Approach that I should next report at reporting point Echo Alpha (EA), to the west of Echo and also shown in the above chart. This was no great hardship as although it would take me slightly right of my direct course from Echo to the runway, the distance was not overly excessive. The VFR Approach Chart from Echo for runway 27 at La Rochelle does have a bit of a kink in it taking you along the main road to avoid flying over a conglomeration of residential buildings and an approach from Echo Alpha would exaggerate that kink, but not by too much.

But it didn’t end there and you have to be ready to deal with unexpected surprises. The next thing Approach advised me that due to a departing commercial (Ryanair) there would be a 5-10 minute delay and what would I prefer to do? I suggested orbiting between Echo Alpha and Echo to which the reply came back, ‘Perfect’ (as an international airport the controllers speak good English). I only had to do so once and my track is shown as a red loop in the above chart to the east of the airport.

My clearance to land Number 1 came through shortly after so I was then able to continue my right hand turn towards the runway down the main road. The two images below give an idea of the offset that has to be flown.

And here we are on short final to land.

After landing as I approached the main turn-off I was asked to hold position to allow an ‘autogire’ to taxy out and take off. Good thinking by the controller.

As I turned off the next two shots show the route down to the main apron. The large painted yellow numbers show the direction commercials have to take for their parking gates. If they are not familiar and go the wrong way they’d end up in a real pickle among the General Aviation with few chances to turn around.

I’d wondered why I couldn’t understood the taxiway chart while doing my flight planning but it turned out that I could because Star Atlantique, who I was going to, have moved since I was last there. The following shots were taken as I taxied round to their new location.

And here’s Hotel Papa parked outside ready for its check-up.

Sadly, this was the point when things began to go downhill. First I found out that the GoPro in the cabin had stopped working half way. It was my own fault because I’d reached around to get something and had touched it. Then some time later the young engineer who was conducting the checks came in and to my great shock was clutching my transponder which he’d removed from my panel. He said that it wasn’t working and was lighting up but throwing a ‘transmit’ error code.

I said how could that be? It has been used in both France and the UK and has shown no faults in La Rochelle, Limoges and Le Touquet and with Lille Approach to name a few, so how come it’s suddenly not working? He more or less shrugged his shoulders and then the office manager came in. Had I bought it new, had it been repaired, the answers to which were yes and no.

I said it was working when I arrived so why didn’t he phone the Control Tower to confirm, which he did. No, there were no problems they replied, so that took the wind out of their sails. The outcome after some delay was that they said it would need to go off for repair at their cost, as I understood it as the whole conversation was, of course, conducted in French. Plus, of course, I’d need to get a clearance to depart from La Rochelle VFR without a transponder.

So this is why in the next image there’s a hole in my Savannah’s panel.

I’m very annoyed because I put the panel together myself and installed everything including all of the instruments plus the radio and transponder. If you want my opinion, I think the young engineer either shorted the unit out or maybe blew its output stage, possibly by powering it up without its antenna being connected. Either way, I think the problem was avoidable.

That then presented me with two further problems, one immediate and one not so. The first was departing La Rochelle and the second was that I’d need to do the whole trip again when my transponder was repaired and ready to be refitted. But first things first. I’d originally planned not to take on any fuel at La Rochelle because if everything had gone as planned I’d have got back to Malbec with about an hour’s-worth left in the Savannah’s tanks. But I’d had the hold delay and quite a bit of climbing and descending en route so I thought it would be prudent to take 20 litres of Avgas on board.

The next few pics are of taxying around to the fuel station at the other side of the main apron near where Star used to be. On the way a Pilatus turboprop pulled out in front of me heading for the runway from the main apron so I had to hold for a minute or so to give it some space.

The fuel point is on the right in the next image. You have to follow the blue line.

This is me clambering back in after taking fuel on board.

After starting up at the fuel point I requested a VFR departure without transponder with a left turn out departing along the coastline. The controller was already aware and the next few shots are of the take off and turn out including a quite spectacular view of the bridge over to the Ile de Ré.

La Rochelle itself.

The next shots were taken as I flew along the coastline. I couldn’t take many with my hand-held camera because by now the flight was already becoming pretty bumpy.

I’d originally planned to arrive at Star at around 10.30 am (which I did, exactly) and get away by mid-day at the latest to avoid the main heat of the day. But with the delay due to the transponder problem this was impossible and as I flew on flying conditions became quite brutal due to the increasing heat causing a great deal of thermic activity and turbulence. The problem was exacerbated by my need to remain below 1500 feet while again passing through Cognac airspace but was not diminished much by climbing to 3000 feet and it was with great relief that I eventually came in sight of Malbec.

I of course knew that in that heat the approach would be challenging and indeed it was, probably more challenging than I’ve ever flown it with its characteristic lift, sink and lift again on final. I can’t say that my landing was as tidy as I would have liked because I ended up a bit low and for the first time ever touched down a little bit early just on the tip of the second arrow, resulting in a little bounce. But only pride was dented and no harm was done.

So that brought to an end my somewhat disastrous trip to La Rochelle. 1 hour 50 minutes up and 1 hour 45 minutes back. And soon I’ll have to do it all over again. I can hardly wait 😕

And two to go!

For once it looks as though the weather will cooperate and I’ll be able to fly up to La Rochelle to get my Savannah’s transponder and radio re-certified this coming Friday 27 June. The winds and weather generally look favourable and if I get away by 08.00 am, current calculations show that I should arrive at La Rochelle in about 1 hour 40 minutes. I plan to fly a counter-clockwise route from Malbec heading to La Rochelle via the north of Cognac and back to Malbec via the south.

With today’s weather forecast the return flight should only take about 1 hour 20 minutes so with the Savannah’s endurance of over 4 1/2 hours and a total flying time of about 3 hours there should be no need for me to take on fuel at La Rochelle. As I remember, I didn’t when I visited to have the avionics checked the first time.

The flight north should be fairly routine – all I will need to be sure of will be to remain under 1500 feet when passing through Cognac airspace. The return flight will be a bit more interesting as I will need to remain clear of Rochefort airspace and also the restricted area at Saintes, which is an Armée de l’Air flying school.

The latter only extends to a height of 1500 feet but to be sure of avoiding any problems I intend to avoid it completely, which is no big deal. I’ll then turn onto a route that passes between the airfields of Pons and Jonzac while neatly avoiding the two of them and with a bit of luck, depending on how long things take at La Rochelle, I should be back at Malbec by mid-afternoon.

So after Friday that will only leave the tasks that I have to complete for my Australian tourist visa. I’ve booked a rail ticket to go to Paris for my biometrics on 2 July and arranged for a medical in Bordeaux on 8 July so that should wrap those up. All I’ll then need to do is wait for my visa to come through.

That will still leave one more thing though – arranging the installation of my new swimming pool the components of which have been standing out in front of my house for the past several weeks. It would have been lovely to have had it during the recent period of very hot weather – over 40 degrees C on some days – but quite honestly I think I’ll be lucky to see it in and ready to use by the end of the summer. Oh well, there’s always next year…

I’ve been very busy lately. The certification of my Savannah’s radio and transponder expires this month and I need to fly the aircraft up to the testing station at La Rochelle airport in the Charente in order to have the equipment recertified. If I don’t I can still legally use the aircraft but not the equipment and especially in controlled airspace, so it’s essential to get the job done.

As I haven’t flown my Savannah since I flew it to the UK and back last August I’ve had to give it a thorough clean, do a small repair to its windshield and give it a thorough check-over, all of which I completed as of yesterday. Indeed, I topped up its tanks yesterday evening so it’s ready to fly and ran the engine for several minutes to check that all will be well for the La Rochelle flight when I can eventually get around to doing it. But that may not be for another week or two.

One of the reasons for that is that we’re having visibility problems here with lots of thick haze, but the other is that having been to Istanbul twice since the beginning of this year and once to the UK, I’ve also been spending lots of time making plans to visit Australia in the autumn. The reason is that I have a cousin living in Victoria who’s about the same age as me but who I haven’t seen since we were little children of about five or six years of age. She returned once to the UK several years ago but I missed her at the time and a few months ago I had a sudden urge to try to get in touch with her again.

The parents of both of us have gone now and we are almost the last of our generation in our two families. I thought it would be difficult but I managed through what was almost a miracle to speak to her on the phone within 48 hours. We’ve kept in touch over the months and as she would have difficulty travelling we decided that I’d go out to Australia to stay with her for a few weeks. Compared to a short break in Europe, planning for the trip has been very detailed. As of now I’ve booked just about everything – air fare, travel insurance, hotel, car hire – you name it, and all being well everything should go off without a hitch

I say ‘all being well’ because I’ve booked and paid for all the above before obtaining my visa, which I applied for on-line yesterday. And I’ve been totally gobsmacked by how difficult it is to get into Aus and I’m just hoping it’ll be forthcoming. The visa application alone cost just under $200 Aus which I understand is non-refundable. It was the best part of 30 pages in which I had to reveal almost my whole life and family history including telling about my son who has no plans whatsoever to travel to Aus, mentioning my ex-wife from whom I’ve been divorced for over 13 years, my finances, health, travel plans, who I’m visiting including her details and DOB for goodness sake, proof that I’ve travelled elsewhere and returned home again, proof I can return to the country I’m coming from ie France and lots more beside. To be honest I found it highly intrusive and much of it bloody impertinent but if you don’t comply you don’t get in.

But that’s not all of it. I’ve been told I have to provide biometric data ie finger prints and a certified photograph. If the Aus authorities knew their stuff they’d know that the French authorities already have those and could easily send copies, presumably at my cost. But no. As there’s no Aus authority in France who can collect the data – the nearest is Australia House in London – I’ve got to go all the way to Paris for an approved agent to do the job. This will take a full day as it means travelling from south-west to north-east France and will cost me in excess of 100€ in train and Metro fares (pensioner reduced cost) and 45€ for the service. Plus although I thought it’d be a good idea to apply early for the visa I’ve only got 14 days to provide the biometric data otherwise my application will be automatically rejected. Scandalous. Common sense says the time limit should be linked to the planned travel date, not the date of visa application.

But it gets even worse than that. I’ve also got to have a medical by an approved doctor. The closest one is in Bordeaux which is in completely the opposite direction to Paris, will incur me a further cost and will again take the best part of a day to get done. However, very ‘generously’, this time I’ve been given 28 days to comply. So in order to meet these conditions I’ll end up having to travel the whole length of France at substantial additional cost and inconvenience and have less than a month in order to do so! So no wonder my flight up to La Rochelle has had to go on the back burner!

I said to my cousin that if I hadn’t already booked and paid for everything already I wouldn’t bother but I’m committed now. It seems to me that Aus wants to make it as difficult as possible for people to visit so only those who really need to will do so. But I have to admit that it’s taken the edge off my visit which I was really looking forward to 🙁

I reinstalled the seats in my Savannah this afternoon and I’m really impressed. The black dye did an excellent job and they more than came up to my expectations.

The next shot is of the arrangement I’ve used to secure the Savannah’s screen to the two internal sloping tubes which I think will be a big improvement on how I did it previously and will prevent any more flexing damage to the polycarbonate.

It consists of a sandwich arrangement with the polycarbonate sheeting of the screen being sandwiched either side by rubber washers of approx. thickness 2.5 mm which then have a metal washer above and below them. So from the outside the order is metal washer, rubber washer, screen plastic, rubber washer, metal washer and the whole is then pop riveted from the outside to the metal tube inside the cabin.

The metal and rubber washers are all of diameter 14mm with a 3.5 mm hole through their centres to take the pop rivets. I’m hoping that the supports being of such a diameter will offer much better support for the plastic of the screen and will obviate any further problems, but only time will tell. I certainly hope that I’ll be able to avoid replacing the Savannah’s screen which was a pig of a job when I did it a few years ago after an accidental fuel spill destroyed the previous one.

I gave my Savannah’s seats a second coat of black dye this morning as on close inspection I could see a few white patches that were still faintly visible beneath the dye. After they’d dried I gave them a spray and buff with beeswax based furniture polish and what a difference compared to before I started work on them. Well worth the effort!

Here’s a shot of the two products I’ve just been using on the Savannah’s seats and polycarbonate screen, both of which I’m very pleased with.

A word to the unwary. You can’t use just any old plastic polish on polycarbonate as almost all will result in blooming and fogging of the surface that is then difficult, even impossible, to remove. You must ONLY use products that have been specially developed for polycarbonate such as the one I’ve shown above.

This one is for slightly more extreme polishing, to remove the beginnings of oxidation as was the case for my Savannah’s screen. If all you want to do is lightly polish the screen, after normal cleaning or washing, I’d recommend Plexus which is also specially for polycarbonate.

My Savannah has black leather seats which I was told were quite an expensive option back in the day. They were certainly quite eye-catching when I first acquired the aircraft (if not the most comfortable on long flights 😕 ) but over the years they’ve become, let’s say, a bit tired looking. Don’t get me wrong, the leather hasn’t split at all or become particularly worn and the seat interiors haven’t collapsed or begun to sag even, but what has happened is that the leather has begun progressively to lose its colour.

This has manifested itself in the form of white patches that have grown in size and number over the years to the point where they’ve become a real eyesore, as shown in the following image.

I’ve been meaning to do something about it for a long time but what with the house and garden, the X-Air and whatever I’ve never got around to it. However, with the X-Air now gone and a lull in my house and garden work I decided that with the Savannah now needing some other attention, as mentioned in my previous post, now was the time to do something about the seats.

So with this in mind I bought a small bottle of black leather dye. I had two choices – a glossy version or one called US Army Black which was described as matt and I decided to go for the former. We had over 35 degrees C today so this afternoon I brought the seat backs and bases home for me to treat this evening when it was cooler because although the dye dries quickly, I didn’t want it to flash off too quickly possibly leaving a streaky finish.

I donned a pair of disposable gloves and applied the dye as you do French polish to a wood surface, using a small cheese-cloth pad, gently wiping it on in the direction of the ‘grain’ of the leather on the sides, verticals and horizontals. To say I’m delighted with the results is an understatement considering it only took a few minutes to do the lot, considerably less than half an hour. Here’s how the pieces came out.

Ignore the ‘brownish’ tinge in the next two shots. It was just a trick of the light and the leather is actually a nice deep black.

Here’s a shot of the dye that I used, which I’d thoroughly recommend.

I was thinking that I might have to apply a second coat but I don’t think it’ll be necessary except for touching up one or two tiny patches near stitching where I’ve missed a few bits of white. Apart from that I can’t wait to see how the seats come out with a bit of wax polish on them and I think they’ll now become a real asset for the Savannah 😀

I haven’t flown my Savannah since my last trip to the UK in it back in August of last year. The main reason is that it suffered slight damage to its screen as a result of the brutal headwinds to which it was subjected which I think were much stronger than most ULMs are designed to resist. The damage was not so severe as to need the screen to be be replaced but it was bad enough for it to need repairing before the Savannah could take to the air again.

There are two pop rivets that secure the front of the screen to two sloping uprights inside the cabin and in order to minimise the stress on the polycarbonate (or so I’d thought) I’d placed a rubber washer between the screen and each metal upright before pop riveting the screen to them. I thought that these would be enough to protect the screen from damage due to the pressure of the air while in flight but I was wrong, mainly because the winds I’d encountered were far greater than what I’d ever anticipated.

As a result one of the pop rivets had failed completely leaving a hole in the screen and although the other had stayed in, spider web cracks were beginning to extend from its hole. I therefore had to remove the rivet, stop-drill the latter and resecure the screen to the sloping uprights with a much better (larger) metal washer/rubber washer sandwich arrangement, which I did a couple of days or so ago.

So so far, so good. That left the job of giving the aircraft a really good wash because as it had been standing in the barn for so long, it had a good coating of dust and also poo from the little finch-like birds that have made the barn their home. And the problem was exacerbated because when I sold my old X-Air I’d moved the Savannah into the centre of the floor and hadn’t realised that its wings were exactly under a roof beam on which the little birds perch, in order to do their toilet apparently.

It doesn’t take much to remove the dust and poo – all that’s needed is a good soaking with clean water using a large floor mop – so that’s what I got stuck into and did this evening after the day had cooled down from its high of over 35 degrees C. The dust washed off easily and probably also helped to remove the bird poo in the process because 99% of the latter is dry before it hits the Savannah’s paintwork. Think mice poop, which is what I originally thought it was until the truth hit me.

The first few shots show ‘before and after’ with one wing still as all of the Savannah’s horizontal surfaces had started out. The others show the dust and poo closer up.

I also noticed that the screen was showing some slight stress crazing around both rivet holes bit it’s not significant and there’s nothing I can do about it other than replacing the screen which isn’t justified. However, the polycarbonate low down in the middle of the screen was also showing some signs of oxidation, rather like car headlamps, and this evening I used some special polish that I received the other day to deal with it.

It seems to have worked really well. I also bought some black leather dye for the Savannah’s seats which I’ll probably apply tomorrow so after that I’ll give more details on it and the special polish I used on the screen.

I came to Istanbul this time with a long list of ‘must see’ attractions in the city but apart from at the week-end when the city was overrun with a huge number of visitors and tourists, the timing of my dental appointments has made it practically impossible to tick any of them off the list. I was supposed to go on a Bosphorus evening cruise with food, drinks and entertainment on Saturday but this didn’t go as planned, fortunately for me I have to say.

I’d booked but not paid in advance and the arrangement was that I was supposed to have been transported from and back to my hotel but in the event was asked to walk a good ten minutes to a pick-up point outside a seedy hotel to the north. This made me rather annoyed and as it was a cold, windy evening and no taxi had arrived at the allotted time I just decided to call it an evening and headed back to my hotel. So too bad for them.

Today was (is at the time of writing) my last day in Istanbul and as for all I know this might be the last time I’ll ever get the chance to visit I decided that I’d head back down to Karakoy for lunch and check out the situation at the Galata Tower on the way. If there were no crowds or an enormous queue, like yesterday, I thought I might then do the climb up (figuratively speaking). And there was neither, so I did.

The price for doing so, 30€, came as a bit of a shock but I thought if you’re in Istanbul you’ve got to do it, which I guess is what the authorities also thought when they arrived at that figure. But anyway, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience so I swiped my card yet again and off I went clutching my no-refunds, use only once on the day of issue ticket. Somewhat unsurprisingly I found that the entrance is via a flight of fairly steep stone steps, so too bad if you have limited mobility and can’t scale them.

At the top of them is an entrance hall that’s all very swish and modern – not the way you’d expect a mediaeval tower to be at all. And that’s the way the whole tower is – it’s been thoroughly modernised throughout as a 21st century tourist attraction. There are a few museum pieces and artifacts on various floors as you make your way down – on foot on some very narrow and precarious staircases some of which have no handrails – but these don’t seem to be of much interest to most people although they are very well presented.

The big attraction, of course, is, or are, the views of Istanbul and the Bosphorus from the top of the tower, so having said that I’ll let the pictures tell the story.

After climbing the tower I made my way into Karakoy from a different direction to last time and couldn’t find the same little restaurant where I’d enjoyed an excellent burger and draught beer. So I tried another but somewhat disappointingly it wasn’t half as good. But that’s life isn’t it. I’ll take it easy for the rest of the afternoon – may pop out to buy some Turkish Delight to take back with me – and then have a last Chinese take-away this evening if I can find the room for it.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my visit to Istanbul yet again and was relieved this time to have some good weather despite it being a bit windy. And I’ll be coming back a more educated man because I’ve found out that the ‘g’ in Beyoglu* is silent, and it’s pronounced Bayolu, and Karaköy is pronounced Karakee. So how’s that then! What a brilliant Turkish scholar I turned out to be 😉

* The g is supposed to have a little accent over it but WordPress can’t cope with it

I took the Taksim to Kabatas funicular to get to what should be my final dental appointment this afternoon. It’s a brilliant way to do it as it saves a massive amount of walking all the way down the hill and back up again. But even so, Istanbul is not a city that’s friendly towards people with limited mobility because even though the funicular can get you down and back again, although there are escalators at each end, these only go upwards and you still have to descend a lot of steep steps down at both ends under your own steam.

I photo-documented the whole journey today as the shots I took previously were so poor and today’s pics give a good impression of what the trip of only around two or three minutes involves. First some shots of the Metro station at the Taksim Square end.

See what I mean about the steps down into the terminus. People coming up have the benefit of an escalator but those going down don’t.

At the bottom there are signs in Turkish and English to direct you to the trains and as everywhere in Istanbul, it seems, at the very bottom there’s a small fast food buffet. Who buys and eats all this food I do not know.

Then you come to a row of entrance turnstiles that only appear to accept credit, debit or previously purchased (by credit or debit card) travel cards. Istanbul seems to be run on credit and debit cards and even small street vendors accept them because everyone has a mobile phone.

Travellers beware. When I swiped my card yesterday the screen turned green with Turkish writing that I did not understand. The turnstile did not move, so I swiped it again with the same result and yet again at another entrance. It was only when I watched other travellers that I realised that you have to push against the turnstile to pass through, so I probably paid the fare several times over learning this simple lesson.

Here are a couple of shots of the empty platform while we waited for the train to arrive and of it emerging upwards out of the tunnel.

The tunnel, the platform and the train all slope downwards (or upwards at the Kabatas end). The sides of the entrances are vertical, of course, and the train floors horizontal with steps in. The entrances have double doors, on the platform and the train carriages, and travellers enter on one side and exit on the other to permit free and easy movement at busy times.

The Kabatas end is smaller in size than the Taksim terminal and more modern but the procedures are similar. You exit onto the platform and ascend by escalator to the outside world via an entrance/exit hall which naturally has a ubiquitous fast food buffet.

They are building a super new ferry transfer terminal at Kabatas which now appears to be almost finished. There’s a large model of it in the entrance/exit foyer.

And to finish off with, some shots of the new terminal itself.

Istanbul is a fast-moving city and there’s a massive amount of rebuilding and development work going on. But anyone thinking of visiting need not be deterred as the amount of disruption to the tourist trade is minimal. You just need to think of it as being a part of the innate character of the city 😀

But this young lady is a bloody good dentist! She understands that for certain procedures you can’t spare the patient. Like when you’re fitting something – like an implant crown – that has to be snug, the patient has to be able tell the dentist where it’s uncomfortable and not fitting right. Where it’s cutting into the gum, for example. And to be able to do that, no pain killer can be administered during the procedures leading up to the final fitting.

So she didn’t and it hurt like hell. Again! But my goodness, I think she did a lovely job and it was worth it. She only gave me a couple of small pain killer injections once she’d finished and although it took a little while, the pain eventually subsided. She asked me to sit quietly for 10 minutes or so and then I went back in for her to finish her work off to her own satisfaction. Like trimming away excess cement around the gum level and making sure everything was neat and tidy and she even gave me a free descale.

And that was it. My treatment had come to an end and she suggested that I might like to return at some time in the future to fill a gap at back upper left with a final implant. I may do so, but I can’t before March next year due to my future travel plans, and anyway, it’s been there since a hack English dentist removed a tooth that he mucked up 57 years ago. So you could say that I’ve got used to it, but we’ll see 😉

Last Sunday dawned warm and sunny so I decided it was time for a decent walk. I’ve not been doing as much walking this time in Istanbul because I’ve been getting a bit of discomfort from my right knee, the one I had keyhole surgery on about 14 or 15 years ago before coming to France.

I think I damaged it again slightly when I pulled my old X-Air out of the barn over soft ground before flying it up to its new owner on 5th March and I’ve been trying to get it to heal again as the consultant told me at the time that the surgery would probably only be good for about 15 years, after which, who knows. I don’t want to get involved in knee replacement and all that stuff and in any case, I’m booked to go off to Australia in the Autumn so haven’t the time.

My hotel, Hotel Mara, is very well placed just off the main tourist street, Istiklal Avenue, along which the trams run from Taksim Square to Tunel.

So I decided to walk down and then turn left with the idea of finding my way down to the Galata Tower and thence to the ferry terminal at Karakoy. This being a week-end there were large numbers of tourists, many of them locals, doing the same as me and as usual, the police were out in force. They seem to make protecting locations with Christian connections a priority and as this was a Sunday, not only was there a police presence outside a large Christian church on Istiklal Avenue there was also an armoured car.

I carried on walking down to the end of Istiklal Avenue but this time, instead of heading straight down towards the Galata Tower, I branched off to the right with the idea of exploring the streets behind it and hopefully making my way up to the tower from its rear.

The trams don’t come down this far but this is where the line ends, outside the Metro station.

I then began to head steadily downwards making my way towards the harbour, and hoping to find the Galata Tower along the way.

Eventually, looking to my left, there it was.

There was quite a crowd milling around in the area at the base of the tower and I can only wonder how big it would be at the height of the tourist season. The ticket office to climb the tower was one of the old Taksim trams and as the cost of entry was only 30 TL I considered going myself. However, the length of the queue and the speed of its progress soon made me decide otherwise.

Instead I opted to continue my walk down the steep, winding streets to find the ferry terminal at Karakoy.

Below the tower I came across this very photogenic flight of steps that led back up to where I’d just come from. While waiting for the crowd to clear a bit and an opportunity to take some photographs I managed to drop my phone onto the concrete road surface and I was very concerned that it might have been damaged. However, I’m relieved that it seems to be unscathed but I’ll have to see over time if in fact that is the case.

I then continued my journey downwards towards the harbour.

And finally it and the Galata Bridge came into sight.

You need to use an underpass in order to get across the very busy road junction. The underpass is a hive of small shops selling everything from mobile phones to underwear and this is a shot of its entrance on the other side.

From there I found my way round to the ferry quayside next to the Galata Bridge. You can walk across the bridge if you want to go from Beyoglu to Fatih on the other side.

This is the somewhat undistinguished looking ferry terminal entrance.

This is not just an area popular with tourists. Today it was alive with local fishermen and the odd sharp-eyed cat seeing if they could find an opportunity to get a share of any of their spoils. They occasionally did when they were tossed the odd tiddler that was too small to count as a proper catch.

A final look back before I made my around to the Galataport side and thence to Karakoy itself.

The next is a shot of a cruise liner moored at Galataport taken from the ‘other’ side of the security screen before I turned left into a side road leading to Karakoy.

I love Karakoy and I heartily recommend anyone visiting Istanbul to go there. Its narrow streets are traffic free apart from the odd motor scooter that are everywhere and its little bars, cafés and restaurants are quaint and super inviting.

And you’ll also come across the odd Shisha bar there too, as in the next picture.

As well as purchasing food and drinks there, you can also hire the use of a Shisha pipe, or Hookah, and as I passed by it was apparent that a number of patrons of both sexes were doing exactly that. There is a misconception that Shishas are for smoking hashish, but although some no doubt are, this is not their intended primary purpose. They are mainly for smoking special blends of Turkish tobacco flavoured with herbal and floral aromatics.

The smoke is filtered through water contained in the main bowl of the Shisha and many people believe that because of that smoking a Shisha is safer than smoking cigarettes. But this definitely isn’t so. The water does not filter out any of the tars and other harmful materials contained in the tobacco smoke and any smokers who are tempted to give a Shisha a go are strongly advised not to do so. The reason is that a 30 minute Shisha session is the same as smoking 100, yes that’s right, 100 normal cigarettes and although Shishas have been around for hundreds of years they present a huge health threat, much more so than ‘ordinary’ smoking, which is very widely prevalent in Turkey among all age groups.

I thence made my way through the narrow windy street to find somewhere to buy a beer and a burger, which I did. And most enjoyable it was too, sitting in the sun filtered through an overhead vine.

A last look back at where I’d enjoyed my alfresco meal. Excellent.

I love Karakoy. If you’re in Istanbul, give it a go. You won’t regret it.

I had to go back to the dentist today for follow-up work prior to the final fitting of my implants. The young lady dentist told me last week that she was going to hurt me again today and boy, was she not lying!

My appointment was originally set for 6.00 pm but I received a call at about 3.45 pm asking if I could get there in half an hour. I said that I could because there’s a funicular railway that runs from Taksim Square down to Kabatas which I’d not tried before but had scouted out yesterday. It would save me ages compared to walking as it only takes about two or three minutes and costs just 40 TL (about 1€) each way, so well worth the saving in shoe leather alone.

I expected the train to look like something off an Austrian ski slope, but no. It’s very modern and looks like an ordinary underground train, except it slopes and has steps in its floors. Here’s a shot I took of it on my return journey.

It wasn’t very busy on my way down so I was able to take the next shot at my leisure. Not so on my return back up to Taksim Square because the carriages were packed out like a normal rush-hour train.

I have a pretty high pain threshold but this afternoon I suffered the most painful dental treatment I’ve ever received. The dentist is replacing the implant pins in my right lower jaw and inserting a new one in my left upper front. She started without giving me any pain killer but the pain, especially in my lower jaw, was so intense that it literally made my toes curl and my eyes water. And it didn’t get much better after the injections because she pressed on almost without any delay to finish her work. Back tomorrow at 3.00 pm. I can hardly wait…

While making my way back afterwards to the Metro station at Kabatas I had to pass a development site that fronts onto the main road and this is the amusing sight that caught my eye – a proud rooster looking after his flock of hens and living in harmony with the cats. Maybe the workmen like boiled eggs with their breakfasts, I don’t know, but I think this could be only in Turkey.

This is the Metro entrance.

And here are a couple of final shots that I took after most of the crowd had cleared the platform.

The images are very poor but I’ll try again when I return to the clinic tomorrow. I managed to drop my phone onto the concrete yesterday and I hope that nothing’s been damaged as up to now I’ve been very happy with the picture quality I’ve been getting.

The Hotel Mara where I’m staying is quite interesting and I’m not absolutely sure what to make of it. The bed is as hard as a rock, harder even than my new bed at home which I’m beginning to loathe, but I’m making the best of it. Every morning the longer I stay here my back ache when I get out of bed seems to be easing more quickly, so that’s good.

I suppose I’d describe it as a boutique hotel but with a large element of self-service. My room has only been made up once since I’ve been here and then in only a very cursory way. Apart from a couple more teabags and a few sugar lumps appearing you’d hardly have noticed as I’d already pulled the duvet back over the bed myself. And that has been it as far as room service is concerned.

I’m still using the same hand and bath towels, although to be fair there are spares, but more worryingly, there was only one toilet roll when I arrived and that is now just down to a few sheets. But luckily I’m used to looking after myself so I’ve gone into survival mode as there’s a small supermarket a few doors up the road where I was able to buy a giant kitchen roll, three large bottles of water for tea making, some milk and some more tea bags as I’d already bought some a few days previously.

I don’t know what the score is exactly but I’ve only seen the charming young Turkish maid making up rooms after people have left so it appears that I’m now dug-in and my room won’t be disturbed until I either die or leave, hopefully the latter. I don’t bother with breakfast which the hotel is not providing anyway and just make do with several cups of tea and a few biscuits, which I prefer as all the spiciness is upsetting my stomach this time.

Yesterday’s breakfast was augmented by the cold left-overs from the previous evening’s Chinese takeaway, which is also just up the road and makes a nice change from kebabs and burgers. So that was very wholesome and nutritious. I ordered only 3 dishes (sweet and sour chicken, beef noodles and egg fried rice) but when they turned up there was enough for 5 people conservatively and possibly 6. So I decided I’d have to make the best of it and the remains have just gone out onto the landing in front of the lift in a plastic bag. Remember what I said about self-service 😉

I think this must be the way to go as I also emptied the somewhat tiny rubbish bin in my room myself and in doing so found a roll of fresh plastic rubbish bags in the bottom of it. I will, however, draw the line at buying a spray can of polish to make the horizontal surfaces gleam and impart a fresh aroma of morning dew to the room. After all, I’d hate to do anyone out of a job…

From what I’d been able to see while walking down the hill from Beyoglu towards Galataport I already knew what to expect so when I entered it after my dental appointment I wasn’t surprised to see what looked like a large block of apartments looming ahead of me.

It wasn’t a block of apartments, of course, but one of the three enormous cruise liners that were moored alongside taking up the whole of the quayside from one end of Galataport to the other.

I decided to head towards the northern end of Galataport before turning back and walking down to Karakoy at the southern end and on my way I saw this sign.

I’m not sure I’d be keen to hang around in an underground cruise terminal this close to the sea as so far I’ve not been that impressed by the quality of basic Turkish engineering. The buildings that have stood for hundreds of years stand much more chance of being around in a few hundred more than what’s going up now, but what do I know…

The Galataport entrance that I’d used last time I was here was now closed and I’d been ‘advised’ by a policeman with a machine gun to walk a bit further down the road and find another way in. From the look of it it was maybe being used exclusively by cruise passengers, or maybe it was being redeveloped as works were going on outside. Nevertheless, there was plenty of port activity going on there.

That’s the Asian side of Istanbul on the other side of the Bosphorus and in the left of centre in the next shot is the Bosphorus Bridge.

Now photographs of what caught my eye walking the length of Galataport from Kabatas at the northern end to Karakoy, what was an enjoyable experience made even better this time by the lovely weather. The first of the three cruise ships, a Viking liner registered in Bergen, Norway. I’ll bet those Norwegians could be doing with a bit of sun after their winter 😉

The liner was the Viking Mars.

Then came a modernist ‘sculpture’ celebrating Istanbul calling itself ‘The City of Names’. It does so, apparently, in honour of all the places from which visitors to the city come. It appears to be in the form of a long roll of coloured stainless steel tape into which all the place names have been punched. Now look, I don’t mean to be overly churlish, but although you can make one or two of them out, you can’t read them, so it seems to me to be colourful but a bit pointless really 😕

Carrying hastily on, the next cruise ship, registered in Hamilton, Bermuda, the Sun Princess.

Looking back up from the quayside you could see passengers swimming around in the ship’s pool which has transparent sides and hangs out over the deck below it. A somewhat weird experience, actually, probably even weirder for other passengers looking up from the deck underneath 🙂

Lastly, the third cruise liner, the Celebrity Equinox.

A couple of shots looking back from the quayside towards the road behind it which is separated from it by a security barrier.

I couldn’t eat much as my mouth was numb after my dental work but stopped in a quayside café along the way for a plate of chips (frites) and a draught local beer. Then I took a last look back up the quay before heading out into the streets of Karakoy.

The last time I was here I was looking for a route back to my hotel via the Galata Tower but this time I didn’t need to so was able to explore Karakoy a bit more. And I was very pleasantly surprised by what I found.

I headed out of Karakoy past a service station showing fuel prices of around 1€ per litre for all grades and types which made me whince when I think what we’re paying in France and the UK. But anyway, I left Karakoy with the thought that I’d have to come back again soon.

Here in Istanbul.

Before leaving for my dental appointment on Thursday morning, I thought I’d have a stroll up to Taksim Square and back. And this is what I saw there. Yup, lots of tourists walking around and enjoying the warm Spring sunshine.

But wait a minute…. what’s that over there by the wall?

Hell yes! It’s a water cannon!

But the recent disturbances here in Istanbul don’t seem to have affected the tourist trade too much, although the smaller hotels in Beyoglu where I am, like the one I’m in, do seem to have vacant rooms and, like mine, appear to be dropping their prices a bit.

There is a more than even the usual police presence everywhere either standing around in small groups with machine guns over their shoulders or dashing about in cars with their hooters that sound like a loud burp as they weave their way through the crowds. But otherwise life goes on pretty much as usual for tourists and locals alike.