CANUCKS OVER EUROPE
Flying Canada’s colours at every opportunity
Over the years, this adventurous couple took every opportunity to fly Canada’s colours with pride.
Aviation has been my passion for as long as I can remember. I had Royal Canadian Air Force radio-navigator wings on my chest before I had a driver’s licence. I had an airplane before I had a wife. So, when I got a very short-notice posting to Germany, I didn’t take a car—ours had suered through a year-long posting, travelling the gravel Holberg road on Northern Vancouver Island— instead, I set about figuring out how to ship our airplane.
It took a while. My wife Carol and I left Canada in August 1990, bound for Germany and the first Gulf War. Finally, in September 1992, a 40-foot sea container housing our Piper Cherokee arrived at the Canadian base at Baden-soellingen, just as I was promoted and posted to Belgium. The first change to the aircraft on reassembly was the addition of Canadian flags to each side of the fin.
We took our little Cherokee to the Belgian base at Chièvres where SACEUR (Supreme Allied Commander Europe) kept his VIP airplane. We were excited to start touring. The first cross-country trip was to Spa, the famous auto racing circuit in Belgium. Then came a flight to Badenoos, where both the airport and the railway station were located, so our younger son could catch a train to Bavaria.
I took a six-month break from flying when I was posted to Rome for the NATO Defense College before returning to Belgium. Then we got more adventurous. In nearly 200 flights, we toured Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, England, Wales and the Czech Republic. We overflew France many times, including a memorable flight over Vimy Ridge, but didn’t land.
The flight to Wales was interesting as Caernarfon Municipal Airport was once RAF Llandwrog, where my father was stationed during the Second World War and
where I was born. I (we) received royal treatment as the returning prodigal son! The locals switched from Welsh to English in our honour and arranged for a B&B and transportation. The local policeman, a dedicated plane spotter, said they’d never seen a Canadian airplane at that airport before.
The flight to the Czech Republic was as far east as we got. The aviation publications said that all light aircraft were to enter via Karlovy Vary, so we duly filed a flight plan, borrowed maps from SACEUR’S stash and away we went. Upon arrival, the airport manager was very surprised. Apparently that point of entry was only for Germans and Americans; Canadians weren’t expected. We either had to go back to the border, where there was no airport, or carry on to the main international airport at Prague Ruzynĕ where, we were cautioned, the landing fee would be ten American dollars. That seemed eminently reasonable to us.
Since filing a flight plan was deemed to be very complicated and time consuming, we were advised to stay below 1,500 feet so we would not have to file; the manager would telephone the main airport to tell the controllers we were inbound. That all sounded fine until I set the altimeter and we were already at 1,200 feet while still on the ground. So, o we went skimming the trees and heading for Prague. A KLM airliner was directed to hold while we landed and, again, we got VIP treatment. The manager went through the computer files and then the ledgers going back to 1946 to declare that there had never been a Canadian airplane there in that time period; the Luftwae had owned the airport before that! Prague was just emerging from 50 years of communist rule and prices were not yet up to the rest of Europe. Dinner for two with wine and a tuxedo-dressed waiter hovering to keep glasses refilled cost $25!
END OF AN ERA
The flight home to Belgium was one of our longest at four-and-a-half hours—then we moved again, to Geilenkirchen in Germany. All told, we made seven moves in four-anda-half years and somehow I ended up with the same wife at the end of it.
I was posted back on flying duties at Geilenkirchen in Germany on NATO AWACS aircraft. The Yugoslav crisis had erupted, so I was back into a war zone. Our aircraft had its own bomber revetment (barricade) as a parking spot, but flying time was somewhat limited as I was averaging five-and-a-half months per year away over a three-year period, generally in one-to- two-week deployments. Nevertheless, we manged to up our total crossings of the English Channel to 16. With fly-ins (social gatherings), there were generally no landing or other fees so we attended them in England, the Netherlands and Belgium. A friend was the airport manager at Popham, near Winchester, so that became a regular stop with no charges.
All good things must come to an end and I reached retirement age in 1997; we were moved back to where our furniture was, the Comox Valley. Before leaving Germany, I sold my beloved Cherokee to an American and it eventually found its way to Florida. Yes, I bought another airplane back in Canada, but that is another story.