Sensory delight

Just got back from my first night flight. An hour of take off and landings with a bit of local sightseeing thrown in for good measure. It was 60 minutes of extra sensory sensitivity not too dissimilar to driving along a country road at 100 KPH in the black of night with your headlights off. The only difference here being the safe thought that you are not going to hit anything, offset by the realisation that things fall pretty quickly from 2,500 ft up and ''oh by the way, where did that horizon go ? '' There is also the constant thought in the back of your head  - ''Where the fark is that airport ?'' . Every sense is more alert than the hearing of a prepubescent 14 year old boy doing naughty things to himself with a Playboy magazine in the confines of his bedroom. Aside from the adrenalin pump it is actually a great time to fly. The air is stable and cool and on a good night like I had with the moon reflecting across the waters of the Gulf of Mexico you almost want to hold hands with your instructor and sing kumbaya along with Peter Paul and Mary. 

I said, ALMOST. 

I had a fellow student in the back who was also doing his night time take off and landings and he kindly recorded the snaps below. 

Instrument panel

Good looking noggins. Especially my recently no.2 clippered scon.

Shoot me

Dare I say it. You all have fair cause to shoot me if I ever buy a number plate like that below. Acutally. Thinking about it, please shoot me if I ever buy a car like that below.

For a moment there I was actually compelled to stand around and wait to see who would 

a. Drive a car like that and 

b. Who would buy that licence plate

However I did not, as Subway beckoned for lunch and I only had 45 minutes between flights.

Apologies for my enforced hiatus. I say enforced because I have had technical issues with internet in my apartment - nee ''condo'' - over the last couple of days and it has only been tonight that I have managed to piggy back the local gated community server to send you this blog. 

Gated community. My favourite subject of the moment. I arrived here last Thursday and that evening decided I might try and jog my lardy ass to the local beach which is 1.5 miles away. So off I trotted via the main road and then detoured via a paved walkway towards the beach and sunset. You can then imagine my surprise when '' Ken '' who according to his name tag was a '' Senior Beach Access officer '' stopped me in my tracks and informed me that I could not access the beach as I did not have a guest pass. The conversation went as follow.

Ken - sorry sir you can not go any further and I'm surprised you were able to get this far

Nick - Errrr well this is public footpath is it not ? 

Ken - No sireeeeee it is not. You need a guest pass to be able to access this  footpath and you most certainly need it to access the beach.

Nick - Oh. Ok. So how do I get a pass to access your beach ?

Ken - You need to get the permission of the owner of the condo you are staying at and get them organise a pass for you.

Nick - Errrr OK. How much does one of those puppies cost ?

Ken - I don't know nothing about no puppies but a beach pass will cost you 3 USD and 50 cents a day sir.

Nick - ( with incredulous look on face ) You are telling me that nature has given us this beach and you want to charge me 3 USD and 50 cents to access it ? 

Ken - Yes sir.

Nick - Well that is about the second most ridiculous thing I have heard this month. As it is 5 minutes before sunset, and I have just carted my lardy ass 20 minutes down here how about you just let me access the beach to watch the sun go down?

Ken - No can do sir, because if the beach guys ask how you got down there then the axe falls on me for allowing you to the beach.

Nick - Fair point you make there Ken.

So I do a U-turn and head back to the main road  and jog on home. Then the story gets mildly more surprising. Or not. With my dodgy back and dodgy knee trying to jog on asphalt is akin to jogging barefoot on marble. So I head to the side of the footpath where there is a lush and manicured lawn growing. Moments later there is a '' beeeewwwwooowww '' ( sound of police siren ) . I look over my shoulder and there is a '' Pelican Bay Community Officer and Security '' car with lights ablaze. The conversation goes as follows 

Officer Don - Excuse me sir. Please halt .

Nick - Sure. What appears to be the problem ? (Cognizant of happened to Rodney King)

Officer Don - You can not be on that grass 

Nick - Errr (again) Why not ?

Officer Don - You just can't. What if you were turn your ankle or a viper get you. Then it would be my backside you would be suing. 

Nick - You are kidding right ?

Officer Don - No sireeee. Additionally the community spends a lot of money trying to get this verge to look good and we would appreciate it if all pedestrians stuck to the main path cos we don't want to see the grass dying as a reeeeesult of you y'all running on it.

Nick - Fark me ! You don't have a brother called Ken do you ? ( This was my thought process and not actual conversation ) ....Sure thing Sir. You have a good evening. 

So. The following evening I turned right instead of left out of  my apartment - nee ''condo'' and ran the same distance to access the same piece of beach via a public access way. Free ! 

Go figure. 

Urrrggghhhhhhhhhhhhh.

p.s. I have a few other things to say about ''gated communities'' but I will do that tomorrow.

p.s. Yup. Another. ''American Liberty Bank''

p.p.s There has been a few who have taken to making comment on my grammar and punctuation. To them I say this. Grammatise and punctuate this    .!.

p.p.p.s Sorry for the previous line Mum

Naples to Venice

With a title like that you'd think I was in Italy. Nope. Florida. Venice Beach is about 65 nautical miles      (69 normal miles) north west of Naples and the destination for my first cross country navigation flight which I did yesterday. With the help of the chart below, some coloured pens, a trip computer (to the right) and a slide ruler (to the left) you plot a route there and back. That ''plotting'' takes some time and when my instructor told me to turn up at 7am for a 9am departure I was a little sceptical it would take that long. We took off at 9.30 !

The two and half hours was taken up with computing fuel consumption given prevailing winds, your true wind speed, your ground speed, amount of fuel required, observation marks along the way, radio frequencies at both arriving and departing airports, correct communication terminology and a few other things consequential to the trip of 2 hours return. We flew up there at 4,500 ft and returned at 3,500 (general aviation rules state when travelling on a heading of 0 to 179 degrees you must fly at an altitude with an odd number +500 ft and when flying 180 to 360 degrees it must be a even number +500 ft ). 

It was a beautiful day aloft with stable cool air our friend. We flew past Fort Meyers International Airport and had an interesting moment when their control tower who was following us on radar accidentally put us on a course with a Delta Airlines 737.  Jet liner versus small single prop plane ? Jet liner wins and we asked to be altered back to a route more becoming of our stature.  Landing at Venice proved to be also quite interesting with another student pilot taking off from a runway perpendicular to the runway that everyone else was utilising. As Venice is an uncontrolled airport ( no Tower ) it rests upon the shoulders of the pilots landing and taking off there to establish their own landing and departure routine. To understand the seriousness and stupidity of this guy take a pen and do the following. Draw a straight vertical line on a piece of paper . Label the top A and bottom B. Now draw a horizontal line across the middle of the first line and label the left point C and the right point D. Everyone was landing at B and rolling towards A. If you were taking off you were starting at B and accelerating towards A. This guy who obviously wasn't aware of wind direction had decided he would take off from C towards D therefore intersecting the correct runway everyone else was using. A recipe for disaster. A lesson learnt from my motorbike riding days in Sydney came in to play. Treat everyone else as an idiot. We got out of there as soon as we landed and headed home.

Spot the grin

Heading south towards Naples at 3,500 ft

Grinning pilot and Mr Creative Accounting ( aka instructor )

Holy moley

What does any self respecting man in Naples do on a Sunday morning ? He goes to church of course ! Now. But for funerals, weddings, and christenings I have not been to church of my own accord since I was last in Fiji about 4 years ago and that was ostensibly to listen to the harmonic singing. Prior to that it was in Tonga for the same reasons and prior to that I was a 5ft midget at school attending a Higher Church of England service complete with incense and a 1 hour sermon in 1982.

Intrigued as I'am about the fabric that makes up this society I decided to try and attend church today as it is my flying instructors day off and so therefore mine as well. I googled '' Churches in Naples Florida '' and came across the First Baptist Church of Naples ( http://www.fbcn.org/  )

A good friend who is an infrequent attendee at the FBCN informed me that it was quite evangelical and therefore right up my Strasse in what I thought would be good entertainment. I chose the 9.30am worship figuring that as there was a 11am worship the 9.30 should be done within an hour and 15 mins. I was right.  The Church itself is actually a massive complex with different wings of the buliding holding rooms/areas for bilble study/musicical worship/children's worship etc etc. The car park not too dissimilar in size to that you see at a small sports stadium. The main ''Worship'' area itself is an impressive  arena that by my estimations ( counting rows and seats ) could seat about 2,500 people. The ''stage '' accomodated a 60 strong choir and what looked like an orchestra band. On either side were 4 very large screens from which I discovered the sermon and the hymns were projected onto. The entire room was not unlike any large seminar room or even small rock concert auditorium you may have been to. Not a stained glass window to be seen. In fact not a window at all come to think of it.

 Check it out below

The weekend note book informed that last weekend there were 1,117 attendees to the Saturday evening sermon. 1,580 to the Sunday 9.30am sermon and a paltry 923 to the Sunday morning 11am sermon. The notes also tell me that the budget for July 1 to November 7 is 2.3 million USD and actuals are 2.1 million USD so there was me thinking they are running a prudent worshipping ship. Ah no. I gaze to the bottom of the financials and I discover that all this preaching is an expensive vocation. Debt balance as of November 7 was a not to be sneezed at..11,228,148 USD. Yup you read right. 11.2 million USD in debt. Little wonder then they were trying to flog me a DVD of my service to me post sermon for a mere $4.99.

The order of service was as follows.

1. An out of tune child choir kept us amused until the Pastor arrives and we watch video of the Collins family in Blackburn, Melbourne who talk about their missionary work of giving gifts to....wait for it....to the children of the Papua New Guinea highlands. This comes with footage from PNG. Scary coincidence I thought. I choose the one church in Naples Florida with a video clip from Australia about PNG.
2. Pastor arrives dressed in charcol grey suit with white shirt and bright yellow tie accompanied by choirmaster similarily dressed.
3. Choirmaster leads 60 strong choir in 2 warm up songs. Only slightly more in tune than the kids.
4. Choirmaster then leads congregation with plenty of hand gesticulation pointing to the heavens as we sing 3 songs. Way worse than the kids.
5. Pastor takes stage and commences his preaching.
6. Pastor breaks from preaching to allow us to watch skype video clip from an American family in Naples, Italy who talk about the '' vice like grip that satan has on this town and the darkness he has cast over the people here '' and their attempt to loosen that grip and bring light to the people of Italy. I started to wonder if the Pope had watched the same video and what his thoughts would be.
7. We then kneel and pray for the family in Naples, Italy
8. Pastor spends 25 mins talking about the need to be useful in life and again we pray for ourselves and for the great Lord to give us the fortitude to be his servants.
9. We sing another song
10. We sing another song
11. We sing another song.
12. Pastor then concludes sermon and .....

yup you guessed right.

13. We sing another song with the Pastor encouraging us to hold the hands of the people next to us, which I do. At the conclusion we all raise our arms (still holding hands) skywards and give thanks to the Lord.

It was an interesting and well spent 75 minutes.

I think.

p.s. Two more banks.

News Bank
Regions Bank

Compare and contrast

The scene - A pub 

You walk into an English pub in central London and the conversation goes as follows

Barman - '' Wott will eeet it be'' ? (in East London accent) or more typically these days.. ''Vat vee you driiink ? ( in Polish, Lithuanian, Estonian, Romanian accented pidgin English )

You - ''Errr I will have a lager please''

Barman - Either a grunt or simple silence

3 mins later....

'' That'll be free quid 20 mate '' or  '' please you give me 3 pound and tweeenty punce ''  (and she/he has probably poured you an Ale)


Now compare and contrast




The scene - A bar

You walk into a bar in central Naples and the conversation goes as follows

Barman '' Why hello sir. How you enjoying your day (regardless of the fact you may not be) and what can I getch ya ?

You - ''Errrr I will have a beer please''

Barman - ''Sure thing sir ! What'll it be ?''

You -''Errr just a lager please

Barman - '' Sure thing sir, we have Millers, Millers Lite, Bud, Bud Lite, Coors, Coors Lite, Corona, (what no lite Corona ? ) Amstel, Amstel Lite....at which point you interject and say

You - '' Just a Corona please''

Barman - ''Sure thing sir and do you want lime, lemon or just straight up ?''

You - '' Errr lime please ''

Barman - ''Sure thing sir and with a glass or just the bottle like a real man ?''

You - ''Bottle please''

Barman - ''Sure thing Sir. Where you from ? ''

You - ''Australia ''

Barman - '' Nice. My sister went skiing there last year''

You - '' Oh nice. Where ? ''

Barman - '' Some place called St Antoine ''

You - '' Ah, St Anton. Nope thats A U S T R I A  I'm from A U S T R A L I AAAA ''

Barman - '' Sure thing sir...the land of Crocodile Dundee ''

You - '' that be the one ''

Barman - '' sure thing sir...that will be 3 dollars 40 please ...do you want to run a tab, pay by credit or do cash ? ''

You - '' I'll pay now thanks'' and you hand him a tenner...

Barman - ''Sure thing sir'' and he returns 3 minutes later with 6 one dollar notes and 60 cents...

As you just arrived, and plan on staying for some considerable time and to ensure you get a decent service later when the place hots up you leave 4 of the notes on bar and the shrapnel.


America. You gotta love it.



p.s. Oh by the way, I saw another one today......yup another Bank I've never heard of. The thing too that intrigues me about these ''Banks'' is that it is not like they are one storey two room shells with 4 staff. Check this one out.  ''America Momentum Bank. '' Given the way things are going for the US dollar me thinks their marketing department might want to think about a possible re-branding.

Nervous about twitching

A couple of things occurred today.


1. I saw one of these. Yes ! A cloud !! Which is just as well because it's been over 4 days since I last sighted one and I was starting to get concerned. Yes she is only a small one but she made a fly by at about 4 pm to remind me what she and her siblings look like.

2. I drove past a few more banks I have never heard of. Ready ?

Ever Bank

Synovus Bank (http://www.synovusbankfl.com/)

HB&T Bank

Coldwell Bank

M&I Bank

Key Private Bank

My alertness to new banks that I have never heard of has me worried that my personality is becoming somewhat similar in its fanaticism to that of twitchers, plane spotters or train spotters. 

3. I moved into new digs. A very very very generous friend of a friend who owns a condo nee apartment in one of the more desirable ends of town heard that I was in Naples and insisted that I use her  place as a base as she lives in NY and is only down here infrequently. Saves me money and I get to see how the other half live. The condo nee apartment is in a gated community about 6 miles north of the somewhat downmarket area where I was staying. Strangely the first thing I noticed was that once inside the gates the speed limit is a snoozeville 10mph compared to the 25 mph in the little community I was previously staying in. I guess the street planners where I was previously staying figured it's hard to take off in a stolen car with contraband at 10mph and hence the more liberal speed limit.

4. I didn't fly today. Morning theory class on cross country navigation ( more on that later ) and in the afternoon I sat the massive FAA Theory Exam for which I have been studying for over the last 8 days and which has a pass mark requirement of 70%. Am pleased to say I defied my own pessimism and passed with a score in the 80 percentile. Giddy up. Now on to the oral exam and then the flight check !

Lest we Forget