TheTrip West


Koonwarra to Langley Park & back-3280 nautical miles in Jodel VH-KVC (in a hurry).

Last November the annual service fell due on KVC and having only flown 30 hours for the year I promised myself that this year I would endeavour to fly more frequently. My New Year's resolution: If you haven't got time for work and play, give up work. Reading December's Air Sport I read of the 1996 Langley Fly-in in March so decided that if I could get two passengers to share the cost I would make the time to go. As I was sure there would be a good representation of Jodels at Langley I decided to write to my good friend and supplier of Jodel Plans Frank Rogers. As I was fairly sure he had never been to Langley he would be interested in going.

The very same day Frank received my letter he phoned me delighted to accept my invitation. The second passenger was Phil Syratt a relatively new member to SAAA. Phil and family had visited us to look over and fly KVC with the idea of building a Skyking. For several reasons he settled on a Jodel D18 Sovereign. Knowing there were three D18's at various stages of construction I thought it would be beneficial for him to go and view these project and talk to their builders and get totally infected with the Jodel virus.

We had planned to leave Koonwarra on Wednesday, 27 February and take three days if necessary to Serpentine. Phil could only get one week off work so couldn't be too laid back about it. I have done it before in two days and haven't forgotten how exhausted you feel upon arrival at Serpentine. Wouldn't you know it - typical Gippsland weather - it started raining Tuesday afternoon and continued all Wednesday clearing late in the afternoon - about 40 mm. A great rain but badly timed. I often say I would gladly share our rain with others in drier parts in this great land of ours and that day was no exception. The TV forecast Wednesday night for the next three days was for clearing showers and improving. Thursday morning was just that - overcast conditions and a few morning showers. We really did have to leave early that morning to make it to the pilot briefing Friday evening in Serpentine. I reckoned if I could just clear the Strzelecki ranges to our northwest and make it to Coldstream to pick up Phil we would be okay.

Dodging round showers we made it. We departed Coldstream 9:00 am still dodging showers and occasionally infringing on Melbourne control zone. We cleared the hills to the west of Kilmore Gap and tracked direct to Waikerie, our first fuel stop. 20 minutes before Waikerie we crossed that very distinct dead straight line running north and south as far as the eye can see. The Victorian/South Australian border then over the nose came those perfectly round green patches on the ground. Phil reckons they resembled some sort of giant flying saucer landing fields or the like. These circles are watered by huge travelling irrigators pivoting from the central point. They sure stand out in that otherwise brown dry land. That lousy weather early in the morning wasn't all bad news as the southerly air stream gave us a 10 knot tail wind. A blessing we enjoyed most of the way to Serpentine and home again.

Wakerie being a strong gliding club base has excellent overnight and catering facilities which were generously made available to us, so it was a quick cuppa and some sandwiches which Phil's wife Rose made for us, refeul the Jodel and on our way again, tracking direct to Ceduna 340 nautical miles. We left the Murray River behind at Morgan, crossed the Mt lofty ranges at 4500 feet to stay clear of Edinburgh control zone then climbed to 8500 feet to cross Spencer Gulf: west of the Gulf came 6/8 broken strata cloud at 8000 feet, so we decided to go above rather than below. This proved a good decision giving us perfect flying conditions.

Phil was a bit apprehensive about not being able to navigate too easily. Half an hour later the cloud broke up and there was Kimba right where it should be. We were exactly on track and a bit ahead of time thanks to the GPS and the tail wind. About all there is to see between Kimba and Ceduna is miles of sand dunes running parallel in a south east north west direction. Pretty obvious which way the wind prevails in that area. The coast and Ceduna came into sight about 4:30 South Australian time, a phone call to the refeullers and 3/4 hour later we were airborne again for Nullabor Road House 150 miles for our overnight stop. This is an excellent spot for aviators as you can land and taxi right to the back of the motel. SAR in this remote area has to cancelled by phone as you are out of VHF radio contact. Something that is easy to forget to do.

Nullabor Roadhouse was fresh out of avgas so had to fill up on mogas from the bowsers out front. There is no quicker way to clear the traffic and bring out the cameras than to taxi your aircraft out onto the highway and line up at the bowsers with the cars. A good meal at the restaurant and a shower and three weary aviators called it a day with 870 miles behind us and 770 still to go the next day.

We rose about daylight Friday morning. I didn't sleep too well. That Lycoming just wouldn't switch off. I think I had about four hours sleep. I phoned briefing and got a favourable weather report and submitted my flight plan for Serpentine with a fuel stop at Balladonia Roadhouse on the western end of the Nullabor Plains 375 NM and then 390 NM to Serpentine. We departed Nullabor and headed for the coast to view that magnificient spectacle of the cliffs along the Great Australian Bight. They really are spectacular rising some 200 - 300 feet straight up from the ocean and continuing unbroken for 100 miles. I am told that sailors have been shipwrecked in the Bight and made it to the foot of the cliffs only to perish because they could not climb to the top. Frank had his video working flat out on this leg as it was early morning with the sun behind us this was perfect conditions for photos. The Border Town Motel and Eucla passed under the nose and we were starting to head over that totally barren and featureless land which we were about to see so much more of. What a contrast from our beautiful green rolling hills of south Gippsland we had flown over 24 hours earlier.

Balladonia airstrip and roadhouse came into sight. We landed and taxied out onto the highway and once more lined up for another dose of ULP. Those four wheel travellers responded exactly as they did at Nullabor. A phone call to cancel SAR and give a SAR time for Serpentine, a quick bite to eat and we were headed west once more. This leg 390 nm. This is the first time I had tracked direct Balladonia to Serpentine. The last time I had went Balladonia, Kalgoorlie, Serpentine, Albury, Esperance, Balladonia. I didn't have GPS in those days. If we thought the 100 miles east of Balladonia was a bit barren, it was paradise to what we were over west of Balladonia.. It was early afternoon, about 40 deg on the ground and extremely poor flying conditions, rough air and KVC was battling to climb about 4000 which is only 3000 above terrain and we seemed to have lost our magical tail wind. About half an hour into our flight I could see we were not going to make Serpentine on that tank full of fuel and certainly not with our 45 minute reserve.

There were only two airstrips close to our track. Norseman and Corrigin, neither with refuelling facilities. We decided Norseman was the closest to town so diverted, circled the town and landed on their airfield, a 10x20 mile across salt lake. Phil equipped with his mobile phone decided he would make a phone call and get some fuel bought out only to find that there is no mobile phone service in that part of Australia. So there was nothing left to do but to hoof it into town. Phil being the youngest volunteered for the 1.5 mile hike. Fortunately he hitched a ride the second half of the hike, and 3/4 hour later we had the town tow truck and two jerrycans of fuel along side. I had packed a self priming siphon hose which sure beats getting a mouth full of petrol from sucking on a hose.

We departed that mining town in similar conditions to which we arrived. Again the Jodel struggled to climb with full throttle and full load and at times the vertical speed indicator was showing 200 ft per minute drop when it should have been pointing the other way. I had been running on the rear fuel tank which is situated under the rear seat to get the centre of gravity forward a bit. Fuel has to be elevated to the fuel system via electrical and mechanical pumps from this tank. About half an hour into this flight I noticed the fuel pressure gauge doing some strange antics like dropping to zero and then bobbing back up again. Within a minute that constant noise up front became not so constant and we were down to below 2000 rpm and running quite rough. It is surprising how everyone jumps to attention especially when there is absolutely nowhere to go, not even a salt lake in sight, only stunted trees which looked pretty uninviting. Because we were running on Mogas I suspected fuel vaporisation and quickly switched to the front tanks and all came back to normal. The front tanks being gravity feed the pumps were able to clear the vapour lack. Not a nice experience in such a remote area.

Out of VHF range all we had was my newly found ELT and a EPERB if we were lucky enough to use it. I'm sure for the next five minutes we were all praying because no-one said much and within half an hour we were at 8500 feet thanks to a few good thermals and in much cooler air. Because of our time loss refuelling at Norseman I was concerned I would not make my nominated SAR time to Serpentine. Still out of radio contact I heard another aircraft talking to Perth so decided to call him up and ask to amend my SAR by one hour which he did. it was nice to know there was someone out there with whom we had radio contact. This aircraft turns out to be Alan and Susi Chinn in their Piper Super Cub also on their last leg heading to Serpentine from Kalgoorlie.

At last we had come out of the mulga and were heading for open farmland. Brown and dry as it was, it still looked pretty good to us and we were back in contact with Perth. Soon we had Corrigin town and airfield in sight, reassuring us that we were on track and the Darling ranges on our horizon. it sure was nice to know that just west of those ranges was our destination.

Still following our trusty GPS we descended to 2000 feet west of Serpentine Reservoir and all eyes were scanning the ground below for Serpentine airfield. To my dismay, where the GPS said it was it wasn't. Tired and confused, I swallowed my pride and called Charlie Urwin on 119.1 and said just where is this airfield. A bit embarrassing when I was there just six years earlier. Seven miles north of where we were, we spotted that strip with all those planes lined up on it. At last we were there with just half an hour to register and be at the briefing. Having got Serpentine latitude and longitude from ERSA, I had assumed I had made a mistake entering figures into my GPS. To my dismay I found the figures in ERSA were what I had in my GPS and ERSA had it wrong. I can't help wondering just how many others are wrong as well. It sure Pays to check.

We climbed out of aircraft and were warmly greeted by WA members. Some weeks before leaving I had contacted a WA member Clem Venables in charge of accommodation for the weekend. Clem arranged for us to bed down in David & Pam Woodward's hanger. This must be the only hanger in Australia with wall to wall carpet. We were introduced to David on arrival and he showed us his hanger. Phil immediately dubbed it the Serpentine Hilton. We attended the pilot briefing which was about exactly the same as 1990 procedure, had our evening meal and headed for those rubber mattresses and pillows that David and Pam had generously provided for us. That felt like the best bed I had ever slept in. Frank had been invited to stay with D18 builder Jim Allarie so we lost track of him and met him at langley Park the next day.

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