Aloft, alow

Buckham's Bay is a long, finger-like slash in the Ontario shoulder of the Ottawa River opposite Quyon and Pontiac - about where the waterway widens and makes a sharp turn south towards the capital.  A good friend of mine has a cottage property - two small cabins with a dock - on the western shore of the bay, abeam its mouth.  It's a favourite summertime destination for the Smith and I.  Both father and son are aviation-obsessed and enjoy the occasional "beat-up" pass.  We're always happy to oblige.

Buckham's Bay "beat-up". (Courtesy: Ernie Szelepcsenyi)

And so, Ernie's place was my target on a pleasant and warm evening in mid-August.  We climbed away from Rockcliffe a little before 8 with the sun still fairly high in the sky.  We approached the Bay from the south-east on a direct course out of Rockcliffe and set up to fly our first pass from south to north.  The extremely popular Constance Bay beaches are less than a mile to the east and the bays are both well-frequented by float planes (and the occasional wheeled daredevil) conducting aerial survey of the more attractive beachgoers under the guise of training.  As always, it's necessary to keep a sharp a lookout but the potential for increased traffic sandwiched into such tight confines make it doubly important.
As we pass Ernie's place, I peer over the side.  One fool is thrashing about in the water, wildly waving his arms.  There's another on the dock.  Both are shirtless and both are likely well into their cups.  I rock our stubby wings in response and roll into a right turn away from the shore and into the open bay.  Head on a swivel, I reverse the turn to bring us back around for a north to south pass - again keeping an eye out for any interlopers.
I know about the Cessna 150 orbiting the beaches to my left - white with a rainbow flash from nose to tail.  The loud paint scheme identifies him as an Ottawa Flying Club machine.  He's flying east now, away from us - either heading to the VOR and then home or simply finishing a pass.  In a few moments, I'll know for sure.
Another rock of the wings and more splashing and waving in response from below.  As we sweep overhead, I guide the biplane into a slight right turn to open up another south to north pass.  As I roll right, the top wing reveals something of a surprise.  There, framed neatly in the backwards "C" formed by both left wings and the interplane struts, are two powered para-gliders - one orange and the other blue.  They're a bold collection of a paraglider wing, shrouds, a lawn chair and an oversized fan being driven by the aviation equivalent of a lawn-mower engine.  Ironically, one of the more popular models also bears the name "Miniplane". 
They appear to be almost stationary - hovering in formation over the southern tip of the bay with the blue wing leading the orange in echelon right.  Their lack of reaction indicates they haven't seen us.  I continue my turn to the east and climb for extra altitude.  It'll be easier to keep tabs on them against the forests and fields below - rather than squinting into the sinking sun.
I pick the paragliders up again as they turn east towards the beaches at Constance Bay - still crawling along in formation.  The 150 has vanished - having likely headed home.  A larger Cessna taildragger, either a 180 or 185 on floats is traversing the bay from the south-west.  It's likely headed into one of the small lakes that speckle the Gatineau River watershed to the north.  As the float plane continues across the river, I fly a few more passes up and down the bay - rocking my wings in greeting each time. 
I've planned my last pass to finish on an approximate return heading for Rockcliffe.  I take the Smith up to 2500 feet so as to cross the river with plenty of altitude.  The only other aircraft I spot is a yellow and blue high wing Zenith job - likely a 750 - scurrying west for Arnprior.  I waggle my wings in salute.  No response.  She slides by our wings and disappears into the blaze of the western sun.
Night is encroaching on day.  A few bonfires flicker and dance in the deepening gloom settling below. The sun now resembles a golden pebble balanced precariously on the precipice of the horizon.  An orange band languishes across the length of the western divide - throwing golden light across the darkening landscape.  The Ottawa River and a few scattered lakes on the Quebec side shimmer in response, their placid faces glowing orange, now pink and now blue.  The colors live as though they were notes played as part of a great concerto, brightening and fading with a rhythm not unlike music as it peaks and then falls away. If it wasn't for the faithful growl of the Lycoming, I swear I could hear each note. 
The sky, however, remains a flat, dispassionate gray - stoic against the exuberant concert of color crashing across the land below.
And then, the pebble rolls off the edge of the earth and the great maestro's firm hand closes on his opus.  Soon, the dying sun pulls the colour and sound into the depths with it to begin its next journey - rolling across the other half of the world.

The pebble.  (Author's collection)

Alow, in the small town of Breckenridge, a boy about to return home after an afternoon playing in the yard looks skyward, prompted by the rhythmic roar of my engine.  Soon, the biplane's dark shape, silhouetted against the shadowy heavens, sweeps into view.  His eyes follow me south-east until just before I disappear behind a stand of trees.  He reaches for the door and pulls it open, sending warm lamplight, the chatter of supper time family life and the smell of dinner spilling into the night.  When he glances up again, I've vanished into the gloom with only the fading sound of the biplane's engine to betray my presence.
Aloft, the boy's throwing open of his front door was but a brief spark in a sea of grey twilight sliding by under my wings.  I don't notice it.  As the light and warmth seep out of the August air, I grow anxious - like a boy caught out after curfew.  Aloft, it is not yet "legal night" - a term used to describe one half hour after sunset - and there is still a fair amount of light.  Alow, on the earth upon which I will soon resume my citizenship, night has already fallen.
I inch the throttle forward and the Lycoming's song increases in pitch and urgency.  The luminescent dials of the instruments are only just starting to glow - providing some comfort in the form of airspeed (105 mph) and altitude (1,400 feet).  I hasten my approach south-east towards the city, her few high-rises huddled together in the downtown core, blackened monoliths, rising up above charcoal horizon; her streets - golden veins lined in Morse code pinpricks of light - sprawling south and stitching together the fabric of the city.  Car headlights weave, probing in the murk.  Taillights blink on and off, sparking crimson chain reactions not unlike dominos falling.  I count - until losing count.  Here, the multi-colored cyclone of a police cruiser's lights soundlessly announce a minor infraction or a more severe tragedy.  There, a searchlight, likely from a theatre, reach skyward - swinging wildly.
I would be more impressed, awestruck even, by the beauty of the scene if it wasn't for night giving spirited chase from the west.
As I turn left around the plunging granite walls of the Gatineaus, Ottawa's northern sister hoves into view.  I have given up valuable ground, turning to give my quarry a broadside look at her prey.  I pull the nose up, the blackened earth falls away and I climb three hundred feet into the indigo sky.  As I lower the nose again, the Gatineau airport reveals herself just off the left side of the Smith's cowl as a series of lights blinking on.  A frequency switch allows me to briefly listen to a Piper Cherokee make its approach and takes me back more than a decade - to driving an aging Beech Sundowner around that same airport on nights blacker than this...and with a temperamental landing light which insisted on overloading and popping off in the flare.
A slight course correction to the south will take me overhead Rockcliffe.  Night continues her advance.  The moon is delinquent, missing.  The only light in the cockpit comes from the glow of the instruments and the radio. 
I reach down to a panel by my right thigh and flick a switch.  My anti-collision lights fade on like the tubes in an old radio - with about half the intensity.  It is an entirely futile act but it gives me some comfort.  I tune the radio back to Rockcliffe and call the Unicom.  No answer.  The dispatcher must be vacuuming the hall or scrubbing down the bathrooms, preparing to close up the clubhouse once the last training flight returns. 
I cross the river and abruptly think about the almost 40-year-old wiring snaking through the wings and fuselage to the lights - green on the right wing, red on the left and white in the tail.  All it would take was one crimp in a wire, one spark and the fabric would burn like a torch.  It would only be for a few spectacular seconds but it would be long enough.
I reach down again and switch them off.  My thumb starts working the transmit button - periodically opening a channel to trigger the runway lights. 
Was it 5 or 7 in an 8 second period?  Or was it 8 in a 5 second period? 
The runway lights wink on.  Either the dispatcher has returned from his chores or my clumsiness with the transmit button has yielded a result.
The Smith and I arrive overhead just before 9 o'clock.  I chop the throttle, the Lycoming whispers her reply and the wires sing in the slipstream rushing past me.   I stand her on the port wings and let her fall to earth in a graceful spiraling dive to the left - aiming to come out on a short final for runway 09.  Twenty seconds later, we roll out abeam the RCMP horse paddock and press our approach home as night finally washes over the field. 
We touch down with a little skip before rolling out straight ahead as the night sky returns us to the bonds of the earth.
A few minutes later, we roll to a stop outside the canvas hangar and I switch off.  It's barely perceptible but my hands are trembling.  I feel calm and content but it seems the nearly-night landing has taxed my nervous system more than usual. 
I extract myself from the Smith's cockpit and sit down next to the left main, leaning my head against the warm aluminum of the lower cowls.  I can hear the engine ticking as its metal innards cool.  The gyros are winding down with soft whine.  Underneath these sounds of flight realized, the crickets are chirping.  The field is dark now - save for the lights of the clubhouse and the outline of the runway.
A deep, steadying breath.  A few thoughts of thanks. 
The runways lights wink out - all at once - and, suddenly, the night's conquest is complete.

Vultures

On a warm day in July, the airport was inexplicably besieged by more than a hundred seagulls.  More or less equally divided, they held post over each threshold of Rockcliffe's single runway - circling lazily in the calm air over the field.  Every so often, a rampie would drive out into the infield with a flare gun to try and disperse them. 
The more dramatic method of animal control involved arriving or departing aircraft.  The gulls would scatter in every possible direction with such reckless abandon that one plainly wondered how an unfortunate encounter between airplane and avian was averted.  In each case, the seagulls would quietly and casually reform in such a manner to suggest the interruption had never occurred.




A seagull off the coast of Vancouver Island in the summer of 2010. (Author's collection)

In the 70s and 80s, Richard Bach's Jonathan Livingston Seagull was not only required reading for pilots but enjoyed enormous popularity outside of aviation circles.  The novella, essentially a homily for self-improvement and barely 10 thousand words in length, tells the story of a young seagull who, unfulfilled with the life of squabbling over food scraps, embarks on learning everything about flying.  For his efforts, he is labelled a non-conformist and is cast out of his flock.  Over the many years that follow, he becomes increasingly skilled at flight, reaches another plane of existence, learns to travel great distances in little time and eventually returns to teach other outcasts.

 

Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach.

The book's success far eclipsed that of Bach's previous works Stranger to the Ground, Biplane and Nothing by Chance.  It also sparked a turn from hayfields, leather goggles, wings and wires to aviation as background to new age thinking, time travel, multiple dimensions and barnstorming messiahs.  To this day, I opine that Bach's first three literary offerings are far superior stories.  However, I suppose the new age stuff sells better.  That said, at the time I was born, the book would have been just as present in a pilot's flight bag as their logbook and the pilot operating handbook of the particular aircraft they flew.

It also served as the inspiration for my given name.
I'll admit that seagulls do not have a sterling reputation.  They're readily referred to as "rats with wings" and "shithawks."  They're annoying, dirty and barely one step up the evolutionary ladder from pigeons.  When I was 9, I watched one, in flight, snatch a slice of pizza from my sister's hands. 
All that said, it's not difficult to see what Bach saw in a seagull in flight. Truly, pulling off that pizza extrication maneuver was no small feat. If you pause and watch them long enough to get past their reputation, they really are beautiful, graceful fliers - perhaps more than any other bird.  

A seagull playing off the bows of the British Columbia Ferry MV Spirit of Vancouver Island, summer 2010. (Author's collection)

Yes, the Canada Goose is certainly majestic and their large formations, as well as the teamwork they depend on, are breathtaking to behold.  However, they're nature's long-haul airliner.  They lift off, fly great distances in straight lines, land again and repeat. 
What about the Heron?  A fine bird, to be sure...and her sheer size and wingspan are awesome to behold - particularly when taking off from a stream or creek.  And yet, she appears awkward and incongruous - equally out of place in the sky as she is on land.
The Hawk or Eagle then - any bird of prey?  Yes, the beauty of their free-wheeling flight and the pointedness of their decisive descents make for impressive visuals and inspiring national symbols.  And yet, the simmering violence behind their movements somewhat besmirches whatever beauty they exude.
The seagull, perhaps, has the greatest obstacle to surmount.  On the earth, or near to it, they pick fights over mouldy bread and rancid meat passed over by racoons and rats.  They revel in garbage.  And yet, away from that environment, they fly with an ease that is equal parts effortless and beautiful.  The sight is enough to forget that her preferred haunt is a municipal dump. 

A pair of seagulls holding post on the masts of fishing trawlers in Steveston, British Columbia, summer 2010. (Author's collection)

I've always liked my name and while the book is perhaps a little too new age for my taste, I've always enjoyed telling the story.
When I arrived at the airport that day and prepared the Smith for flight, I caught myself watching the gulls circle, wheel, dive and zoom climb over the field.  Part of me wondered why they were hanging about at all - loitering like vultures over carrion.  It would prove to be an unfortunate omen.
The day's plan called for circuits - a short flight of 5 or 6 touch and goes to keep my skills sharp and the airplane happy.  The overhead patrol of seagulls would be a factor to consider - along with the usual training traffic. 
The circuits progressed as normal.  My first wasn't great.  The second was better and the third would prove to be my best.  By the time I'd gone around the patch four times, I was getting tired and resolved to make the fifth circuit my last for the day.
Everything was normal.  It was a calm day and so the approach was smooth and right on target in terms of airspeed, attitude and glide slope.  We crossed the perimeter fence and I pushed my head all the way back to take advantage of my peripheral vision as we began the flare.  With the little biplane gliding along atop that invisible blanket of thick air nearest the ground, I slowly brought the power off and held her off as long as I could.
She sank onto the pavement and her wheels met with a chirp - all three at once as we had planned.  My feet worked automatically to keep her running straight as the airport's landscape slowly solidified from a blur to the green of the infield, rows of multicolored planes and the clubhouse and hangar beyond.
Slowing through 45, I bring the stick all the way back to ground the tail.
A rattle passes through the airframe.  I feel it in my right wrist and in my seat.  Tailwheel shimmy - a trembling likely caused, in this case, by too much weight on the tailwheel.  It's an easy fix.  All I need to do is release a bit of the back pressure.
In the time it takes for me to process the shimmy - barely a second - it has ceased. 
A second, shorter bout of shimmy.  As I'm about to move my right hand forward to relieve the pressure on the tailwheel, everything goes sideways and all at once.
Where there was once blue sky, is now the grey siding and black windows of the museum building bordering the south side of the runway. 
I can hear the wheels screaming.  And I do mean screaming - a bloodcurdling cry of rubber laboring against asphalt.
I've already moved the stick left, into whatever is happening.  Likewise, my right boot is on the brake - desperately trying to horse the biplane into line. 
I am going to ground loop. I am sure of it.
The airplane responds immediately - although it seems like a lifetime before she lurches right again.  I relax the right brake and, at once, she heels sharply left once more.  More screaming, more pressure on the right brake.  Once again, drunkenly, she staggers into line.
We taxi off.  My mind is racing.  My mouth tastes like copper.  Fear?  Yes, obviously, but it's more than that.  I tear off a glove and bring my hand to my mouth.  It comes away red with blood.  In the excitement, I've bitten my tongue. 
I can hear my heart smashing away.  My eyes are throbbing.
Brake failure?  No, I surmise.  Otherwise, we would have gone through the fence or overturned the moment we hit the opposite brake.
Rudder cable break?  Astronomically terrifying but even less likely, I reason.  The right rudder is spongy, slow to react, and I need brake and a little power to turn...but the airplane does respond to inputs.
The tailwheel steering springs!  God damn it, of course.  The shimmy must have either broken the right hand spring or knocked it off the steering arm or rudder hook-up - jamming the rudder to the left and giving us little authority to neutralize it.

The offending spring, reattached.  (Author's collection)

Our only saving grace was 25 cents worth of safety wire.  At some point in the Smith's past, Al had lockwired the rudder hook up to the steering arm on the tailwheel as an added safety measure should one of the springs break or be kicked loose.  This would keep the rudder from deflecting fully left as well as allowing some measure of control.
We taxied to the pumps and shut down.  I spent a few minutes staring at the panel and listening to the engine ticking over behind the ringing in my ears.  I tried to go over the incident in my mind but could only dredge up snapshots even though it had happened mere minutes before.  I know I took corrective action otherwise we'd have gone through the fence...but I couldn't quite remember what I'd done.
I must have been as white as a ghost because another instructor pilot walked up and asked if I was okay.  I asked if he could see my tailwheel steering springs.  He ducked out of view and came back holding one in his hand. 
"It was hanging off the steering arm," he said, handing it to me. 
The grease on the spring mingled with the blood in my hand as I turned it over thoughtfully.
"Thanks," I replied...only I wasn't speaking to my colleague.
Overhead, the seagulls continued their aerial ballet - undisturbed by the would-be carnage below.

Lone Wolf

During the flying season, the Smith is one of three flying biplanes on the field.  I say flying because the Canada Aviation and Space Museum has a whole mess of biplanes under its roof.  DSA's companions are a pair of WACO UPF-7s, identical but for one letter in their registration marks, that endlessly hop tourist rides from May until October.  In the winter, the Smith is Rockcliffe's only permanent resident with twin wings. 
As such, and likely also due to her dwarfish appearance, she attracts a fair amount of attention.  Certain curious parties yell inquiries through the perimeter fence.  Some slam on brakes and shout questions through open car windows.  Others wander over to have a look and a chat.  Still others accept my offer to climb in.
"It looks like a lot of fun to fly."
"Sure is," I answer.
"How does it do with aerobatics?"
"I don't know," is my reply.  "I don't fly acro in it.  Steep turns, lazy 8s, chandelles - that's about it."
"So, what do you do?"
"Whatever I feel like," is my honest reply, usually accompanied with a shrug.  "Sometimes I just point the nose in a certain direction and see where that takes me.  Other times, I just bomb around, go see my buddy's cottage, or follow a river...you know..."
Some do, some don't.  The ones who don't get it are given a different answer.
"I hunt Cessnas."
"Really?"
"Yeah," I say earnestly, nodding.  "150s, 152s, the later 172 models.  The older ones with the flat 6 are a little hard to catch but with a good deflection shot, I might get lucky."
"Huh..."
"Yeah, and I got a chopper out by Wendover a few days back," I pop a stick of gum into my mouth and grin. "Bag two more and I'm an ace."
You can almost see the gears working away.  Is he serious? Does he really hunt Cessnas?
My grin widens.  He'll be looking over his shoulder next time.




Hunting Cessnas.  (Author's Collection)

The storylines of my flying the Smith, in some ways, run in parallel to the lone wolf patrols of Bishop and Ball nearly a century ago.  Clearly, I am blessed to fly in peace-time, at much lower altitudes, in fair weather and without the added worry of flak, enemy fighters, balloons and the fairly constant spectre of engine or catastrophic structural failure.  Still, my craft's charming inefficiency, the way the wind sings in the wires, the whisper of the slipstream caressing the fabric flanks and how the air pools and swirls in the open cockpit remain largely as they were in the days of my heroic forebears. 
Truth be told, my greatest aerial foes are the wayward gull and the increasingly populous and menacing drone.
My first "kill" wasn't a Cessna, in fact, but a Piper Cherokee 140 - white with blue trim - over Gatineau just south of the Chelsea dam.  I had just left Rockcliffe's circuit, turned to the northwest to pick up the Gatineau River and was about to begin a climb when something moved just on the border of my vision.  I checked the climb, turned my head to the right and picked him out almost instantly.  He was just below the horizon, a moving piece against the static puzzle of the city beneath.  It took me a moment to see that he was climbing and moving towards me.  I slowed down slightly and turned right so that my path would take me behind him while still maintaining visual contact.
He literally flew into my sights, plodding along from right to left, right across my nose at a few hundred yards.  I pressed the trigger on the stick and opened a radio channel with my thumb.
"Bang," I said.
The Cherokee didn't even flinch.  He continued west, likely on the way to Carp, trailing imaginary smoke.
The next victory was a 172 based at Rockcliffe in nearly the same fashion and in exactly the same spot as my inaugural Cherokee.  He was returning from a flight to Toronto Island as I was running the Camp Fortune gap back into Rockcliffe.  I caught him in the pre-dusk sky as I finished my climb to 1700'.  He was way up there, over my left shoulder and descending.  I watched him get lower and grow larger until we were in lose formation.  I gave the Smith a little right aileron and left rudder, coaxing her into a gentle sideslip, and put the 172 on my nose.  She hung there, a black silhouette against the golden sky of a dying day...and then I gave her a three second burst.
Out of the slip, then.  I keyed the mic, announced my presence and suggested he might wish to enter the pattern at Rockcliffe ahead of me.
The Cessna put her nose down and accelerated away, the last rays of sunlight dancing in her smoky wake.
Occasionally, would-be prey reveal their location quite willingly - particularly in the practice area straddling the Ottawa River north of the capital.  Each time a new airplane enters the practice area, it announces itself in the same manner as a debutante is introduced at the ball before demanding to know how many suitors are in the hall and from where they hail.  The result is a nauseating litany of replies punctuated with periodic squealing as two attempt to relay their position, mission, favourite color and food at once.  This repeats itself each time a new player is introduced or every 5 minutes, whichever comes first.
In the practice area, airplanes and their crews seize gargantuan, three-dimensional swaths of land with the zeal of a gold rush prospector.  Whenever an aircraft betrays even the possibility of threatening the borders of their aerial fiefdom, the resultant call is laced with enough paranoia that one begins to wonder if the radio truly plays a greater role in avoiding the mid-air collision than, say, the human eye.
On one such flying day, I was returning home to Rockcliffe by following a south-east track about a half mile south of Breckenridge - a hamlet on the Quebec shore of the Ottawa River.  I had been making the requisite radio calls, dutifully adding my voice to the chorus.
So, you can imagine my surprise when I hear:
"Biplane over Breckonridge, come in!"
"This is Smith Miniplane Delta-Sierra-Alpha," is my cheery reply.
"Yeah, this is Cessna 172 Fox-Uniform-Charlie-Kilo," says a voice dripping with contempt. "You should really make position reports because I'm up here at thirty nine hundred feet doing spins."
You can almost hear each of the four gold bars on his shoulder in his venomous rebuke.
I consider my response. 
It really should be something along the lines of should you actually get that pregnant sow to spin and if you have the great misfortune to still be spinning when you arrive at my meagre altitude of 800 feet above ground level then, my dear sir, you've greater concerns than a mid-air collision with me.
I look up.  There he is - barely a grain of sand in a sea of blue.  My thumb is poised over the push-to-talk.  I take a deep breath of fresh air and open my mouth to speak.
Up front, the Smith's Lycoming purrs steadily.  Something in the sound of the engine and slipstream makes me take pity on the poor soul nearly 3000 feet above, sweating as he saws back and forth on the control yoke, wincing as he listens to the engine surging as he forces his reluctant craft into violent earthward gyrations. 
Down here, life is good.
"My apologies," I want him to hear the smile in my voice.  "I'll make more position reports next time!"
I punch the flip flop on the radio and switch frequencies for Rockcliffe before the Cessna Captain is able to reply.
If only all such unpleasant things could be stopped with the simple push of a button.

Working aviator

As the season progress, the natural order of renewal followed.  Spring gave way to summer.  The rains slowly subsided, winds calmed and colour returned to the country side.  The sun was a constant companion and warmth returned to the air.  The airplanes and their pilots grew busier as well.  It seemed that the machines flew constantly given that the flight line was almost always empty during the day, with only black patches of oil betraying the fact that an airplane had been in the tie-down at all.  The Flying Club enjoyed a more-or-less constant stream of students.  A few instructors moved on to other jobs, new ones appeared and students shuffled around.  Rockcliffe's song was one of pistons hammering away on take-off and wings whispering as they glided down the final approach for landing.  It might be the echo of history or the inherent promise in one learning to fly, but there's something about that place that just makes it stand out.
Against this background, my professional flying career developed.  As I said, it had never been on my radar as a viable option - and, to be honest, it really wasn't viable - but I revelled in it.  My uniform consisted of a blue company polo shirt, sun faded and oil stained cargo shorts that had once been brown, a tattered twill belt and a pair of holed loafers.  I wore my old, sweat, oil and dirt encrusted RCAF ball cap with pride.  My skin glistened in the sun and under the film of sweat and oil and my clothes smelled of sunscreen and avgas.  I walked the ramp until I wore out the soles of my shoes. I lost weight.  Not only did I fly, but I pushed airplanes around, gassed them up, replenished oil and, on occasion, rooted around behind and under seats to reattach belts or coax a flat battery back to life.

Steely-eyed and far too serious.  My first flying job in April 2010 as a Class 2 Aerobatics Instructor on the Burkhart Grob G115C.  Go Pack. (Photo Courtesy: Jason Burles)

The full-time aerobatic instructor pilot hamming it up, summer 2015.  (Photo courtesy: Ernie Szelepcsenyi)

We were so far from the "glamorous" pilot life of starched shirts and shoulder boards that my compatriots pined for.  It's true that I smelled and was, generally speaking and more than most, filthy.  At the very least, however, I was happy.
It was not unusual for me to teach a lesson in the Super D and then jump into the Smith for a quick flight.  The two airplanes, while both taildraggers, could not be more different.
The Super Decathlon traces it's lineage all the way back to the venerable Aeronca Champ.  The Champ, while introduced just after the close of the Second World War, first flew more than a year before the armistice.  In a 5-year production run, more than 10 thousand were produced in a number of variants.  It taught an entire generation of pilots how to fly. In fact, the Flying Club's original fleet was nearly entirely comprised of the plucky tailwheel trainers and it's rumored that the remains of one still lie at the bottom of the Ottawa River, just off the airport. The Champ, like the line of trainers it is responsible for (the Citabria and Decathlon among them), remains a popular general aviation aircraft today.
In a pack of mules, the Super D is a thoroughbred.  The Club's Super D pilots are a tight knit bunch and, almost to an individual, extremely protective of "their" airplane.  Newcomers are regarded with a measure of suspicion until judged that they "get it."  It's nothing personal.

Returning from an aerobatic dual flight.  I'm in the back seat in the orange sweatshirt and Matt McCuaig is up front.  (Photo courtesy: Chuck Clark)

Tailwheel airplanes usually expose a weak pilot but the Decathlon is such a good-natured, pussycat of an airplane that it tolerates an unfair amount of abuse before running out of patience.  Today, most pilots, the author included, are trained on aircraft with a tricycle landing gear; that is to say, two main wheels and a smaller wheel under the nose.  This configuration was, at inception, marketed as "Land-O-Matic" - implying that the airplane can land itself.  While not entirely true, one can land a tricycle airplane with very little interference from the pilot by simply smashing it into the ground at any degree of crab and, after a certain amount of squealing from the tires, have it right itself and roll merrily along.  This is thanks to clever engineers having arranged the centre of gravity to be ahead of the main wheels.  If the aircraft does not touch down in line with its direction of travel, Sir Isaac Newton, dead now for nearly 400 years, takes corrective action and pulls the airplane into line again.
Taildraggers, however, have the centre of gravity behind the main wheels.  Therefore, when the aircraft touches down at an angle, the centre of gravity tries to pull the tail around.  If unchecked, this swing can become a ground loop - or worse.  So, these machines require a firm hand, some measure of attention and functioning feet. 

Didn't believe me?  Here's proof.  (Courtesy: Cessna)

I was fortunate to have learned this early on in my flying career - at my father's insistence.  With barely 80 hours, I checked out on a cute little Citabria near Newmarket.  Once the tail came up, I was hooked.

With Super Decathlon C-GKXD at CYRO (Photo Courtesy: AR Photography)

When the Decathlon joined the line, I checked out in the back seat because that's where the instructor sits.  It's an infernal pit of exquisite design - robbing the pilot of any forward view and giving him or her the basic tools of stick, rudder and throttle.  There is also a seatbelt should the aforementioned not keep one out of trouble.  In order to survive, one learns to take-off and land using peripheral vision.  One also acquires an ear and hand for what certain speeds and attitudes sound and feel like.
By the end of my first season in the back, I was comfortable.  Mid-way through my second season, the front seat just felt odd.
All this to say, I love the Super D and am almost eerily relaxed flying and teaching acro in it.  I know her every nuance and tendency, rib and stitch, nut and bolt.  I understand the language she speaks and when I'm away for a while, I worry about her well-being.  Because of this love, I subconsciously - and sometimes, I'll admit, unfairly - hold others to the same standard.

Demo-ing a hammerhead in KXD.  Richard Himbault is up front while I fly from the back.  Rich is one of the nicest and most enthusiastic pilots I've flown with - and a good stick too.  (Author's collection)

"Right rudder, right rudder, right rudder!"  my voice, fighting the roar of the engine.
The airplane, at a comically slow pace, wanders for the left edge of the runway.
"Move your feet!" I jockey the pedals.
"Stick forward," my voice again.
Feeble response from the front seat.
"Stick forward!" Louder now.
"More?"
"Yes, more."
"Why?"  I know they say there are no stupid questions.  They're wrong.
The airplane lurches into the air, sideways naturally, and behind the power of the 180 horsepower Lycoming, flies out of ground effect a little earlier than it should.
"That's why," I have to stifle a laugh.
"Oh," comes the bewildered reply.
"Fly the damned airplane," I say gently, softening the bite of my words.  "Don't hang onto it like you're walking the family dog."
In the air, she flies like most other airplanes of her class do - except it's louder and draftier in the cockpit.  When it comes to aerobatics, she does every basic maneuver fairly well and is forgiving enough to handle some ham-handedness from the neophyte. 
The landings are, for a tail dragger, largely non-eventful.  The airplane has a fair amount of drag and isn't a great glider so getting it down isn't a problem - even given the absence of flaps.  That's usually one of the first things people notice when they walk up to the airplane.
"Oh," they say, genuinely surprised.  "No flaps."
"Nope," I reply, cheerfully.  "You don't need them."

Power Flying Scholarship 2002, Eastern Region, English Flight, Les Cedres QC.  I'm in the back row, 5th from the right.  Chuck is to my right.  The aircraft is Cessna 172 C-FSEX.  Only a few of us ever got to fly it and only at the end of the course, but we had to have it in the flight photograph.  (Photo courtesy: EVVRE)

It wasn't that long ago, however, that I might have asked the same thing.  When I was doing my license, one of my classmates had a flap failure returning from a solo cross country.  I was in the old lounge studying when a pack of blue flight suits rushed by the door. 
"What's up?"  I called out.
One of them poked their head in and said, "Chuck's flaps don't work.  He's been flying around for the last hour to burn off gas.  We're going out to watch him crash."
I know how it sounds, but it underscores my point.
I drove out in the company van with our instructor, who was talking him down on a handheld radio.  We parked on the grass taxiway, a few hundred feet past the threshold.
"Cedars Traffic, Zulu-Sierra-Zulu, turning final for runway 25," Chuck's voice, normally thin, sounded thinner.  He was tired - having flown from Cedars to St-Jean and then overflying Cornwall on his way to Gatineau before returning to Cedars and droning around for another hour.  While not explicitly articulated, the goal was to lighten his fuel load and correspondingly reduce his chances of bursting into flames if the landing ended in a crash.  Again, it sounds like overkill, but we were students and, at the time, Chuck was solo and may have had 35 or 40 hours of total flight experience.  He sounded scared.  Hell, I was scared.
"Okay, Chuck," Nigel began.  "Keep the speed up, fly 70."
It was nearly dusk.  I could just make out the outline of the little 152, a green and red smudge at each wingtip, landing light blazing.  I watched it come down the approach.  He looked fast but Chuck was doing a nice job.
As ZSZ crossed the threshold, Nigel raised the radio again.
"Start your flare now, Chuck," he began.  "Keep it straight, hold it off, keep holding it off...good..."
ZSZ raced by about two feet off the runway, silent except for the whistle of the slipstream.  He floated till midfield and then the wings gave up and ZSZ sagged onto the runway.  No crash, no fire, no death.  A non-event.
Years later, Chuck recalled that he wasn't at all frightened by the prospect of landing an airplane without flaps.  Rather, his concern lay with the malfunctioning electric flap motor and its less than ideal location below one of the fuel tanks.  A few days after the incident, the maintenance guys showed him the flap motor.  It had slagged and there was clear evidence that the unit had been gleefully throwing sparks.
A year later, ZSZ would be written off by a student pilot practising take-offs and landings on a calm day.  After a series of bounces that would make an out of control elevator feel like one of those tea-cup rides at the community fair, her nose gear gave out and the rest of the airplane followed.  So much for "Land-O-Matic."

Cessna 152 C-GZSZ, my solo plane and Chuck's mount for his flapless landing, shown here in August 2008 - five years after its unauthorized tail dragger conversion by nose wheel failure.  (Author's collection)

The Super D is an honest airplane and does exactly what you want it to do and smartly.  As long as you're patient with the flare and you follow the cardinal rule of keeping her straight, everything unfolds as it should.  In challenging conditions or on days when the pilot lets his attention lapse momentarily, the airplane will protest with enough obvious warning signs to alert all but the most incompetent aviator. 
As I said, I love the Super Decathlon and regard it as an old friend.  There's a tremendous amount of comfort, familiarity and trust between the airplane and I.  There must be, given the maneuvers we undertake together.  It didn't come instantly but rather, was built over hundreds of hours and many years.
I love the Smith too, as it truly is my airplane - and yet, it is a different kind of love.  The Smith challenges me, judges me, gives me a good swat if I don't do things just so.  It was a long time coming - dropping into the cockpit for the first time.  Every time I do, I think of everything, good or bad, triumphant or tragic, that had to happen to put me here - in this airplane and this moment.  And while that first landing resulted in an absolute cock-up, every minute since that baptism by fire has been something of a love affair.
Around the time Chuck made that flapless landing at Cedars, I fell in love all over again with biplanes.  My dad's Smith had faded into my deep memory - her button nose poking out from behind the mountains of rubbish that collect in a teenager's mind over time.  Nigel and I had just landed at Gatineau in a Cessna 152 Aerobat.  We'd left Cedars perhaps two hours before, stopping in St. Jean-sur-Richelieu and overflying Cornwall before alighting here for gas and a stretch.
We were standing on the ramp, next to our mount - Nigel leaning back against his hands to loosen his back while I knotted my blue flight suit around my waist - when this tiny red devil of an airplane came blazing down the runway trailing a white wake of smoke.  Its approach was silent - only the flash of movement caught my eye.  Then, suddenly, as it drew abeam where we stood, there was a snarl and the airplane seemed to stand on her tail, bending the sky as she clawed upwards along the arc of a loop.  There was a mad tumble at the top, the aircraft whipping round smartly and flashing her wings in the summer sun.  Then down again she came, buzzing like an angry bee, and tore off across the tarmac again.
Nigel, shielding his eyes against the sun, let out a low whistle.
I stood there, rooted to the ground, awe struck. 
The little ship now followed a steep, angled approach - always turning until just over the numbers.  Then the airman balanced his ship on an invisible cushion of air and let her drop gently onto the runway, swinging the rudder this way and that as they rolled to a walking pace.  He taxied off, spun in a circle and fired off a burst of smoke-oil.  It roiled up, teased by the slowly turning biplane and fanned by her prop, until melting into the blue above.
It was a Pitts S-1 and it looked remarkably like my dad's Smith.  I spent the flight home thinking about all that time I spent pretending to fly it.
Twelve years later, it would no longer be a dream borne of a distant memory.
And in that way, the Smith provided a momentary escape from my newfound working life.  It was a throwback - a reminder of the days when Nigel sent me out on my own to hone my craft.  Everything was new and exciting.  No matter how many times I viewed a particular town from the air, I could always pick out something I'd missed.  The Smith managed to transform even basic maneuvers into something of an experience.  It gave you the oddest sensation, turning round in circles while feeling as though you and the airplane were precisely balance on the tip of a needle two thousand feet above the ground.  You felt every ripple in the air mass.  On smooth days, it felt just like gliding across a still lake in a small sailboat; on bumpy days, like running the gauntlet of flak on a balloon-busting mission over the Western Front. 
No matter what, however, the Smith always managed to put a smile on your face.  Each time I landed from a flight, only to resume my work on the airfield, I did so with an increasingly far-off look in my eye - not unlike my Dad's when he recalled his flying days in Foxtrot-Alpha-Mike.

Five Days in May

On May 2nd, I had an open booking in the middle of my day.  It was a gorgeous spring morning with light winds, temperatures in the high teens, clear blue skies and unlimited visibility.  I had already taken the Super Decathlon up to do Immelmann turns with a student and didn't have my next lesson - hammerheads - for a little more than two hours. 
With KXD tied up on the line, the Smith sat alone in the shade of the hangar.  I sat a few hundred feet away, watching, and chewing thoughtfully on a protein bar.
The Smith was imploring me to take us out for a quick rip.  There was no mistaking that.  You may think it isn't possible for a machine, in this case a collection of steel tubing, hand-planed wood and doped fabric, to give you a look - but, believe me, it is.  It's the same look a dog gives you when it simply must go for a walk this instant.  The Smith might as well have been sitting by the door, tail wagging, leash hanging from her jaws, whining softly.
With a sigh, I hop off the plywood box meant to house wing covers, engine blankets and tie-down ropes for a Cessna 150, and start walking towards the biplane.  It's a haphazard, circuitous root.  I stop to let the Cessna 170, that old flat 6 Continental clattering, roll by.  I casually wave to the pilot.  On the other side of the taxiway, I chat briefly with another aviator and, once the pleasantries and idle topic of the day are exhausted, promptly forget what the conversation was about.  With each step, my excitement builds.  The whining grows in volume and urgency.

The Smith in her corner of the hangar on May 2nd. (Author's collection)

A few minutes later, I've rolled the Smith out of her corner and into the bright sunlight.  I give her a thorough pre-flight inspection, lingering longer than usual in certain high importance areas.  I've noticed that I'm doing that with increased regularity and I'm fairly certain I know why.  Still, the anticipation prods me onward through a full circle of the bipe and her underside.  Everything is at it should be.
Not too long after, with the Lycoming growling in my ears, we're sprinting down the runway.  I've hardly touched the rudder pedals on this particular roll - save for periodic taps on the right pedal.  I've eased off on the forward stick so that the Smith adopts a slightly tail low attitude as we approach flying speed.  As I've planned, she calmly breaks ground of her own accord and we begin rising gently into the sky above Rockcliffe.
I haven't decided where we'll go or what we'll do.  I just felt like going up to have a look around, just for the fun of it.  The Smith and I consider the concrete carpet of Gatineau, the hills and the flat lands beyond as our destination but her little wings keep pulling us around onto an easterly heading.  Holding the leash, I let the biplane set the pace. 
We crawl along above the Ottawa River, chat a little with the flight service station at Gatineau, and keep pushing on to the east.  At Masson-Angers, we turn left to follow the Du Lievre River north past Beauchampville on the left bank and Buckingham on the right.
Beyond these small towns, the landscape settles into a narrow ribbon of puzzle-piece farmers fields centered on the river and flanked for miles by a sea of granite cloaked in green.  The river, once used move lumber downstream to the Ottawa, meanders north-north-west to the small town of Notre-Dame-de-la-Salette.
There's something about this town.  We noticed it last season when we first flew out this way and loitered overhead for a little while.  We felt it again on our next visit but couldn't quite identify the allure.  It might be that the little town, known as Portland until the mid 1960s, is the only outpost for 15 or 20 miles in any direction.  It's beautiful but lonely up here and perhaps, this tiny speck of civilization soothes that feeling.  It might be how the town is nestled tightly around a set of crossroads nuzzled up to the river's eastern shore...or the way the sunlight glints off the steel grey roof of the church. 

A house destroyed the 1908 landslide in Notre-Dame-de-la-Salette. (Collection Bastien)

 

The feeling is also one of inexplicable sadness.  It washed over us each time we orbited overhead, on days much like this one - when we had absolutely no reason to feel this way. 

After our second trip out here, the feeling persisted and I did some research.  Notre-Dame-de-la-Salette has many reasons to be sad.  More than a century ago, in the early morning hours of April 26th, a landslide swept down the western shore of the river - taking 3 houses with it and killing 6 people.  With the river blocked by mud and debris, huge blocks of ice were carried across the town, destroying a dozen houses and 25 other buildings.  In the end, 34 people were killed, roughly ten per cent of the town's population - many of them in their beds. 

Two additional landslides, in 1900 and 1912, as well as a 1903 fire, ravaged this river town.

The scene of devastation after the 1908 Notre-Dame-de-la-Salette. (Collection Bastien)

And maybe that's what we feel, what makes the air heavy - that lingering echo of catastrophe, careening off the nearby hills, swirling around the town and rising gently into the sky above.

After a few more lazy spins around the village, we point our nose west and follow it through the hills to Poltimore, then south to Val-des-Monts before picking up a valley and taking it west to Wakefield. 
Here, we turn south again to follow the Gatineau River home.

At this point, I became aware of a faint headache.  It was after 1 in the afternoon and the sun was strong and high in the sky.  Sunlight leaked through the propeller's disk, bounced off the Smith's nose and into my eyes.  I hardly ever wore sunglasses when flying and I'd likely been squinting for most of the flight.  In order to take advantage of the warm air on my face, I'd left my goggles on my forehead and now the pressure points were burning and seemed to be centered on my temples.  All this conspired to force my mind from the business of flying to the urgency of landing.
The circuit is not our best.  We're pushed out long and wide by the busy Saturday afternoon circuit. The final approach features more power adjustment and speed chasing than I'd normally deem acceptable.  And yet, I pursue the approach.  I'm sore and flushed from the sun.  My head is pounding and my eyes itch.  I just want to put the little ship down.
We rush over the perimeter fence and into the flare.  I could bail out of the approach here but I don't.  Instead, I bring the power off, the plane settles onto the pavement and skips back into the air.  We slide sideways for a few feet and touch down a second time before galloping at once into air again.  I see the edge of the runway hovering into view as my hands and feet work to wrestle the biplane to the ground. 
An instant later, the little ship, tired of flight, sags to earth and the wheels chirp as I manage to finally horse the biplane into running straight. 
We roll clear of the runway at Bravo taxiway.  My mouth is dry and tastes of ash.  My heart beat is crashing around inside my cavernous head. 
I am an idiot.
The Smith's only reply is the admonishing rumble of the Lycoming at slow idle and the swishing sound of the prop. 
"A good approach is a good landing," I hear my Dad say, as clear as though he were standing next to me, leaning up against the cockpit rim and shouting advice into my ear.
He's right.  That was a lousy approach.  I had plenty of reasons and many chances to break off and set up again but I chose to press the approach and then tried to save the landing.  I broke every rule I incessantly hammered into the heads of my students.  In fact, and ironically, I'd echoed my Dad just this morning.
I tucked the Smith into the corner of the hangar, laid an apologetic hand on her cowl and went back to the Decathlon and hammerheads. 
The hammerhead is perhaps the most exciting and most difficult maneuver in the basic aerobatic repertoire.  It involves a brisk pull to the vertical - until the wing cleanly cuts the distant horizon in half.  One must lean on the right rudder to stay straight during the pull and, once the desired angle is achieved, slight forward pressure on the stick is required to keep the machine from slowly rotating onto her back.  At this point, it's a waiting game.  As the ship climbs the vertical line, gravity inevitably takes over and her heavenward progress slows and will eventually stop.  The slipstream tightens around the airframe and gives the pilot a buffet, a trembling of the stick similar to what's experienced during run-up when the machine is stationary with the engine at high power. This is the only real cue the aviator is afforded. At this point, some four to five seconds after the hitting the vertical line, the pilot must add left rudder to begin the pivot, right stick to hold the wing down and slight forward pressure to keep the cut even.  If executed properly, the aircraft pivots through 180 degrees and travels earthward again.
There's a lot going on in the hammerhead, most of it counterintuitive - and it all happens more or less at once.  In the novice, there's a terrific desire, fueled by borderline panic, to stuff everything into a corner and then get frustrated about the unpleasant result.  With experience, however, time slows down, the process crystallizes and the hammerhead grows into the sweet maneuver it really is.  Of course, time doesn't really slow.  The sand in the hourglass keeps flowing at the same rate but patience and experience make it much easier to count the grains.
"Patience is a virtue," my dad used to say.  He used to say it all the time.  He kept saying it after he'd passed. 
When my wife and I had settled on a venue for our wedding - a building that my dad had built, in fact - we were faced with only two available dates, one in May and one in October.  Given it was already March, I was pushing heavily for October.  Mel wanted May.  After some discussion, she relented.
"Patience is a virtue," she said. 
I wept.  My wife had met my father once, and only for a few minutes.  After I had calmed down enough to question her about the phrase, she admitted she never really used it and didn't know why she had at that particular moment. 
I did, however...and we were married in October.
Over the next week, I flew the Smith four more times.  For the first two flights, I flew only circuits - at first stop-and-go landings and then touch-and-goes.  I concentrated on the fundamentals of speed, energy management and power above all else.  Keeping her straight while blind out the front had become almost second nature.  I went around a few times - once because of traffic on the runway and twice because I just didn't like the approach.  On one or two occasions, I rolled out to a slow walking pace, taxied off and went back out again so that I could simulate full stop landings.  I sank myself into sharpening my skills in the most critical phases of flight, shoehorning the tutelage into short intervals made even shorter by the biplane's faster approach speed. 
The circuit flights were relatively short - no more than 25 or 30 minutes.  This kind of flying in the Smith was just as taxing as the time I'd spent in the Pitts - the only difference being I still had lessons to teach in the Super D.  The physical workload was significant but mentally, it was a marathon.  I'd emerge from the cockpit sweating from exertion but grinning in triumph.
The second pair of flights involved circuits bookending a short jaunt out of the airport's zone.  The goal here was to give me a break and an opportunity to just relax and fly the biplane.
With each flight, I became increasingly aware that I had been hurrying the airplane, forcing things to happen before they naturally should.  The May 2nd flight in the midday sun was a perfect example; I was tired, uncomfortable and anxious to land so that I could uncoil myself from the airplane, get some water, shade and rest.  The unplanned extension of the circuit exacerbated that impatience and I then punched through every warning sign in an effort to put the airplane down.
The Smith was teaching me to be patient again.  If I did things just so, she would reward me with a gentle touch down and a well-behaved roll out. 
It really was that simple.  Good things do come to those who wait.

Fluency

My full-time employment at the Rockcliffe Flying Club remained on my own terms.  I set myself up to work Wednesday through to Sunday in order to keep myself available for the higher trafficked weekends.  The aerobatic program competed annually with the petulant nature of April weather, with its undulating temperatures and sporadic rain showers that often came unannounced with the fury of a monsoon.  May usually brought stability in the weather and a more or less constant stream of returning and new aerobatic students.  In the short term, I planned to fill the gaping holes in my schedule with short jaunts in the Smith.

I had plenty of opportunity in the days following our first flight of 2015.  The Smith and I launched on the 16th, 17th and 18th with the goal of recapturing the modicum of comfort and skill we'd built during the previous season.

On the 16th, we went east instead of west - racing along the south shore of the Ottawa River and across the urban sprawl of Orleans spilling out of the nation's capital.  Once the ferry crossing at Cumberland disappeared under the left wing, we turned right to a heading of roughly south-east.  Here, Orleans breathed her last gasps of suburbanization and the expanse of field and forest reigned.  Here and there, a small town or hamlet crowded the intersection of two county roads that, remarkably, ran straight and true for miles until fading into the dull, grey blur of the horizon.

I picked up a rare winding asphalt road, crossed a small patch of fields, then a forest that had sprung a cell phone tower from its pine canopy.  Just beyond, was J.P. and Maria's farm with the cliché red barn and its incongruous slabs of solar panels.  I guided the Smith through a few left hand orbits until someone emerged from the house and stood in the dirt courtyard, shielding their eyes with one hand while waving with the other.  The Smith and I went around the patch a few more times before waggling our wings and sweeping southward to crisscross the countryside.

I love this part of Ontario because it has remained largely unchanged since the days when we first took to the skies.  You could, as they did in aviation's infancy, take off or land from any of the fields spread around us - provided they were reasonably flat, devoid of ditches and you took care to avoid fences, trees or livestock.  Later, when the literal flying fields became aerodromes and then airports, the purpose-built installations at Rockcliffe and Pendleton were carved out of the wilderness or born from repurposed land.  Airplanes too became more specialized, more sophisticated - and they flew higher and faster behind engines of increasing power.  Still, they remained essentially the same - wings for lift, a tail for control and stability, a compartment to carry the aviator and an engine to provide thrust.

Rockcliffe's face had changed drastically over the years.  Her three runways had been whittled down to just the single strip - one being erased entirely while the other now serves as a taxiway.  Her expansive military hangars are gone, leaving only the faint footprint of their foundations and the occasional iron tie-down ring.  The song of the Merlin and the bass rumble of the old radials has long since faded only to be replaced by a chorus of small Lycomings and Continentals with the occasional refrain of a Kinner and Jacobs thrown in.  Purists decry this aging as the tearing down of national monuments while most are simply glad the old field exists at all.

Further east, and actually not far from where we are now, is the former RCAF Station Pendleton.  During the second world war, it hosted No. 10 Elementary Flight Training School (EFTS) where trainee pilots were given 50 hours on the Tiger Moth or the Finch.  The field remains largely as it did more than 75 years ago.  It retains its characteristic triangular arrangement of runways and most of the buildings from that era, however, the asphalt is in such bad shape that the tow planes and gliders mostly use the grass.

I can see the pale triangular smudge of Pendleton, neatly framed by the forest, hovering just over the nose.  It's well camouflaged and, if you're not purposely looking for it, easy to miss.  I quickly tune my radio to Pendleton's frequency and listen in.  Silence.  Well, outside of the blast of the slipstream and the growl of the engine.

My eyes strain to pick out any traffic loitering about the old airport.  No joy - and it's not surprising either.  It's lunchtime on a Thursday.  I'm very much alone in the sky's basement.  In fact, it's likely that I'm the only pilot flying around these parts.  At least the only pilot not getting paid to fly.

I smile in spite of myself.  I suppose this is one of the perks of being more or less unemployed.

About ten minutes later, still smiling over my how great misfortune led to me frolicking in the skies while everyone else worked, I am crossing the field at Rockcliffe and about to join the circuit.  There's only one airplane in the circuit, a rental flight in one of the club's Cessna 172s, and I've been listening to him plod around the pattern for the last several minutes as I flew inbound.  As I'm about to make my overhead call, he comes up on the frequency to say he's turning base.

This is good news.  As Andrew Boyd taught me during my apprenticeship in the Pitts, "flying these things is easy, it's fitting into the circuit and landing that's hard."  With that in mind, I fly a circuit similar to the one flown by the ride-hopping WACO.  It consists of a descending, U-shaped base to final at 85 miles per hour and carrying 1700 RPM until the flare.  In the Pitts, I flew a similar profile to a slant final, before making that final adjustment to line up with the runway as I crossed the threshold.  I can see well enough straight ahead over the nose in the Smith to render the slant final unnecessary.

The whole thing, from the end of downwind to touchdown takes about 25 seconds.

Still, given the 172 is on base for a touch and go and I'm overhead, this should work out nicely.

The only issue is that the 172 isn't where I expect it to be.

After squinting hard at what I would expect to be the terrain above which one normally flies a base leg, I catch a glimpse of the white trainer turning final somewhere past Beacon Hill.  The accompanying radio call confirms it.

My groan is instantly swept away by the wind, leaving only a despondent rumble in my chest.  I power back and trim for 70 miles per hour, which is the slowest speed I care to cruise at.  This is 10 miles per hour faster than the Smith's stalling speed and only slightly faster than the 172 final approach speed.

And so we come to every biplane pilot's rub. Two wings means double the lift but also double the drag.  These things can't glide worth a damn.  Rockcliffe affords little when it comes to off-airport landing sites so once you're in the pattern, the preference is to stay close enough to the field that you can make it should the engine quit.  The trouble is, you can't fly slow enough to avoid being pushed way out by a slower airplane flying a wider circuit.  The end result is that we end up wallowing around the pattern, holding our altitude until final and then increasing speed to 85 miles per hour for the approach.

It isn't dangerous or difficult, really - just backwards.

The end result is, by the time we're crossing the perimeter fence, we're a little faster than we should be.  I know I can carry a lighter power setting into the round out and bleed off the excess by being patient in the flare. 

I let the cushion of air beneath us flatten a shade earlier than I'd aimed for and the little ship skips back into the air.  It's an unpleasant feeling - hanging a few feet above the asphalt with the power at idle and the scenery rushing past in a frenetic blur.  I know we're floating more than a meter above the runway - I can feel it in my seat and in how the wings feel heavy.  I won't break it if I drop the Smith from this height but it will be a wild ride down the runway. 

This is the Smith talking to me.  Like any language, it fades with disuse.  After 5 months away, I'm only just starting to remember some of the words.

Instinctively, the left hand moves forward and the engine responds.  The wings, light again and invigorated by thrust, stop the Smith from settling.  With the lightest of pressure from my right wrist, we rise into the sky again and set up for another go.

Breaking 700 total time and 25 in the Smith on 18 April 2015.  I'm holding a sign displaying the numbers.  (Author's Collection)

On the 17th, we flew north-west to the drag strip at Luskville with the intention of racing against cars but there weren't any.  On the 18th, we flew a short patrol up the Gatineau River to Wakefield.  When we returned to Rockcliffe, I'd surpassed 700 hours total time and 25 in the Smith.
My time in the Smith represented 3.5 per cent of my total flying time over 13 years.  When I reflected on the simple mathematics, it dawned on me that the meaningfulness and impact of that time, barely a day, had quietly defined my flying life.

Waves

It's peaceful out here.  So tranquil, in fact, that it stands as a rare moment when one can experience each individual sense as its own monument to a life well lived.

I was 26 years old in June of 2010 - hardly a long life but certainly a rich one.  I had been fortunate to have travelled much of my country and the world, gained an education, something of a job and membership in the relatively small but tightly bound group of aviators.

As I said, it's quiet out here. The only sound is of water lapping against fibreglass.  And my breathing - somewhat labored but calming as the pounding of my heart, reverberating like a drum inside my head, subsides.  The air is clean and fresh with an undertone of a salty waft of an ocean breeze.  The Pacific is a deep grey, nearly black and almost oil-like as it rolls by in gentle undulations between ridge and valley.  The flat, shimmering disk of the sun has only just dipped its feet in the distant western horizon.

On this vast face, we bob like two corks - perhaps a half mile from a shore that slides in and out of sight.  I'm lying prone on my board, hands tightly clasping the edges while my feet hang off the edge, occasionally dipping into the waves as they work their way back in with the tide.  I have my left ear against the board listening to the sound of the sea slowly drowning out my heartbeat.  My friend, who I haven't seen in a few years now, is perhaps another fifteen feet out to sea, sitting astride her board and knee deep in the Pacific.  Eyes closed, face upturned - she's the only break on a wide horizon tinged in red and violet.  She came out here after university to find...something.  I'm not sure what but I think I may know why.  We haven't really talked about it and I have no intention of broaching the matter.  They are her secrets and hers alone.  She does seem happier and that's more than enough.
We could not be more different, more divided.  I marvel at her ease and quiet confidence - straddling the ocean in the same manner as one holds dominion over a backyard lawn chair.  I'm clinging to my postage stamp of salvation and wondering how deep the water is and why on earth I paddled out beyond the break. 

Dominion.  Yes, it wasn't always this way.  It couldn't have been.  This mastery came only with time and practice and repeated defeat.  Where I am now, she once was.  I begin to understand the responsibility she assumed by bringing me out here.  I now accept why we (rather she) spent hours studying the waves, changing beaches, waiting for the proper conditions.  I accept that having ventured into the maw of the Pacific, we would inevitably be spit back out.

"Okay," she says, eyes still closed as if in communion with the sea.  "Let's go back."

I swing my board around, dip my arms and feet into the cool water and, instantly invigorated and emboldened, start paddling for shore.  As my speed builds, the gentle waves grow.  At a certain and very specific point, I feel the ocean swell under my board and drive me forward with more force than I can muster on my own. 

"Get up!"  I hear her distant cry through the roar and hiss of wave and spray. 

I'd practiced getting up on the board on dry land and in the surf without success.  Even before paddling out, we vowed that this will be my last attempt.

A frantic second later, I'm standing on the board.  A quick glance at my feet confirms it.  I've no clue as to how this happened.  I am riding the ocean, gliding along on the crest of a small wave - just one heartbeat of this rolling mass.  The euphoria almost instantly devolves into fear and the bottom falls out.  The board goes one way, my feet the other.  The horizon revolves smoothly before disappearing in a rush of white mist.

Surfing Tofino in 2010. (Author's collection)

Nearly six years later, I draw my collar up against the blast of a chilly spring wind.  I am far from the warmth of the Pacific.  Rather than lying on a board, I am sitting on an old park bench in the shadow of the portable building that has served as the flying club's temporary home for nearly a decade.  Both have been painted an alarming combination of sky and royal blue.  The paint, hastily applied, is peeling and chipping.  I brush away a few specks with a gloved hand.

Rather than studying the waves, I am gazing intently at the windsock mounted above the fuel pumps.  It is my visual indicator of the unseen waves of air that roll across the surface of the old air base at Rockcliffe.  It points stiffly east, indicating a wind of some twenty knots out of the west.  Every few seconds, it flicks, spins or wags as the waves change direction and speed.  Every few seconds, I change my mind between staying on the ground or launching into the blue.

The wind is straight down the pipe and no stronger than the day I first brought the Smith here.  But that had been nearly ten months ago and I hadn't flown the airplane, or any airplane for that matter, in the last five months.  The airplane was made ready yesterday and my feet had betrayed no weakness during a half dozen taxi runs.  And yet...

"Just relax and fly it."

The words belong to Geoff, our ramp manager.  Clad in blue coveralls and topped by a mane of grey-blonde hair, he towers above me - a giant silhouetted by the early afternoon sun.

I nod resolutely and begin the walk to the hangar.  Moments later, I am listening to the sound of the wheels roll along the same tarmac that once hosted AVRO 504Ks, North American Harvards, Hawker Hurricanes and Avro Lancasters.  I drum my fingers on the taut fabric of the wings, strum the flying wires and tail braces, run my hands along the leading edges, cowls and prop.  Dropping into the cockpit, I'm welcomed by familiarity - the sights, smells and feelings of a well-worn armchair. 

DSA comes out of hibernation.  (Author's Collection)

Belts on and locked.  Helmet on and goggles up. Fuel on.  Throttle set. Mixture to full rich. Three shots of prime.  Master switch on.  Ignition switches on.  Brakes set. 
I whisper the words as my eyes follow my hands around the cockpit. 
Right hand on the stick, left hand resting gently on the throttle, head up and neck craned left - straining to look around the long nose.

"Clear!"

My pinky finger hits the starter button.  The propeller cracks, swings around once, twice.  There's a cough from the Lycoming and then it roars to life.  The Smith quivers and trembles in response, in excitement. 

A few minutes later, we're climbing into a clear blue sky with only a scattering of wispy clouds.  The take-off roll, thanks to the wind, was quite short.  My blood is still pumping but I'm happy with how my body performed.  My mind too, sharpened by that unique mingling of fear and anticipation, did an admirable job.  Having reached a thousand feet, I turn slightly to the right to cross the river at Gatineau's Jacques Cartier Park.  I'll permit myself to relax a little now, rolling my shoulders back and letting my body sink into my seat. 

We race across downtown Gatineau.  The casino, with its lake and hundred foot water spout, slides by the left wings as the hydro electric dams at Chelsea float by on the right.  The Gatineau Hills slope up from left to right just beyond the nose.  Jostled by periodic bursts of wind, I guide the little biplane towards the lowest point of the hills.  My eyes dart from the engine gauges to the few fields and off-airport landing sites available on this brief run.  I have them memorized.  Should the engine quit now, I will go here.  Should it quit then, I will go there.

The Lycoming, offended, purrs steadily on.

At last, we bound across the pass and I guide the airplane into a gentle right turn to the north-west - right wings over the sheer drop of the Gatineau Hills escarpment, left wings framed by an expanse of patchwork fields and the river beyond. 

It's a Tuesday afternoon.  The radio is silent and the skies are clear.  From my meager height, I can still see the eastern reaches of Algonquin Park.  I will never tire of this view.

Flying near Luskville on the first flight of the season.  Note the ice still clinging to the shores of the Ottawa River.  (Author's Collection)

Tuesday, April 14th, 2015 marked the beginning of our second season.  It had been an eventful offseason.  After being laid off in late November and taking a month off to reset, I launched myself into finding new work.  This search, in and of itself, was a full-time job.  The process was at times both exciting and discouraging and, while I did enjoy a few call backs and interviews, I had yet to land work.  So, as the flying season opened in April, I offered my full-time services to the Rockcliffe Flying Club.

Working as a full-time pilot had never been on my radar. While the pay was decent due to my specialized skill set, there just weren't enough hours in the day to safely make a go of it.  I always considered it a great way to keep my hand in some interesting flying while avoiding the high cost of rental.  Later, after acquiring the Smith, it became a convenient way to run the biplane without leaning too heavily on the fruits of my day job. 

I thought the flying club job would keep me from slowly going batty.  It would give me a sense of professional purpose and normalcy, I argued.  It would also put some money in the bank.  This was important given we had welcomed a baby boy at the end of January - the only bright spot in an otherwise cruelly bleak winter. 

The 5 months preceding this flight had subjected me, and at times my family, to a wide and wildly opposed range of thoughts and emotions.  In the same minute, I would feel the hot pang of anger bordering on white rage, followed by a desperate sadness and powerful feelings of eroded self worth.  I busied myself by searching for work, writing applications and going to the gym - usually twice but occasionally as many as 3 times a day. 

When I was a little kid, I remember saying something along the lines of "I hate this..." and my father telling me, quite solemnly,  that "hate is a very strong word and while you may not like something or someone, you might even strongly dislike them, hate is never something you should feel."

Sorry, Dad.  I felt hate.  I hated in bountiful, unhealthy amounts.  I wished terrible things onto unsavoury people.  I knew it was wrong, and yet...

Sorry, Dad.

But I tried to fight against it.  Every time my mind's eye saw a face I wanted to drive my fist through, I drove to the gym and mindlessly pushed weights until my muscles screamed.  Every time my mind wandered to some aspect of that bone-chilling November morning, I chained myself to my laptop until I'd written three job applications.

Every time I went down the proverbial rabbit hole, I fought like hell to get out.  And always, once a day, I caught myself sighing, "God, I am so tired."

And then, on one of those bitterly cold January mornings when the whole of your world waits in longing anticipation of that first ray of sunlight and when the snow, carried on a stiff wind, swirled outside and collected on window ledges, things...everything changed.

I trudged down a hospital corridor in suede mukluks, grey jogging pants and a t-shirt I'd been wearing for 24 hours.  My wife, being wheeled in a bed by a portly nurse, was outdistancing me and eventually vanished around a corner.  The hospital, clad in uniform taupe punctuated by the pastels of nurses' scrubs, hummed around me.  And I was lost in the presence of the little boy I cradled in the crook of my left arm like a football.

I asked for forgiveness for all the wrongs I'd committed - known and unknown.  I forgave any wrongs - known or unknown - that had been done to me.

Sorry, Dad - that you can't be here to meet your grandson.  It had been my fear since I'd heard about the second cancer diagnosis.  And now, here it was.

The Smith purrs on faithfully, reassuringly - each cylinder following the one preceding it with unerring regularity.  Intake, compression, power, exhaust - in that order and a million times over without as much as a hiccup.  I've put the escarpment on the left wings and pointed the nose south-east towards the gap we'll run on our way home to Rockcliffe.  The wind is shepherding us along at a fairly fast clip and while the airspeed indicator assigns one number to our velocity, the hum and tremble of the flying wires betray a much greater one.  We'll be landing at our home in a matter of minutes and, suddenly, this flight feels too short for the time I've waited. 

Short final approach to runway 27 at Rockcliffe.  We got some good chop off those trees.  (Author's collection)

The approach and landing are much like our first successful one at Peterborough and I recall it, even seconds after, only in single-sense snapshots.  The Smith and I play that old game where one attempts to outwait the other, endeavouring to keep the little ship balanced mere inches above the pavement until the wings surrender their lift.  I'm amazed at how my hands and feet operate a shade faster than my mind.  There's a squeak as the main wheels touch and a little swing as the tailwheel grabs the pavement.  My feet contribute an ever-so-subtle jockeying of the pedals and the bipe rolls out straight and true.

The tension melts from my back and shoulders and a smile creases my face.  I pull my goggles up and breathe a sigh of equal parts relief and restoration.

Now, firmly anchored to the earth again, I feel light.  The seconds and minutes passed without consequence while we were aloft and while nothing had really changed, the mantle of my worries and responsibilities is not quite as heavy as it was barely an hour ago. 

This is the afterglow and I will wear it a little while longer still.