Where have you been? What have you seen?
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By Rob P
#1864787
With the closing down of flights to France and beyond my logbook looks a very sad thing with lots of twenty minutes or half hour 'locals' enlivened only by an instructor hour, great fun as ever, and a trip to Shoreham for a weekend getaway.

Yesterday, with Mrs P wreaking havoc on London with her bestie I had decided that either Cornwall or Scotland had to be on the agenda, as both are a decent flight from Norfolk.

Using everything Dr Keeling had taught me I chose Cornwall. There was a slight issue with a forecast 20-30 kt headwind, I decided that long flights are all very well, but even so, to minimise the flight time I would take it at low level, around 1,000ft AGL all the way. It was a wasted decision as the weather didn't permit a VFR pilot to get above about 1,800ft anyway

Over Wiltshire and Somerset I was gradually being forced further and further south of the planned track and started to have doubts about the whole enterprise, a lot of random swerves were needed to avoid heavy showers, my recorded track is not a thing of beauty including a fair amount of avoiding towns and airfield bearing in my the height I was flying.

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It was fairly peaceful though, listening-in on Luton and Bristol yielded very limited entertainment or information, I was starting to think I might investigate playing music through the headset in future.

Eventually, through a gap in the shower I spotted the north coast of Cornwall from where the nice chaps at St Mawgan took me to "field in sight" of the old RNAS Vulture. AKA St Merryn after the local village.

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Organising the visit was simple, an e-mail the night before resulted in a request to phone Francis, the guy who runs the farm which the airfield is part of. He gave a decent brief, he's obviously a pilot, including the all important, how to get out of it to civilisation, tips.

The choice of three runways is useful for taildragger types with the coastal winds being a feature. They look to be in awful condition, but in fact they are pretty sound, over the years farm carts have dropped soil all over them, grass has sprung up and the appearance is not pretty, but these bumpy little tussocks aren't a threat to the prop, a problem with many WW2 airfields today.

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The little hut has an honesty box and a few bits of local information, such as taxi numbers.

The weak frontal system that had been causing all the issues had mostly blown through as in the photograph above, it was turning into quite a pleasant day. In retrospect I should have just called a cab to take me to Padstow, but I had already decided that the objective of the mission was real Cornish pasties, rather than expensive seafood and I would walk to the village.

I set off through the ruins of the old domestic site, a little more dilapidated than when I first visited some forty years back on a camping holiday

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I quite like the way nature is reclaiming the old sites of conflict, some of the buildings are now barely discernable under mounds of ivy and bushes, and they are peaceful places, a contrast to their intended purpose and a great deal preferable to loads of ticky-tacky boxes along Spitfire Way and Catalina Close.

I have to own up to a mistake here. The village is about thirty minutes walk away and I had fondly imagined strolling down quiet country lanes, listening to birdsong and waving at the odd cheery farmer leaning on his five bar gate and chatting about the prospects for this year's clotted cream harvest.

What I had missed was this was the height of lockdown summer holidays and Cornish lanes have much in common with the bocage of Normandy, high hedges either side and no footpaths. The traffic was heavy too, involving much backing into nettle-rich banks whilst jolly caravanners tried to miss each other, and me. I would never advise that as a walk, hence the title of the thread. Get to St Merryn airfield, phone a cab and go to Padstow.

Once in the village I was greeted with a wonderful sight, a bakery with a huge queue.

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Guessing this had to be the right place I joined the queue. It moved fairly quickly, and I left via the socially distancing back door to sit in front of the shop with my prized, three-hundred quid pasties. Mission accomplished.

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My plan was to eat one and take one home with me. I failed. I ate both.

There is a village pub. I took a look at it and it seemed pretty decent. Had I been in the mood for a meal then it would have been a good option.

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The airfield lack fuel, of course. In fact to call it an airfield is probably misleading, it is a farm with big runways. There is an aircraft maintenance company in one of the hangars, I dropped in and chatted to a couple of chaps on their afternoon fag break. I suspect that, if asked nicely and slipped a few quid, overnight housing of an aeroplane could be possible - but that's opinion, for heavens sake don't tell them I suggested it.

The RV just about has the legs to make the return journey, but, with the weather as it was that wasn't a risk I was happy to take, possibly ending up with me short of fuel over Norfolk and looking for a weather diversion if Tibenham was out of the question. So the next leg saw me dropping into Dunkeswell for a top up. Oh.. and a slice of flapjack. In fact I needn't have worried as I would have landed with 22 litres on board and the weather once I returned to the East was near perfect, especially the 20 knot tailwind, offering a lovely headwind for landing, right down one of the base runways.

Stats:

Tibenham to St Merryn, 275 nm, 2 hours 13 minutes
St Merryn to Dunkeswell, 75 nm, 34 minutes
Dunkeswell to Tibenham, 196 nm, 1 hour 16 minutes
118 litres consumed
Last edited by Rob P on Sat Aug 14, 2021 3:25 pm, edited 19 times in total.
JAFO, Aerials, Flyin'Dutch' and 15 others liked this
By johnm
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1864789
Never been in there though I have been to Newquay and Perranporth a few times. I always thought St Merryn was disused :oops:

Looking at Skydemon the North South runway is plenty long enough for the TB so what's there???
Rob P liked this
#1864791
@johnm

Patience dear boy :D

I am typing as fast as I can

EDIT: Hopefully your question is now answered, but if I have missed anything, just yell.
Last edited by Rob P on Sat Aug 14, 2021 9:53 am, edited 1 time in total.
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By Milty
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1864797
Great write up. I’m very new to this flying malarkey and just had my third lesson this week. After my trial lesson, I was hooked and booked up to learn. Since then, I’ve been wondering what do you do once you’ve got a licence :lol:

I like the idea of a trip to Cornwall for a pasty or Wales for a Welsh cake. I can see the appeal of flying over the summer log-jam of the M5.

Nice to hear Dunkeswell get a mention too - it was the aerodrome closest to my home town and from a purely nostalgic viewpoint and hope to meet up with my parents, I’m going to try to have it in my repertoire of airports during my nav training and beyond.
Rob P, Rob L liked this
#1864802
Milty wrote:Since then, I’ve been wondering what do you do once you’ve got a licence


When you are flogging endlessly round and round the circuit trying to get your landings right feel free to revisit the post to remind you that it is all worth it in the end :thumleft:

Rob P
Milty liked this
#1865617
Rob,
I am planning a visit in a “wheel spatted” C182. Ref your comment on grass tussocks etc. No problem with landing/to distance But in your opinion are the runways suitable for a nosewheel type, re prop clearance.etc.?
Pete
By Tac_R
#1865688
Great write-up Rob,

Fully concur with all of the above, as I went in to St Merryn on Monday (16th Aug) for a trip to Padstow for my Daughter's 9th Birthday - nothing as heartily provincial as the great Cornish Pasty for me I'm afraid, but the sole object of the trip was for my Daughter to experience the glory that is the Marshfield Farm's 'Birthday Cake' flavour Ice Cream (!) in a waffle cone at 'Down by the Ferry' on North Quay Parade... and apparently according to her well worth the trip!

This was my first time into St Merryn, but Sue and Francis couldn't have been more welcoming and accommodating, with the brief from Francis concise and accurate - very definitely necessary to carry out the obligatory low pass before landing as there was a pick up and free-range dog on the runway when we arrived, but they moved off promptly when we passed over to allow us to land. I took runway 36 (with a slight, quartering crosswind) for the length, and while it felt bumpy as anything to someone who flies exclusively off of tarmac to- and from the likes of Oxford, Southend, Bournemouth, Cardiff and Shoreham, it was perfectly sound and as Rob describes (and no damage to the prop ensuing!), and the Arrow had no problems on Landing or Take-off - cant say I'd be able to take either of the other runways, though. Newquay Approach on 133.405 are seemingly well used to communicating with and accommodating of St Merryn traffic, giving inbound and outbound LARS (call up before departure to infirm them your on the ground at St Merryn, and intentions).

[I meant to insert a picture of the approach here, but haven't figured that out yet...!]

We took a taxi into Padstow (10 mins ride, £20) with KJ's Taxi's - Kevin is a lovely chap and very convivial, and not phased at all when finding on arrival that I'd forgotten to mention the dog was with us... (07875637734 and best to call ahead to book, though not actually necessary).

One word of caution though; we visit Padstow several times each year and have done so for maybe 5-6 years, and have never seen it so busy - the streets and harbour were absolutely heaving with people and in places difficult to even walk through the crowd (same with most shops, obviously). That said, we had lunch at the excellent Greens of Padstow as usual, and didn't have to wait any longer than normal for a table - the food was fantastic as usual and very reasonably priced.

Overall, a bit of a 'pathfinding' exercise for me but having now done the trip, I'm certainly not intending on going back to the 4.5hr+ drive from Oxford to Rock if I can help it at all!

Regards,

David
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By Rob P
#1865896
Oldfart wrote:Rob,
I am planning a visit in a “wheel spatted” C182. Ref your comment on grass tussocks etc. No problem with landing/to distance But in your opinion are the runways suitable for a nosewheel type, re prop clearance.etc.?

The Van's wheel spats are a tight fit and very little tyre peeks out underneath them. I'd suggest then that there would be no issue with the 182. There was a high wing Cessna in the maintenance hangar

The fact David took an Arrow in without issues should be a reassurance for nosewheel types.

Rob P
User avatar
By Rob P
#1866112
Thank you. I thought it would be helpful to others, but in fact every one of the contributions tells the same story, so all I was able to do was to confirm that nothing has changed :D

Rob P