I think I posted last October about my OH's 70th birthday and how the day we'd planned fell apart. We had booked him a flight in a World War II Spitfire, the ones flown by 'The Few' over our skies. We rebooked the flight for April, and it was cancelled because of bad weather, and rebooked it for yesterday. The weather forecasts weren't optimistic, but more in hope than expectation we set off from our DS1's in Sandhurst at 6.30am to get to the Imperial War Museum at Duxford (within waving distance of Wee Granny) by 8.30. The sun tried to break through, failed, tried again, failed, but at least the cloud base was quite high, visibility was good and there was no wind. So you can imagine how thrilled OH was when he was told they would be flying. DS1 and I sat in on the preflight briefings, admired how smart he looked in the flying suit they provide, and of course took endless photos.
OH was like a child whose Christmases had all come together! So excited. The pilot was great, very friendly and totally 'got' OH's enthusiasm. Spitfires were build as single seaters during the War and it was only afterwards that they built 2-seater trainers. Before that the pilot's first flight was solo! The plane OH was flying was built as a single seater and had seen active service, only later becoming adapted to a 2-seater for training purposes. This was the first flight of the day so OH got an extra 5 minutes while they sat at the end of the runway warming up the engine. The pilot knew OH has a private pilot's licence and was keen to have an exciting flight. So off they went, with a small crowd of visitors with very big cameras watching. They returned half an hour later, having done 3 victory rolls, several wing overs (where the plane is on its side) and quite a lot of manoeuvres. Best of all OH had had control for 10 minutes, actually flying the plane. As you can imagine he was over the moon. The plane is a dream to fly and I can see this is something he'll want to do again and again - if we win the Lottery!!
We had a much-delayed breakfast and returned to DS1's for a barbecue, with OH still like an excited toddler.
DIL's parents called round and we were all having a drink the the garden when my phone rang. It was DS2 with the sad news that his lovely FIL had had a heart attack and was in Bournemouth hospital. We came straight home in case DS needed to go to the hospital with DIL, but she was ok and got back home about 9 pm, exhausted and rather tearful. I'm just on my way over there now to look after the girls so they can both go and visit him this morning. He has had 2 stents put in but still needs treatment for a narrowed artery. Not the end to the day we had expected .... but hopefully he will be ok.
OH was like a child whose Christmases had all come together! So excited. The pilot was great, very friendly and totally 'got' OH's enthusiasm. Spitfires were build as single seaters during the War and it was only afterwards that they built 2-seater trainers. Before that the pilot's first flight was solo! The plane OH was flying was built as a single seater and had seen active service, only later becoming adapted to a 2-seater for training purposes. This was the first flight of the day so OH got an extra 5 minutes while they sat at the end of the runway warming up the engine. The pilot knew OH has a private pilot's licence and was keen to have an exciting flight. So off they went, with a small crowd of visitors with very big cameras watching. They returned half an hour later, having done 3 victory rolls, several wing overs (where the plane is on its side) and quite a lot of manoeuvres. Best of all OH had had control for 10 minutes, actually flying the plane. As you can imagine he was over the moon. The plane is a dream to fly and I can see this is something he'll want to do again and again - if we win the Lottery!!
We had a much-delayed breakfast and returned to DS1's for a barbecue, with OH still like an excited toddler.
DIL's parents called round and we were all having a drink the the garden when my phone rang. It was DS2 with the sad news that his lovely FIL had had a heart attack and was in Bournemouth hospital. We came straight home in case DS needed to go to the hospital with DIL, but she was ok and got back home about 9 pm, exhausted and rather tearful. I'm just on my way over there now to look after the girls so they can both go and visit him this morning. He has had 2 stents put in but still needs treatment for a narrowed artery. Not the end to the day we had expected .... but hopefully he will be ok.
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