Day 262 - Reluctant Messiah

on the up

I've been wanting to get a shot of this chap for ages, and this evening I just about managed it!

I didn't get home until gone 6pm, despite having left just after 7.30 this morning, and I was tired and distracted.  But as I bimbled about saying hello to Anna and the Cats (great band name - it would be worth starting a band just to call it that!), I realised I could hear in the background, like a bee somewhere in the undergrowth, the steady drone of a little prop plane.

Just as I realised he was up there, several things happened.

Firstly, I realised I'd been vaguely on my way to change out of work clothes, and consequently I was climbing the stairs and taking my trousers off at the same time.

Then I realised that the camera had the wrong lens on, and the right lens was packed away in the accessories bag somewhere.

As these thoughts jumbled around my head, I heard the distinctive increase in pitch of the plane's engine, to an angry whine, followed by a disturbing silence...and then a few seconds later, a hack and a cough as the engine sputtered back to life...it's the aerobatics guy!!

Quickly changing (but with no time to do my trousers up), I rushed to grab the DSLR and hastily swapped lenses, before dashing out into the bright, sunlit evening.

Scanning the skies, I saw him above and ahead, circling around for another go at the loop the loop, and barrel-rolling as he went.

It's really hard to focus on something small in the sky a long way away...if you're not close, focus wise, you can't see the subject at all, and so can't aim precisely at it to focus on it.   

Catch-22!

Once you find the plane, and manage to both zoom in and focus (best done in stages), your troubles aren't over...when you take a photo, the camera tries to auto-focus - if you're not pointing the centre of the viewfinder directly at the tiny (and moving!) plane as you hit the button, the camera will zoom out wildly trying to focus on nothing...and then you've lost sight of the plane and have to start all over again... 

It's quite frustrating!

I must have looked quite a sight, stumbling around the garden with my trousers falling off, wildly pointing my camera with the full-on perv lens on at the sky!

Good job I'm too old to be bothered about that!  ;-)

Anyway, I got 3 photo's before he wandered off into the sun...here's one of him the right way up:

on the level

It's good to see him back, I haven't seen him for a while...and actually, I'm not sure if it's the usual guy, as it's a different plane...maybe he's got a new one?

Maybe he's Donald Shimoda, The Reluctant Messiah, (which is a great book that you should all make the effort to read at some point)....that would be so cool! 

In any case, it looks as though he's having fun...

Wouldn't mind a go at that myself!

B-)

Day 249 - Flying Machines

black ops?

I was rudely awoken this morning to the sound of a large helicopter throbbing away somewhere in the locality...but it wasn't this one!

As I drifted through that strange world between asleep and awake, so the sound of the helicopter grew, then faded, then grew again.  After this had gone on for some 20 minutes, curiosity dragged me out of bed, and I looked out of the window only to find...nothing at all!

I could still hear the pulsing sound, but there was no sign of any obvious source.

Taking the camera, I went out into the garden to see if I could spy it off in the distance somewhere, and maybe grab a photo of the day...but after a few minutes scouring the skies, and peering through various foliage off in the direction of the test track up on the ridge behind us, I eventually got a brief glance of a large, pale chopper right up on the horizon, perhaps over the test track.

It was only a fleeting glimpse though, before it went behind a tree and I lost sight of it, never to see it again...I could still hear it though, so kept trying a variety of vantage points hoping for a photo opp, but none came.

Then, just as I was about to give up, by odd coincidence there came from the south the sound of another, smaller helicopter...turning round I saw this sleek black Agusta A109 Power Elite (you can easily find these things out on the internet just using the serial number - who knew?!) approaching.

Trying to focus on a single small object in the sky is no mean feat, especially when it's travelling at speed.  It took a few moments to find it in the viewfinder before I could finally focus and rattle off a few shots as it passed overhead.

I have no idea why the activity of course, but here's another odd coincidence...we were talking cars at work today, and I was enthusing about the MkIV Supra 3.0tt that I owned for a few years from 1998...I had it for 5 years and did 100,000 miles in it, and it was the best car I've ever owned, by about a bazillion miles.

It looked pretty much like this, only with stock wheels rather than the upgrades this one is wearing:

beauty of the beast

For me, it's just about the most aesthetically pleasing car ever made...I just love it. 

3.0l straight 6 with twin turbo's, pulling 326bhp - the thing was an absolute beast.  It was limited to 165mph, although it was geared to do over 200mph. 

Sure enough, on the one occasion I tested this (on an empty motorway in the middle of the night, I hasten to add), it accelerated all the way to the rev limiter, and sat there comfortably at 165mph for as long as I dared keep my foot down. 

Utterly gorgeous machine, my dream car, and I have no regrets, despite the enormous amount of money it consumed, both to buy and to keep on the road...it was totally reliable in true Toyota style, but the rear tyres cost a few hundred pounds each and only did about 12,000 miles...and I only got around 300 miles from a full tank of fuel - I seemed to be filling it up every few days for those five years.

So just now, I wondered if there was something on up at the Heritage Motor Museum (next door to the test track) which could explain this morning's events...

There's no sign of anything that might involve a helicopter...but the next event on there is this Sunday...

It's the MkIV Supra Owners Club meet!

I wonder if, to round this little story off, I might get a glimpse of my old friend, that beautiful black Supra?

Apparently I'm still very fond of my old beast!

I guess the chances of it being there, and then of me seeing it passing by (I won't be attending) are slim to nothing...but as I said last night - I can dream!

B-)

Day 235 - Our House

in the corner of our field

Since our garden was trashed by the cowboy contractors, this is a much better view of our house. 

It's the nearest one in this photo, hunkered down and hiding away behind the wild hawthorn hedgerow in the corner of the wheat field.

They harvested half of this field two nights ago...throughout the evening, until well after dark, the harvesting went on, and our little house sat there under a cloud of dust. 

For reasons unknown (presumably the weather?) they've not been back since, and the field remains half cut. 

We took the opportunity to wander along to the line of trees where Barney the Barn Owl used to live.  We were hoping for signs of him, although without any particular hope - we've not seen him this year. 

Whilst there I took this shot, which is the reverse of the Hole in the Hedgerow shot that has featured a few times in these pages...you can just make out the pale glint of my car through the hole on the horizontal mid-line of this photo, a fifth or so in from the right edge. 

Unfortunately, we couldn't get around to the side of the owl tree where the entrance holes are, as the ditch and surrounding undergrowth were too...well, overgrown!

We did find this brilliant little cave in the bottom of a tree though...

cosy cave

Something had managed to drag a load of hay in there, making a cosy little bed.  Badger is most likely, I suppose...or fox?  Maybe Muntjac deer, we've seen those along here in the past.

This may be a good place to site our trailcam, once they've been back and finished harvesting.

As we wandered back, a large passenger plane was taking a north westerly route, quite low in the sky:

northwestbound

This is highly unusual - the normal passenger flight path is North to South, and quite high...the military flightpath is East to West or vice versa.

As we watched, it banked steeply northwards...being so low and so large, it must have been heading to Birmingham Airport. 

Anyway, to finish off a somewhat rambling and fairly pointless post, I'll mention that we did Week 1, Day 2 of our 6 week 20 Pull-up Challenge this evening.

I had to do sets of 4, 3, 3, 4 and 5 pull-ups, with only 90 seconds rest between sets.  It sounds fairly straightforward, I suppose, but it was actually really hard.  The last two pull-ups in particular were really very hard, and I only just about got enough range of motion on the last one.  

I suppose that's how it should be - those are the ones that will convince my body that it needs to get stronger.  

The previous 17 pull-ups were all just setting up those last two!

:-)

Day 231 - Not Superman

it's a plane

Throughout Summer, there's often a little plane that flies back and forth over our house, practising aerobatics...but this is not that plane!

On many a warm, dry afternoon, it can be heard (and seen) doing loop the loops, corkscrews, stalls and who knows what else.  It's mostly centred above the test track up on the ridge above the valley, which used to be a military airbase.   In fact, nuclear bombers were deployed out of this tiny little airport, back in the day. 

Now it's a test track for a prestigious car manufacturer, and sometimes we can hear them squealing around the track too. 

Anyway, when I heard this little plane revving his engines above me whilst out checking Anna's tyres, I dashed to grab the camera to catch a shot of him...and I only just managed it as he headed off into the distance.  I thought he might come back around and show me some tricks...indeed he did turn around, but then disappeared back the way he came, and I realised that it wasn't our Magnificent Man in his Flying Machine.

We do get an eclectic mix of air traffic over our house.  

Starting in order of least interesting, there's a southbound flightpath out of Birmingham Airport that crosses above our house.  We've even seen our house whilst on a flight to Spain, although only the once...I always look, but rarely can identify where I am.  The flight path is high, so we can't hear them from in the house, but on a quiet day outside you can hear planes cruising south, and sometimes at night you can see a line of lights coming from the direction of Birmingham.

Other frequent flyers on warm summer evenings are the hot air balloons - when the weather is right there are often two or three at varying distances across the valley...Bluez found them highly suspicious, and I can kind of see his point - strange bulbous beasts floating slowly across the sky, occasionally roaring and breathing fire.  

I don't quite trust them myself!

Then of course there's the aerobatics plane...he's the most fun!   

When the Grand Prix is at Silverstone, we see a steady stream of helicopters ferrying VIP's there or back again...

Then there's the covert night-time traffic, which is a more regular occurrence than you might imagine.

We must be on some military flight path, which is always the same - North-East to South-West...this route is only ever used at night, and they fly very low indeed - much lower than legal limits. 

The most common aircraft to use this route are Chinook helicopters (or similar, I'm no expert), and they're usually in twos, or sometimes threes. 

Sometimes lumbering bomber planes will rumble past, alarming the animals...and once in a while, jet fighters come through, often in twos or threes, sometimes very fast indeed. 

Finally there are the frequent flyers of the feathered variety...we've had plenty of examples of those in the blog, of course.

Whilst out walking this evening, we spied the buzzard across the field, but by the time the camera was ready he'd landed in the tree...

it might be a bird

I think he's in there somewhere...bonus points to anyone who can spot him!

Right, I'm very, very tired, so I'm off to get my Saturday night on.   Climbing today, and Tai Chi all week have left me weary, and somewhat in need of a shower. 

Rest day tomorrow, I think!

:-)