Thursday. Uh-oh.

Yesterday was odd. Flying was cancelled because of the rain forecast, so most of the camp went in two buses to Prague to the Aviation museum... 6 hours in a non air-conditioned bus for 2 hours in the museum, though it was apparently pretty good.

The rain came before lunchtime, a bit of wetness for about 90 minutes then the skies cleared and it was a beautiful sunny day, the evening conditions were calm and many took advantage of the perfect conditions to do a bit of engine-off spot landing practice. Except for those who went to Prague and were still on the way back, of course. One of the buses was quite new, the rumour was that it didn't have the necessary 'tax' sticker on its new windscreen to be able to use the motorways so it did a tour of Czech instead. The first bus load returned in time for a bit of evening flying and they'd stopped at McDonalds. The second bus finally got back just in time for the start of a hangar party.

Parties mid-week are a bit odd. There's the marshals and others who are quite happy to sink a glass of Pils, a few team leaders and maybe the odd (slightly less committed) pilot too. A couple of Brits were seen enjoying themselves, but nothing too outrageous. That was left to the South Africans and the French who engaged in beer mat wars - a fantastic sight, seeing 20 people launch a thousand beer mats at the other team accompanying it all with a huge tribal cheer. Then South African Rob McFie played his ace card - a high powered water gun, capable of clearing a hangar in seconds. Hmm...

It was all good fun, in measured quantities. These competitions are very social occasions, many of the competitors are long time friends who meet once a year. The flying is intense, today's task looks set to be another nasty one. It's a navigation exercise, but will require pilots to draw circles on their maps while flying and trying to find photos/markers. It's not easy for 2 seat crews, so very challenging for solo flyers. The wind is shaking the trees too, I doubt there'll be much of a party atmosphere in the tent tonight.