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Post by Tom/CalClassic on Jul 19, 2020 18:58:07 GMT -5
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Post by dave mcqueen on Jul 19, 2020 20:09:02 GMT -5
Exactly. If it came from Transocean maybe it was when they had tried to order 707s and were blocked by a certain airline....
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Post by Dennis the menace on Jul 19, 2020 20:11:23 GMT -5
Yes, a B-707 it is. Transocean had planned to buy 707s, and it was that decision why Pan Am (I assume) and the IATA got the government to shut them down. I guess the big carriers didn't feel so threatened by TALOA using older, out of date propliner equipment, but at the thought of them flying jets with those low fares was the last straw. I had read that Pan Am told Boeing that if they sold a single jet to Transocean, that Pan Am would cancel their orders and never buy another Boeing product again. This same thing happened in Europe with Loftleidir. Nobody really cared about them using ex Pan Am DC-6Bs to Europe, but when they announced they wanted to buy DC-8s, BOAC got the British government to say not only would they be denied landing rights in the UK, but also flyover rights. Several other European countries followed. I know SAS was opposed and did not want them flying jets into Scandinavia. So they bought the CL-44s and nobody seemed too upset about that, although only Luxembourg and New York granted landing rights for the CL-44. The DC-6Bs flew to the other cities. Eventually they did go on to by DC-8s some years later.
Perhaps this is a pr photo for Transocean's expected 707s? Or perhaps its just a regular Boeing photo that they used. Its only five abreast, and Transocean certainly would have had six abreast. Cabin photos of TALOA are basically impossible to find.
I'm on the first part of the third leg of my trip. I pulled away from the gate at Honolulu right on time and what do you know, there were TWO TALOA Strats parked in that far corner across from the immigration and customs Quonset huts. As I started engine number one, one of the TALOA Strats pulled out for its run to Los Angeles. .........and no wonder Dave McQueen likes the paintjob, I just checked the readme file and it says "Painted by Dave McQueen"! LOL
Inspired by my current flight, I decided to have a little Cantonese food tonight!
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Post by Al on Jul 20, 2020 15:56:20 GMT -5
A nicely done storyline. It’s evident you invested a lot of time and details into formulating a great read here. Looking forward to the next chapters. I’m not going to hazard a guess yet as to your final destination as your hint may only be your next stop.
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Post by Dennis the menace on Jul 21, 2020 19:12:14 GMT -5
My friend and I journey onward! Leg three of this journey has now been started. Its been an exhausting flight and we are still nowhere close to our final destination. In recap, we began our journey at St. Louis at 10:00 pm on Sunday, June 21, 1959 and boarded at TWA L-749 "Sky Club Coach" flight to Los Angeles. The flight was to have gone on to San Francisco, but we deplaned at LAX. We arrived at 8:30 am at LAX on Monday, June 22, 1959. After breakfast at the Flight Deck, we bought tickets on Transocean airlines and then at boarded their Boeing Stratocruiser at 11:00 am and flew to Honolulu, where we arrived at 5:15 pm. That gave us time to relax, wash up a little big and have dinner at the Sky Room restaurant at the Honolulu terminal, and have a drink at the bar and listen to a little Hawaiian music. There are many options for food and drink when you at the Honolulu airport terminal during the summer of 1959! We've decided to not visit the actual "Sky Room" restaurant, but we want something nicer than the coffee shop. The terminal offers the Lanai, where you can enjoy Hawaiian specialties on a terrace with a full open view of the apron area and runways. So many delicious choices one does not know where to start! The Sky Room bar seems a little to quiet and business like, so we will patronize the "Short Snorter" bar. The ad says "...where East does meet West to the haunting strains of Aloha Oe and toast to Maholo, Aloha Nui Loa and Bon Voyage".
The Short Snorter bar provides a festive atmosphere while you wait for your flight, or while you wait to pass out.... Hello Miss...... I'll have one of each! So far, my friend has spent a total of $180.40, or $1,603.68 in today's money. So its time to spend more money! We noticed they just opened up the counter at the QANTAS ticketing, and we proceed there to purchase a one way ticket to Sydney, Australia. The ticketing agent informs us there are several seats available in tourist class on tonight's flight 737. It will depart Honolulu at 9:30 pm and boarding will start at 9:10 pm. Once they have checked and approved our passports, we give them our luggage and they collect our money. The cost for the one way ticket is $436, or $3,875.84 today.
The ticketing agent shows us a seating chart and informs us that we are on the "Pacific Route". There are only 15 seats in tourist! He told us they have five seats available; two in the front left row, and three on the rear right row. Without hesitation I said "we'll take the front row, please". Get as far from those props and exhausts as you can!
Flying in 1959 is certainly not cheap, hopefully the new jets can bring the prices down somewhat. So as of now, my friend has spent a total of $616.40 to get from St. Louis to Sydney, Australia. That's an incredible $5,479.52 in today's dollars. I think most people today would pass at that price and just sit home instead. But we did save a little bit by getting off the TWA at LAX and then using Transocean to get to Honolulu. That was a smart move. The extra cost on the TWA flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco (it had a stop in Fresno) was $9.35, and the cost of the portion on QANTAS from San Francisco to Honolulu was $104. That's a total of $113.35, plus all the extra flight hours. We only spent $99 on Transocean to get to Honolulu, giving us a savings of $14.35 ($127.57 today). That's enough to pay for breakfast at the Flight Deck restaurant at LAX, and for dinner and a drink at the Sky Room at Honolulu! From now on there is little we can do to save any money. The Australian aviation market is the most heavily regulated market in the world. They do not allow charters and non-scheds into Australia. They regulate the fares, meals, even what types of equipment the airlines can buy. We are at their mercy, basically. At 9:10 pm, a woman's voice on the loudspeaker in the main lobby of the terminal announces "Will all passengers boarding QANTAS flight 737 Super Constellation service to Fiji, with continuing service to Sydney and Melbourne please proceed to gate 7". We make our way out into the warm Hawaiian air and the smells of avgas, teriyaki smoke and garlic from the kitchens, and gardenia blossoms fill the night air. We pass a couple sitting on a bench eating fresh pineapple on a stick. A large bird, or a monkey of some kind, makes a loud noise high up in the coconut palms as we continue towards the east end of the terminal fence and boarding gates area. And their it is, our magic carpet that will fly us high through the night sky to to the world of down under, where everything seems to be poisonous, or not quite right - like furry things with claws and duck bills that swim in creeks, large hopping things with long tails and deer like faces, birds and tree frogs that sound like laughter, and huge bugs that sound like a baby crying. The world were everything and everybody is upside down and people drive on the wrong side of the road! Here is the big brother of the little TWA Connie that brought us to Los Angeles. My friend takes one look at it and said, "oh my, its got these things out on the ends of the wings, looks like bombs." I said "I heard they were extra fuel tanks". He looks at it again with Midwestern skepticism and says "They'll never build them any bigger than this, if they do, they won't get off the ground"! Honolulu airport isn't real busy right now. The tiny plane next to ours is a local air tourism company called "HATS - Hawaiian Air Tourist Service". They operate inter-island sightseeing flights, and "Luaus in the air". The specialize in flying over active volcanoes on the big island of Hawaii. The sloping windows on the right side of the terminal are the Sky Room restaurant.
A further view down the flight line reveals several Aloha Airline planes, including on of their new F-27s. At 9:30 promptly the door closes and the airstairs are pulled away. The No Smoking sign was on when we boarded, and now the Fasten Seat Belt sign joins in on being lit. Shortly after the First Officer returns to the cockpit, the engines can be heard starting to crank over, and you can feel the vibration. Engine number four sputters and coughs, and then finally catches and roars to life while a full moon watches on.
I did notice a few empty seats back in first class, but the tourist section is filled. Two Australian kids in the seat behind mind are talking endlessly about their trip to Disneyland, and the drive to Boulder Dam and Lake Mead and all the lights in Las Vegas. ATIS tells us that both runway 4s are in operation, as is runway 8. We contact Honolulu ground and then ask to taxi to runway 8 for takeoff. Our payload is 19,984 pounds (20,925 allowable), and our gross takeoff weight is 141, 232 pounds. We are going to need a long runway in order to lift off for the 2,796 mile flight to Nadi, Fiji. Its estimated that our flight time will be 5 hours and 34 minutes, and that we will burn 7172 gallons of avgas. Now that we have permission to taxi to runway 8, and the checklists are complete, we release the brakes and pull away from the gate. Just as we leave the gate, another Transocean Stratocruiser is departing for the flight back to Los Angeles. We taxi past the terminal, past the "dog house", and that Seaboard & Western is still sitting there where it was when we landed earlier today.
It takes us 15 minutes to taxi all the way west to the start of runway 8. We are now on the military side of the airport (Hickam). That TALOA Strat is just making its turn onto the runway. No sense rushing things, Strats don't do anything fast. We take note of the sign "Turn Right Soon as Practicable After Take Off". We'll have to remember not to disturb all those honeymooners at Waikiki with a low flyby at METO - although the thought is tempting!
Now its our turn. The stewardesses are fastened into their seats for take off, the cabin is quiet - nobody is talking. A few people had thought that the earlier runup was the take off, but of course it wasn't. We will roll until we reach 126 knots and then rotate. Then its gear up, and make a turn to the right and go into METO. The TALOA Strat is safely off to our left hand side.
At 128 knots we lift off! Now we are making that right hand turn over Sand Island and the harbor. You can see Waikiki to our left. We'll hold our turn until we are on a heading of 192 degrees. At 2,000 feet its flaps up, and due to our weight, we sink just a bit, but soon recover. At 175 kias we go into climb mode. Our first cruise altitude will be just 16,000 feet. Even at that, we expect a 2.5 pitch up. Nothing we can do about it except to plod along and burn off fuel. At 10,000 the supercharges get changed over into high, and the cabin is quieter. No food will be served on this flight, just beverages and some snacks. This is a "snooze and booze" flight. Tiny Canton Island is passed in the middle of the night before you even know its gone. Too bad, it would have been kind of nice for a short stop and a chance to enjoy some of that real Cantonese style food! However, dawn soon breaks and before you know it, we are passing over Wallis and Futuna island at 18,000 feet. One hundred miles out from Fiji we begin our descent from 18,000 feet. We have the FIJI VOR tuned in, and soon we can hear ATIS telling us that we have 15 knot winds from the south so we are to use runway 20. Its a non precision approach, and a dangerous one, too. There is a ridge of hills just north of the runway and its not so easy to see. If you are not careful you can descend too far and run into them, just like Pan Am will do in the 1960s with a B-707 that crashed into this same ridge at night. There's not even any warning lights on top of the ridge - nothing. There's that ridge. Here we are, lined up and ready for full flaps. AP is off and its all under my command. With little traffic the tower clears us to land.
We settle onto the concrete and bring the props into full reverse. Around 50 knots they come out of reverse and the brakes begin to squeal. We have now come to a stop with almost 1,000 or runway to spare. There are no taxiways here, we must do a sharp turn and not end up in the soft Fijian soil, otherwise we'll end up sitting and waiting for a tug. At the gate and 30 minutes late! But no fear, because Nadi is a two hour stop for QANTAS. Breakfast is provided in the terminal restaurant, and the plane is fully serviced. QANTAS has a large facility here, and flight 737 started at Vancouver, British Columbia. We are limited by customs and immigration to where we can go, so its basically washrooms, coffee shop, bar and gift shop, and an international lobby segregated from the main lobby terminal. Half an hour after we landed, a TAI DC-3 leaves for Nouméa in New Caledonia. Those angry Tiki gods do not make for a pleasant arrival or departure - ominous, almost as if they are wishing a curse on outsiders.
After the TAI DC-3 left, we were basically alone. There's hardly any noise in the terminal building, and everything on the menu seems to have coconut in it. We will continue our flight after breakfast and after the plane is fully serviced. At least there are some nice gardens to stretch our legs!
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Post by Erik on Jul 22, 2020 7:08:13 GMT -5
Brilliant piece of work Mike, and it isn't even finished. Well-researched, well-written, well-illustrated, simply great. I love the little details in both text and screen shots -> sceneries. And also how you silently took for granted that your poor friend was riding the Connie workhorse bus stop route through the night, while you were sound asleep in your own bed, suitcase packed. Oh wait, you piloted that flight at the same time!
Thanks!
Erik
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Post by aharon on Jul 22, 2020 9:07:11 GMT -5
Everybody is gonna need lobster bibs to read this thread because it is most beautiful presentation that will cause readers to drool over this thread.
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Post by Herman on Jul 22, 2020 9:10:18 GMT -5
An amazing account of your flight to Hawaii, both explanatory and pictorially.
Herman
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Post by Dennis the menace on Jul 22, 2020 19:37:02 GMT -5
The second half of leg three of our flight continues... *First of all, let me say, there is a mess at Fiji. Almost every time I fly there, the map refuses to show the ILS for runway 02. In fact, I'm not even sure when Wolfgang and I worked on this old Asia Pacific scenery, that there actually was an ILS on this runway. Anyway, most of the time it will not show up on the map, nor will it be listed on the airport facilities menu, and Nav 1 radio will not pick up its signal. Its like it just - vanished. Other times, the entire airport will vanish. Not on the map, it not even listed when contacting ATC. Like the whole airport vanished. Only by going to the map, setting your heading 1 degree different so that the ATC will then be reset, will it appear. Everything that is, but the ILS. Putting a copy of the afcad into the world scenery library folder does not fix things, nor does creating a new addon scenery with just the Nadi afcad file in it at the highest priority in the world scenery library hierarchy listings. I can find no possible way to solve this issue. An FS issue is with the international date line. Fiji is supposed to be -12 GMT, and on the "tomorrow" side of the date line, if you are flying from the USA. I was scheduled to depart Honolulu at 9:30 pm on Monday, and arrive in Fiji at 7:30 am on Wednesday. I actually landed at 9:00 am on Tuesday. So two strange things happened - the international date line did not change the date, and there is an extra hour for some reason. I did have 2 to 5 knot headwinds most of the way, and I ran at the normal settings of 2350 rpm at 173 bmep, and I supposed over the 2700 miles those headwinds can account for a 30 minute late arrival. QANTAS must have been aware of that, thus they allowed for a 2 hour layover at Nadi. But that extra hour? No idea where that came from. And from Nadi I flew all the way to Sydney expecting that somewhere the date line would change to the next day, but it didn't. I guess FS2004 has no international date line. So Fiji is a mess! ...and now, back to our flight! There is literally nothing to do at this terminal other than eat breakfast. It is hot and sticky outside. The air conditioner is, once again, broken, and just some portable fans are running here and there. A quick peek into the gift shop reveals hanging hand carved wind chimes, Polynesian dolls and clothing, some carved coconut heads with shell teeth on them. Lots of things made at of shells including long strings of them that hang in a doorway and go almost to the floor. I wonder how long that would last if you had a bored cat in your house? Just then I hear the call for passengers on QANTAS flight 737 to Sydney to please begin boarding. I quickly make my choice and then find out that that the lady cashier does not speak English, but writes down a price. Thankfully she takes US dollars (like I mean, who doesn't?) and I proudly walk out with my "Souvenir of Fiji" in my hand! I guarantee you won't find these at Sears or J.C. Penny!
The flight from Nadi to Sydney will involve four legs. First we will fly a course of 203 degrees from Nadi to the VOR at Norfolk Island. Our gross takeoff weight will be much less than the long stretch from Honolulu to Nadi, so we can climb right up to 18,000 feet initially. After passing over the Norfolk Island VOR, we turn to a heading of 234 degrees and proceed to Lord Howe island. From there we will fly a heading of 233 from Lord Howe island to Sydney. Once we burn off enough fuel we can jump up to 20,000 feet. Our flight planner shows a total distance of 1761 nautical miles, and for that we will burn 4550 gallons of avgas. This flight will be a lunch flight.
Blue skies, scattered clouds and light breezes serenade us as we commence startup. Again, number one engine seems to resist cranking over. Killing the mags and then cranking it repeatedly soon forces out oil and raw gas all over the apron, and reluctantly it starts. A few passengers think this is a bad omen, but none of the crew seems concerned. They act like they've seen it many times over. Since the winds have changed since we landed, the tower instructs us to use runway 02 for takeoff. With no taxiway to the end, we'll have to use runway 27 and then proceed down runway 02 and do a turnaround, ever mindful that soft oozy clay soil awaits any tire that leaves the pavement. That would mean more delay. Thankfully that fate does not await us, we line up, do the runup check, finish the takeoff checklist, move the throttles up and then release the brakes. Once the engines stabilize we go to full takeoff power and rotate at 119 knots. A few hundred feet up and its time to pull in the gear and then go to METO as we start our turn to 203 degrees. We'll leave the flaps down until we hit 2,000 feet. Having completed out turn, we raise the flaps and wait for that magic number of 175 kias so we can go into climb power. Out the left side we get a final view of Nadi. My friend from St. Louis asks "I wonder how many sharks are down there?". Goodbye, Fiji, we hardly knew ye... The Pacific has been cloudy the entire time. Should anyone be following us at 18,000 feet and not as fast as our Super G, this is the only view they could expect to see. The further south we proceed, the worst the clouds seem to get. We were able to get a small glimpse of Norfolk island from 18,000 feet. This was not the case regarding Lord Howe island. The clouds just got thicker and thicker. The Captain announced that we were passing over Lord Howe island and were cruising at 20,000 feet. He then announced that after lunch was finished, that the cabin staff would be handing out immigration forms to all passengers, and to fill them out and keep them with you to give to customs upon arrival at Sydney. Our stewardess said that before landing she would be serving a coffee or tea and a biscuit. My friend asked "why on earth would you serve a biscuit in the afternoon, that's for breakfast?". I told him that "here, a biscuit means a cookie".
A little more than 100 miles out from Sydney, we hear the engines throttle back some, and sense the plane is starting to descend. Forty miles out from Sydney we pick up ATIS which informs us that runway 15 is in operation. After picking up the CALGA NDB, we turn 270 degrees and fly to it with the goal of passing over it at 4,000 feet. The lights of the northern Sydney suburbs and towns are directly in front of us. The Fasten Seat Belt sign dings and flashes on.
Looking out the left hand side, we can see Sydney 35 miles to the south. Passing the CALGA NDB, we watch as the Sydney VOR needle slowly swings over to 155 degrees. As it gets closer, we begin our turn to the south and slow down to 150 knots. Now its time for flaps 1, and we make sure the landing lights are now on. We are entering a congested and restricted airspace. ATC now instructs us to descend to 3,000 feet to intercept the runway 15 localizer. The No Smoking sign is now flashed on and passengers start gathering their personal belongings. The stewardess makes her last pass through our tiny tourist cabin of 15 seats and makes sure we are all buckled in for landing. Localizer alive, glideslope alive! We are now locked into our approach as our magical electric eye takes control of our aircraft and guides it down to the runway. The sound of the gear extending is very loud in the tourist section, and you can feel a slight bump as it locks into place. The flaps whine as they grind into the second setting. Looking out the left hand side, one can see the Sydney opera house, the harbor bridge and just a few medium rise buildings downtown. No skyscrapers here, but in 25 years time that will all change. Less than 1,000 feet above the runway means the autopilot is off. From now on its all manual control, so we are going to let First officer Manuel fly it in tonight while the Captain watches - and later - praise and criticize! Here we are on full flaps and short final. He's a little low on his airspeed, we should be at 120 knots, but that's not a problem with radial engines that have an immediate throttle response. Lazy pure jets have a 20 to 40 second lag time, so you have to always think ahead. Many pilots just couldn't make the transition from piston to turbine, and many careers came to an end once the company retired the last of their propliners.
First Officer Manuel does a satisfactory job of getting her down on the ground. The props go into reverse and our light aircraft quickly slows down. Off to the left passengers have a view of the QANTAS hangars and terminal area. Flaps up, cowl flaps fully opened, and we merrily taxi alongside runway 15 to our gate, the arrivals area of the QANTAS terminal. The landing lights have been switched off and now we are under the guidance of our taxi light. Douglas airliners, for some strange reason, do not offer a taxi light. Its either full bright landing lights, or pitch black. Pity the poor ground crews. At 6:00 pm on the nose we arrive at our gate where we will be ushered into the customs and immigration area, and hopefully will be released. My "midwesty" friend looks out the window and wonders if they have funnel web spiders in the building. He said "I read in a magazine that the city is just alive with those things, just alive with them". I said I doubt either of us will ever see one... As we step out of the door and down the airstairs the first thing I notice is that its very cold outside. I had completely forgotten that we are now in WINTER! Its just 52 degrees outside - it was 114 the day I boarded in Phoenix. My friend said "I wanted to get out of the hot, humid St. Louis summer air, but this is ridiculous". I said Looks like we will be shopping for a coat right off! I wonder just how many tourists to Australia or New Zealand this has happened to before? There's an old joke in Arizona about the heat that goes something like this - "Do you know the first thing that happens when people from Arizona die and go to Hell? The Devil hands them a fur coat and gloves!" By the way, last night it was 99 degrees on my patio at midnight, and because we are having our summer monsoons, the humidity was up. Its like being in the Everglades when its 120 degrees. Yuck.
Just before heading into the building, I take one last look back at that huge flying machine that brought us all the way here from Honolulu. I can see the QANTAS hangars in the background, and a KLM Super G. I can just make out a Canadian Pacific DC-6B sitting far in the background.
We have both traveled basically non-stop now for days, with only napping on the planes. Its time to get a couple rooms at a hotel, a hot shower, change of clothes and a real bed and rest up for the remainder of our flight. Remember, this is a five legged flight, we have only done three of those legs. Leaving customs and immigration, we go to the main information desk in the terminal to see about getting a hotel. A lady asks "Do you have prior reservations" and we said no. She says "well I'm afraid your out of luck, what with the conventions in town every hotel is fully booked". I said "There's no rooms at all?" and she says "I'm afraid that's the case". Then a man says "Occasionally a few mom and pop places, small places will drive by and see if any one needs a place to stay. Go past the taxis to where the jitney's cruise by and see if one shows up". So out the door we go, past the taxis and down to where the sidewalk starts to end. And we stand...and the Hilton van goes by, and other hotel vans go by. And we stand. Finally, an old man in a 1940s faded green Holden station wagon stops and says "You folks looking for a place to stay" and I said "yes we are". He says "the wife and I run a small place with 14 rooms, we have two available. Two pounds a night each. Nothing special, but clean and safe. No phone, no pool, no pets, we don't allow any cigarettes." I said sold, so we load in the luggage and off we go. Its a short ride and we are here.
Here is a map of our travels so far.
The deep red is the TWA section from St. Louis to Los Angeles, 1,586 nm. The gold is the Transocean section from Los Angeles to Honolulu, 2,222 nm. The red is the QANTAS section from Honolulu to Sydney, 4,558 nm. So far we have flown 8,366 nautical miles. We left St. Louis on Sunday at 10:00 pm and arrived at Sydney on Wednesday at 6:00pm. My friend's total travel costs so far from St. Louis to Sydney is $616.40, or $5,479.52 in today's dollars.
So here we will leave things until we start leg four of our journey. (hint, there are many places that one can fly to out of Sydney!)
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Post by Erik on Jul 23, 2020 17:39:43 GMT -5
As you cannot have done this at the time yourself, you must have been reading up for at least a year and take the journey IRL for preparation. Standing by for tomorrow's episode!
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Post by JasonK..AKA "Pal Joey." on Jul 26, 2020 8:42:31 GMT -5
It's been three days!! You Can't leave us hanging like this!! : )
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Post by chris_c on Jul 26, 2020 11:24:27 GMT -5
They're probably still taking in the sights and sounds of Sydney!
Chris
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Post by JasonK..AKA "Pal Joey." on Jul 26, 2020 11:52:55 GMT -5
That's true...Unless a Drop Bear got them.
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Post by PW053 on Jul 26, 2020 13:28:46 GMT -5
It's been three days!! You Can't leave us hanging like this!! : ) That's to keep the tension in it
breathless waiting
Best regards, Frank
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Post by Dennis the menace on Jul 27, 2020 20:37:44 GMT -5
Our trip to our final destination continues at last. Having been completely exhausted by basically 8,400 miles of non-stop travel, and multiple time changes, we rest up at the motel for a couple days to get our bearings. One thing we are still having trouble getting used to is being upside down. It really doesn't feel any different, but just knowing you are standing upside down does take some time getting used to. Having been the typical absent minded tourists and NOT realizing that it is now winter, and not the hot humid Midwestern summer that we left back in Missouri, we had to run out and get some coats and long pants. The motel manager's wife suggests McDowell’s Limited. Its an old time Sydney department store with various locations, and there is one not far from us in the south Sydney suburb of Caringbah. We arrive by taxi and it suits us fine. Not too expensive, and not to cheap or shoddy, things are priced right in the middle, sort of what in the United States we would expect to find from a J. C. Penny's. This one is a newer store, built with a mid-century modern look. The service here is odd. Its not like back in the states, where you bring your items to the check out and then pay. Here somebody takes them away and wraps them up. While that is going on, you pay, and they give you a receipt and a ticket. Then you take the ticket to another counter and they give you are items. Now at least we won't freeze, because its only going to get up in the mid 50's here today and perhaps a chance of rain later on. Right now we'll take a taxi back to our motel and get into some warmer clothes, and then explore downtown this afternoon. Tomorrow we head back to the airport. Finally dressed appropriately, with with some helpful directions from the motel staff, we walk 5 blocks to the end of the streetcar line (here they are called "trams"). Twenty minutes later one creaks up and makes the dog bone loop and then stops to let us on. We'll take it all the way into downtown to see some sights and get some lunch. The old man at the motel told us that we "better had get our fill of riding the trams, because they are scheduled to be all taken out of service in the next year or so". Turns out he was right, by 1961 they were gone. Seems that GM, Firestone, and BP wanted to sell buses and gasoline, so they forced the trams to close and be replaced with - you guessed it - GM buses that run on Firestone tires and burn BP gasoline. Our tram grinds through the downtown squealing and squeaking. Every time we stop there's that loud clank - clank - clank as the air compressor kicks in. I better get a picture of it, next time we come back it will be just a memory... I'm thankful for the tram. In fact Sydney had the largest tram network in Australia. Its much cheaper than the taxi and I didn't want to rent a car. People here drive on the wrong side of the road! By the time we get to downtown, it has been lightly raining. Sydney gets a good bit of rain in the winter, though not as much as Melbourne, and a bit less than Brisbane does, but it does rain in winter. Seeing that my friend and I want entirely different things for lunch as I want fish and chips and he wants roast chicken (I don't think they eat fried chicken here), we finally come across the solution - a cafeteria. Coles has a number of cafeterias around Australia that provided numerous selections at a fair price and let you decide just how much you want to eat. Home cooked food and a huge dessert selection. The first Cole's cafeteria opened in Sydney in 1928, and the last one closed in 1987 - a victim of "fast food". Cafeterias in the USA have a line of customers that usually goes from left to right, but in Australia the line goes from right to left. Backwards - you guessed it. The water in the sinks also circles around the drain in the opposite direction than they do in the USA. Here's view of the Cole's downtown dining room. When you pay, you can pay with US dollars, but they don't like it. The checker has to ask a manager to figure the exchange rate, and then that backs up the line until the situation is resolved. Being the good Aussies that they are, they queue patiently! We exchanged some of our money at a local bank and got this in return - Australian Pounds. You get back coins which are completely confusing and make even less sense - penny, half penny, three pence, six pence, shillings, florins. Ughhhhh what does it all mean? After lunch, the rain has stopped and the clouds are breaking. Because there's still some time to spend, and since we are near the harbor, why not take a harbor cruise? One of the highlights of the cruise was seeing the new Sydney opera house under construction. Its designed to look like the sails on a sailing ship. As we approached it, we saw all this concrete and cranes, you couldn't really tell exactly what it was. My friend said "oh look, they are building a nuclear power plant right in the heart of the city, there's the reactor core". A few of the locals overheard and got a bit miffed. It was then that the tour guide announced over the loudspeaker that it was the new Sydney opera house, in an "avant garde" design. That little white boat in front is one of the harbor tour boats. Finishing our cruise its now time to get a tram back to hotel. As we walk though downtown we come across Sydney Central Station, the main train station built in 1906. It has a tall clock tower that can be seen for blocks. In fact, its difficult to get a picture of the entire building! Since its not too crowded, we'll take a quick peek inside to see what's going on. Nobody seems to stop us, so we'll stroll out to the train platform and see if anything is there. Just one train is waiting. Its called "The Fish" and it runs between Lithgow and Sydney and passes through the Blue Mountains. It is complimented by another train called "The Chips", no kidding! "The Chips" must be in Lithgow, because here "The Fish" is waiting for passengers. We catch the tram back to the motel, and get to bed early as tomorrow we have to be at the airport bright and early for our next flight. Up before the birds we are, and settle our bill, and then climb into a taxi to the airport. The driver says "where to?", and I said "Sydney airport". The driver said "no, which terminal?" I said "Trans Australian Airlines" and off we go. Half an hour later we are let off in front of the TAA terminal and in we go to the ticket counter. Only three people are there, all businessmen. The clerk asks us do you have reservations, and I said "no, sorry, we don't". After asking were we want to go, he said "well you're in luck. There's been some cancellations. I only have one seat in First, but I have 5 in Tourist". We purchase two tickets on TAA flight 430, a Super Viscount non stop to Adelaide. Its a breakfast flight, as it departs at 7:50 am. We purchase both sections of our ticket, because we will have to change planes at Adelaide. The clerk says that will be A£ 31-16-0. After weighing our baggage and taking our money, he writes out a ticket. Notice I did not say "print out a ticket". Everything here is written out on forms, is slow and nothing seems to be hurried. After handing us our tickets, he says you'll be departing from gate five. Off we go, minus our A£ 31-16-0 each, or about $89.16 in today's money. But hey, at least we'll have breakfast on board. It is STILL dark as we walk out onto the apron to board our Super Viscount. There is no need to wait for a ramp man to push up airstairs, they are automatically deployed from the aircraft. There are few planes in action this early, and fewer people about too. This is the "businessman's special" or early bird flight. At least no screaming babies! The cabin is not as roomy as our Super G was. After taking our seat, the engines one by one spool up and there is that unmistakable Dart whine sound. The windows are very nice and make for superb viewing. The seats, just a bit smaller than Douglas seats, are comfortable enough, and in Tourist there is five abreast. The aisle is very small, however, and a large person would find they would have to scoot sideways down the aisle to get anywhere. The stewardess pulls a handle and the airstairs retract and the door closes. After a short delay, we start to move, and it is apparent that once again we are being directed towards runway 15. The winds don't seem to change direction here in the winter. We make a turn, a chime sounds the the stewardess takes a seat and fastens herself in. The engines spool up and there is a shrill that is nothing like the throbbing roar and vibration of a 3350. Just a shrill with the noise of prop blast. After feeling the brakes bump off and on a few times, we are off. That shrill does not change. It sounds the same at rotation as it did when we started our takeoff roll. As we climb it continues with the same exact sound, however there is almost no vibration. A couple of thousand feet up, we can hear the flaps retract as we head east and up and out of the clouds. We catch a bit of rain as we past east of Sydney.
We level off at 21,000 feet and it is very still and nice up so high. That shrill has now faded to a hum as we buzz along. Its about this time that I ask the stewardess when will breakfast be served. She looked at me kind of peculiar and said "Sir, a full breakfast is only served to first class passengers. Tourist class passengers are only served refreshments and a light snack breakfast". I "snack breakfast" I muse? Once again, Australia had in the 1950s the world's most regulated airline service dictating what routes, what times, even what equipment they were allowed to purchase, and what food and beverages could be served on board. Somebody in the government decided long ago that Tourist class passengers did not need to eat, because on most flights they get refreshments only, or a refreshment with a biscuit (cookie). That's it. One cookie. Not half, not two - just one, so don' be in too big a hurry to eat it 'cause there won't be another. They don't even give you the choice to purchase a meal on board like TWA's Sky Coach Club does. Its really the world's worst tourist service - even Aeroflot and CAAC does better. The aroma of eggs, bacon, crepes, potatoes, hot rolls and other food delicacies wafts its way in from the first class section. I'm not getting any happier. Not only does first class get food, but they get served first too. Finally, they announce that tourist snack/refreshment service will begin. I wait for a stewardess to come around asking if I will have this, or prefer that, but nothing like that happens. Still I can hear them giving something out in the rows behind us. The stewardesses on TAA wear white, they look like a nurse. If I don't get something soon to eat, I'm going to need a nurse...
Finally its my turn! I prepare myself for my first airline breakfast in Australia - what will I get? Roast kangaroo? Quiche wallaby? How about a hearty outback style lamb patty with mint sauce? I can't wait to dig and and try! ...and there is is, in all its radiant beauty, naked before the world. And its mine, all mine. Whipped Australian green fig puree with cream, and a hardtack roll. When I asked "what the yellow stuff was" she said "nobody seems to know". To wash it down, I have my choice of weak, lukewarm tea, or watery juice. I take the juice. Bon Appétit!
Somehow, I manage to gag down the pureed figs. Gee, time sure flys when your having fun. Its not long before I hear the engines start to power down, and we begin our descent into Adelaide. The weather is much nicer here than it was in Sydney when we left, its mostly clear skies and a bit warmer they say. Soon you can hear the main gear drop. The touchdown is smooth as silk, but the strange thing is there is no sound of a propeller reverse. The plane just slows down and soon you can hear the brakes catch. We turn and taxi to the terminal. Reversing the order it did after we boarded at Sydney, the airstairs deploy and the door opens. Everybody must leave the aircraft, even those who are continuing on. Heavily regulated Australia does not permit a single flight to where we are headed. So we must actually leave the plane, and then get back on the plane which now has a new flight number. This does happen in the US occasionally. One example is Pacific Air Lines. They are not permitted to have a single flight from Las Vegas to Los Angeles. The flight leaves Las Vegas, stops at Palmdale/Lancaster, and then everybody must get off at Burbank. Those continuing to Los Angeles can continue only after boarding the same aircraft with which now has a different flight number. Same thing happens with Loftleidir. Same plane, different flight number at Iceland - not allowed to have the same flight from the US to Europe. So we leave our aircraft and wait in the terminal to be called to re-board our flight.
Plane spotters will spot an Ansett ANA DC-4 at the far end, a TAA F-27, an Airlines of South Australia DC-3 and our Super Viscount (800 series). And here will leave our story until we re-board our plane under a new flight number. No need to re-ticket, and the baggage stays on board.
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