The Adventures of Corinne - a microlight flight

At last a period of decent weather so I decided to make a flight from the Alps to the south of France at the end of September 2001....

Albertville - Grenoble

Started doing my make-up monday morning at 06.00 - yuk ! Looked horrible ! By the time I was packed and had the machine ready it was midday and boiling hot. I took off from Albertville and flew to Grenoble le Versoud, a flight of 1 hour 15 minutes because of a 50 kph headwind. I was cutely dressed in a little fluffy mauve top, a white cotton layered miniskirt, wide mauve leather belt and black suede high heel ankle boots ! Not quite what you'd expect for flying a weight-shift microlight but there you are.
At Grenoble a lovely looking girl approached me on the aircraft parking area and introduced herself as a member of the local microlight club, responsible for security. She asked me a lot of questions and it was immediately evident that she didn't believe that I was a real pilot and she was afraid that I was going to crash and that this would have unmeasurable consequences on the flying of microlights at this airport. Once she was convinced she became very friendly and was clearly fascinated by this gorgeous creature who had dropped in from the skies !!! She very sweetly gave me advice about how I should fly high because there were few emergency landing places for the next... kms. in case of engine trouble.
Unfortunately she didn't ask me for my phone number....

Grenoble - Gap

I said goodbye and left for Gap, in the Alpes du sud, which is an airfield with a lot of activity : aircraft, microlights, parachuting etc. I had to climb to 2000 metres and got a little cold, but eventually, despite the best efforts of the headwind, I was able to descend and land at Gap. Imagine the faces of the ultra-macho parachutists when I landed and parked my little machine right in front of their hangar and climbed out dressed as I was !

Gap - Fayence

I took off again for Fayence, a gliding airfield in the south of France, not far from Cannes. After half an hour, the visibility began to worsen and the cloudbase descended to envelop the numerous mountain peaks in this particularly inhospitable area. To make things worse I had to go around a restricted military area where there are missile launches. Well I didn't get shot down, and I arrived at Fayence at sunset. I was going to spend the night at at old girlfriend's flat in Cannes but she had made a last minute cancellation, and anyway it was too late to go hitch-hiking to Cannes. Therefore I tethered my microlight in case of wind during the night while 3 youths continually asked me questions about flying. They carefully prefixed each question with "Madame" which I thought was terribly funny, and when they left they said "Goodbye, it has been a great pleasure talking to you Madame !"
I ate in the restaurant at the aeroclub and the owner helped me to find a hotel nearby. He even drove me there ! In the morning I dressed very conservatively in a little black halterneck t-shirt, black leather belt, pink minikilt and black anklestrap high heel sandals. The owner of the hotel very kindly offered to drive me to the airport when he saw my heavy backpack. Then a woman gave me a lift to the petrol station and back when she saw me walking with my petrol can. They're certainly very friendly around here !

Fayence - Roquebroussane

I had a little difficulty steering my microlight with those high heels but managed to take off and fly to a tiny strip at Roquebroussane 10 kms away, having been invited by a a pilot I'd met the day before. He gave me the rough coordinates of a small strip at St. Tropez and mentioned that there was a zone of bad weather coming from the south west tomorrow. Since I absolutely had to be back home by tomorrow evening I decided to speed my trip up so as not to get stuck, but I still wanted an afternoon in St. Tropez... what girl wouldn't ?

Roquebroussane - St. Tropez

After 30 minutes I took off again and flew the 10 minutes to the Mediterranean coast. What a lovely sight... clear blue water, expensive houses with enormous swimming pools, luxurious yachts as far as the eye could see. After a short search I found the little airstrip and landed there.
No sooner had the engine stopped than I heard someone scolding me. It was a very disgruntled elderly man on a bicycle. "Who gave you permission to land here ? This is a private strip". Oops ! I took off my helmet, unrolled the scarf which was wound several times around my neck and lower face, removed my jacket and suddenly his tone changed as he realised he had before him such a charming and astoundingly beautiful young woman ! I gave him a big smile and he suddenly became most accomodating, explaining that he was the guardian and lived in the adjacent caravan. He suggested that I phone the owner which I did and he in turn sounded very displeased, insisting that he come to talk to me before I left in order to explain which houses I should avoid flying over because there were some difficult neighbours. The old boy arranged a lift for me through a forest of bamboo to the village of Cogolin and I stood there to try to get a lift to St. Tropez. After a few minutes a van went past and I could read the lips of the driver: "Ooh la la la la LA !" As expected the van reappeared a few minutes later and he proposed to take me to St. Tropez.

On the way he asked if it would be ok to stop at his yacht at Cogolin harbour. I didn't particularly want to as I was short of time but he insisted it would just be for a few minutes.
Of course it wasn't and I found myself in the situation that many girls find themselves in when hitch-hiking alone... Well unfortunately I ended up more or less having to walk the rest of the distance. I wandered around the town for a while then decided to hitch back again. I was standing on the road next to a group of elderly German tourists who were busy trying all sorts of manoeuvres to get a picture of me without my knowing. Each one found a reason to be photographed with me in the background. I pretended not to notice ! I can just imagine them at home after their holiday, showing their snaps and saying "Guess what we saw in St. Tropez !" A coach stopped to pick them up and the driver opened the door and said to me "Eh ! Come over here ! Come !" I thought he was going to offer me a lift. "You've got nice thighs... show me your tits ! Come on, a little effort ! Listen.." he said conspiratorially "I'm built like an elephant ! Can we see each other later ?" All this completely unabashed in front of the tourists who were queued up to climb on the bus !!!! The sea and the sun were clearly having an effect on the local male population and getting a lift was going to put this girl into another tricky situation so she decided to catch a bus instead ! Unfortunately I got lost in the bamboo forest for an hour and ended up walking along all sorts of rough roads and paths. When I finally found the landing strip, its owner was waiting for me and I expected the worst ! However he was smiling and friendly - I don't think he has many visitors like me...

St Tropez - Gap

I took off as quickly as I could as I only had 2 hours until sunset and I wanted to get at least as far as Gap. In fact this time I had a tailwind so I made it confortably, overflying the airfields of Château Arnaud and Sisteron. Since violent storms had been forecast I wanted to try to put my machine in a hangar overnight, and everything was closed except for the parachutists' hangar where they were all having a beer. I walked in (what a joke !) and they very kindly gave me a place. Then I was taken to a hotel, although, on the way the car fell into a ditch and the driver had to leave me in charge of the car while he went back to the airfield to get a tractor to pull it out.
At the hotel the owner and his wife were incredibly friendly. I get the impression that I bring out the best side in peoples' characters ! I went out to eat in a pizzeria and then went to bed. The sky next morning was a very menacing black, with tinges of red from the sunrise. I got to the airport at 09.00 but spent 2 hours trying to get petrol. For once my hitch-hiking efforts didn't work out. Eventually I had to phone for a taxi and the driver was more than a little confused when he arrived in front of the airport. Instead of finding a guy with a petrol can he found a cute girl in tie-front black chiffon top, minikilt and high heel sandals ! I had to call him over to tell him it was indeed me. He finished by carrying my 20 litre jerrycan for me as he saw that it was a little difficult in heels.

Gap - Grenoble

I finally got back in the air for a really turbulent flight to Grenoble with a groundspeed of no less than 140 km/h ! The turbulence was so bad and the thermals so strong that I arrived a bit too high for the circuit and the air traffic controller made a few very dry remarks about it over the radio. He made me park the microlight in front of the control tower which was a long way from the aeroclub restaurant. This meant that I had to walk past all the hangars and I was whistled at several times. I sat on the terrace to eat a salad and the wind started to get really gusty. The waitress came over to tell me that the air traffic control had phoned to say they were worried about my microlight and suggested that I go and check it over.
As I walked past the tower the controller stuck his head out of the window, gave me a big smile, and said that I could park behind the hangar in the lee of the wind. I got permission to park in front of the restaurant terrace much to the amazement of the clientele. I finished my meal but the waitress was concerned that I hadn't eaten it all. I replied laughingly that I didn't want to vomit it all up in the air. An official from the Chamber of Commerce came over to ask if I would be so kind as to pay the landing fee, and said that air traffic control were suggesting that I put the machine away in a hangar and wait until the next morning as the wind was now 40 kph. He kept calling me "Madame" which delighted me ! I went back out to prepare for taking off but it was very difficult because the wind kept snatching at my minikilt and blowing it upwards while I had to hold on to the wing to stop it from being blown over. All this under the watchful gaze of the restaurant clients. I had to wrap my scarf around my thighs and knot it tightly !

Grenoble - Albertville

I took off into the wind using just 3 metres of runway and climbed almost vertically ! A short while later I landed in Albertville where it was completely windless and boiling hot. Later that afternoon there was a very violent storm that caused quite a lot of damage. What a fun 3 days it had been, and a shame it couldn't have lasted longer as I would have liked to have flown to Spain. Next time !

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