It was strange landing at two international airports in microlights. Going through all the radio procedures of first calling Maputo approach then being transferred to tower then ground and apron on arrival and the reverse on departure. You really need to know your compass sense of direction to not land on the wrong runway into the takeoff path of an airbus. When arriving you are then directed to your parking bay between all the commercial traffic by a warden with bats. It is strange to follow the yellow line between a TAP and Kenya Airways A340, directed by the batman and to stop with your front wheel in the yellow box intended for much bigger aircraft. Our flying coat hangers really look small in this environment. Then when paying your landing fees and filling in the mandatory flight plans you are addressed as "Captain”. Both Maputo and Kruger international were very good with the clearing and immigration procedures. We were warned about Maputo and expecting the worst were surprised on how quick and easy all went. The controller at Kruger was the best I have ever encountered. He had a warm African voice and directed the busy traffic pattern of inbounds and outbound very professionally. He had to contend with lots of aircraft with very different speeds from Jet, turbine, twins,c210,c172 and our very slow microlight formation. We really felt safe in his hands. He stacked us all at different heights and we continually saw faster aircraft passing underneath or above us. The Portuguese-speaking controllers were difficult to understand at times. They had a different way of controlling and their RT procedures were different than we were use to. We found that if you kept using standard international code language e.g. zone outbound or zone inbound etc comms were ok. We used the call sign zu-byo formation where ever we went and made sure that we filled in the flight plans as zu-byo in formation with zu-baz.
It is strange to be back in civilization where we have running water, traffic lights, lots of vehicles, filling stations and shops. We are back in our world of reality, bills, stress and responsibilities. But we endure all of this to be able to be free to adventure which makes life worth living and interesting.
We look forward to reuniting and renewing our unique friendship on our next adventure. It hasn't been discussed or planned but I know that it will happen again sometime in the future. When it happens it will be as if us friends had never gone our separate ways and our friendship will be proved all over again.
Comment by brett hill on June 10, 2008 at 3:51pm 
Comment by Ross Jeffery on May 30, 2008 at 3:20pm 
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