Author: PilotWhite

Two Tom’s in a Cessna 210 over the magnificent Namib

Every once in while a VIP shows up and this time it was my turn to be the VIP’s personal pilot for the day. It was strange that the company gave me these flights, as they were usually done by the experienced freelance pilots who have thousands of hours flight time over the whole of Namibia in bush planes. Film crew and scouts are notorious for being scared of small aircraft and typically request two experienced pilots on an aircraft for which one pilot is the norm.

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A South African’s perspective on Zambians

One thing that I’ve noticed is that the working class is definitely more personal. The reasons I would attribute this to is that the income disparity is not as severe as in SA. The materialistic nature of wealthy individuals is definitely far and few between and not a daily sighting. Sometimes you see the odd 7 series BMW or something similar, and just wonder what an idiot he/she is, to go for such a car with these terrible roads! The GDP per capita is less than a third compared to SA. South Africa is ranked 7th and Zambia 21st out of African countries.

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Validation in progress

So I’ve been told that the airlaw exams can sometimes be a tricky one to pass over here. But not for the reasons you might think. They are not too difficult to pass, but one just hopes that the person marking your paper aligns the memorandum correctly. In spectacular bureaucracy fashion, I went all out and wrote word for word what they required for the open book section. It left me writing 5 full pages and a slight carpal tunnel syndrome in my right wrist.

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From Nam to Zam!

I have flown the last year and a half in Namibia, and as that time has come to an end I will be writing on the adventures I encounter in the beautiful country of Zambia for the next 6 months! A Namibian blog post will slip through every now and again, as it was an extremely good experience. Unfortunately, at peak season it would have been impossible to maintain a blog as it was horrendously busy.

Zamabia

 

I anticipated that I might only leave mid-April as our ridiculously efficient CAA was in charge of issuing my license before I could be let loose on my journey. Surprisingly the Gods must have aligned the stars as the favour I had asked CAA to expedite the issuing of my license had come true!

Continue reading “From Nam to Zam!”