Sambro Flying Super Hero Action Flyerz, Ironman

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It was time to see what that ‘turn’ was all about. The canyon feels tight, not much space to turn, is what I thought. We are flying on the updraught side of the canyon. “Are you ready?” asks CC, “Full power, full flaps, and turn. Minimum 45°, 60° is better, remain coordinated.” We’re at 60° bank angle in a perfectly coordinated turn, and CC removes his hands from the yoke showing me how effortless this manoeuvre is. Suddenly the canyon didn’t feel so tight anymore. We complete the turn ‘on a dime’, with plenty of space to spare. They had been landing on Runway 05, which would have been perfect for a downwind join, but when we called up they gave us 23, which meant some re-positioning. Tomorrow I have to fly to Galena, a small town on the Yukon River, in a DC-6. You could fly up in a small plane. There are still two places left. And then you could stand right next to the runway and take a picture of the DC-6 approaching . What do you think?”

We also take a look at the apartments for pilots and mechanics that Everts makes available if required. “If you are unhappy with your accommodation, you can also stay here with us,” the 61-year-old suggests. W e run the weirdest syndicate arrangement possible. Our Ikea-coloured Auster Arrow, which was born in Lincolnshire in 1946 and now lives in Lithuania, has three co-owners, but I’m the only one who’s ever seen it in the flesh, let alone flown it. Covid has kept the other two co-owners abroad. For a year now, they’ve only been getting photos of the aeroplane – and invoices for their share of the fees – on our chat group.

And that’s the next mistake. At least, it is if you do it without gloves. The icy metal of the ladder and hull sends a searing pain into my hands. There’s a real variety of types from single seat flexwings to sleek hot-ships, gyroplanes and everything else in between. The 2024IRONMAN Portugal-Cascaisoffers Age Group Qualifying slots to the 2025VinFast IRONMAN World Championship.

Right in the middle of the country sits Kaunas, another medieval town, with winding narrow streets, great food, and talented buskers. It has two airfields: Kaunas International (landing fee: €3) and Kaunas Darius and Girenas, a GA field with more than 1,000m of tarmac.Away from the capital, the south-east where our Auster is based, is Lithuania’s answer to the Lake District. You take off, turn south and immediately find yourself cruising over a glacial landscape, with miles of blue lined by pine forests. The only thing missing are the fells – Lithuania is a very flat country. So you want to make a portrait of our company?” The friendly woman repeated our ‘request’, after my brother and I turned up at the office – unannounced.

Big John Moore organised the event for many years before handing over the reins to the Hampshire Microlight Flying Club and then finally, the man himself, Danial Subhani, for the last five years or so. CC performed the first approach demonstrating his technique. He started his approach higher than you usually see in most General Aviation airports. We like to route inland on the return to Kent, following along the edge of the towering South Downs, while occasionally swooping a little lower over the steep-sided valleys. We are home in 1hr 25min, before most people are having their breakfast. The next day it’s actually already early morning, but it’s still dark, the sun hasn’t really risen yet. When we climb out of the Pilatus PC-12 at Galena Airfield, our nose hair freezes after just two breaths.Rob Everts shows us a DC-6 simulator. “It still works. Must be pretty unique. But we don’t actually use it. It’s more of a curiosity,” he says. It seems that if, after their training, they had the choice between a major airline and Everts Air, they would almost always choose the major airlines. The ‘something like a Cub’ turned out to be an Auster Arrow, one of only six airworthy Arrows in the world. It had spent most of its life in Germany before moving to the Danish equivalent of Old Warden. The guy who was selling the aircraft – a retired factory director – swapped a pristine pre-war motorbike for it. He directs us to create a grid with one column for the different flaps position, one for the stall warning activation, and a final one for the actual airspeed, and says, “today, we are going to be test pilots.” And then, there’s Druskininkai, a bumpy strip in the spa town where half of Eastern Europe ‘takes the waters’. Druskininkai sits close to Belarus, and as you tune into Flight Information, you share the frequency with Belarusian MIG pilots on their training sorties.