British Flapways

• kateshrewsday

The toy owls are lined up on the bed, a motley bunch of various-sized cuddly bird-alikes arranged on the duvet either side of a hastily-created aisle.

Maddie prefaces play with a suitably banal bing-bang-bong airplane chime. Her voice becomes syrupy. “Welcome,” she announces, “to British Flapways: the airline which does the flapping for you.”

She takes a break for a second, to persuade her brother to come and sit on one side of the aisle. Bribed by ten minutes extra up-time before going to bed, he joins her. She hurries him. “The screens are coming down!” she urges, “Hurry up!”

There is a pause, and then she continues. “In the event of a forced landing, please shout ‘Mummy’ and desperately try to flap your wings. This will not help many of you, as you are still at owl school and have not learnt to fly yet. You may also text HELP on your mobiles. The exits are here; and here.”

Before  long the owls are texting each other in flagrant disregard of the flight-mode mobile phone regulations.

The children have just taken their first flight, and it has left a lasting impression. Their father spends his time on earth watching air crash investigation programmes and inspiring crash scenes like ‘Alive’ in which a group of students plummet to a grim fate in spectacular fashion. He is reticent about the whole business. It is, for him, a necessary evil, and he does it because it gets him from A to B at hundreds of miles an hour.

I think Felix feels the same way. Flying makes him feel sick, and he doesn’t feel great about being 3000 metres above sea level. Mad, however, has warmed to flight, and enjoys it immensely, as I do.

There is something about that moment when the plane leaves the tarmac; when speed conquers the unlikely bulk that is a plane full of hundreds of passengers, and the great hunk of metal leaps into the air with the agility of Rudolf Nureyev. I find I just want to cheer raucously in support of the peerless laws of physics which make such a leap possible.

I flew myself, once. Young journalists have the power of print behind them, and so many a free-publicity-seeker woos even the humble local hack with the most lavish of feature opportunities.

Kate, my deputy editor hailed me one morning. Fancy learning how to fly?

A week later I found myself driving towards a tiny local flying strip, ready to soar over the fields of Maidenhead and Windsor. The journos were given a swift theory lesson and then lined up with their instructors ready to fly duo.

The put-put of the tiny engines filled the air. I sat in front, my instructor behind, and I took the plane along a runway and lifted the wheel. That little ground-breaking miracle lifted my Pegasus off its hooves and into the updraft, that land where lift balances weight and thrust exceeds drag.

This was an undiscovered country, a kingdom without kerbs, a joyous rule-free piece of abandon. I adored flying at first soar. The country below became a patchwork quilt at my behest, that sunny afternoon long ago.

Last Sunday afternoon we were lolling, lobster-red, through the heat of a Paris afternoon. We trod the pink tarmac of wonderland. We had sampled so much of what this plastic paradise, Euro Disney, had to offer: but there was one experience after which I hankered.

It was dubbed ‘Star Tours”.

Walt and Lucas, together at last. We, too, could take a ride in a spaceship into deep space, dicing with wormholes, daring x-wings to do their worst. Ooooh, I said with uncharacteristic enthusiasm. Let’s try that one.

We queued, it seemed, forever, sweltering in the unconditioned air of a space station somewhere in the second sector of an unnamed galaxy.

After a space-time eternity we were lined up outside the doors to the ship. We were allocated door quatre. A slick screen appeared above our heads with a space-air hostess who welcomed us to our flight and read safety instructions. And with a whirr and all the doors opened to let passengers on.

Except for door quatre.

Door quatre remained stubbornly closed. An operative dressed fetchingly Han Solo-style spoke to someone on the space phone and told everyone to get off. We would need to use another spacecraft.

At which there was an unholy Euro-scramble to get the best place in the next ship. Stay with the door number you were last time, they told us in broken English; and still a stolid German family stood where we had been, styling incomprehension for all they were worth.

We took door cinq.

Don’t sit on any of the grey seats, the operatives told us. They’re ejector seats.

We minced past these and sat in two pairs: me and Felix, and Phil and Maddie a little distance away. And then it began: the space flight of my dreams. It incorporated speed, aggression, wormholes and ice tunnels, death-defying plummets and breathtaking soaring. I needed to be flying this thing, and cursed the designer for failing to give me a control panel.

We landed; the lights went up. The doors slid slickly open. I observed a slightly green husband sloping out. I bounded, Tigger-like, up to him.

“Wasn’t that great?” I enthused.

My husband did not answer. He was looking for a solid piece of brickwork on which to sit down, and a bottle of water. He needed a little time to gain his equilibrium.

One must always look on the bright side of these matters.

At least he wasn’t about to fly home on British Flapways.

 

Image courtesy of Geek.Com

33 thoughts on “British Flapways”

  1. Simply marvellous! He DOES do flapways – gets in a flap, doesn”t he?

    I adore small planes and microlights since I was taught to fly our Hornet Moth at about age six.

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    1. Rosemary, you may be right there 🙂 I spent a lot of time fighting worry and nerves about preparation for Monday’s interview. But there were many moments when I forgot myself, despite myself…

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  4. Sounds like fun! I just saw a billboard for Star Tours (all the highway billboards in LA are for entertainment or the Lap Band weight loss).

    I want to fly on British Flapways with Maddie’s owls.

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  5. Oh, Kate . . . I adore your writing AND your daughter’s imagination. Perfect together.

    Love that you got to take a turn at the flight controls once . . . even if you never got to fly solo with Han Solo! 😀

    Since I also adore all things Tigger . . . I love this line:
    I observed a slightly green husband sloping out. I bounded, Tigger-like, up to him.

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      1. He addresses how “amazing” cell phones, ATM’s, and flight are . . . while questioning why none of us are happy. 😀

        Flight is at 2:00.

      2. This is just fantastic, Nancy and we,ve been sitting with out early morning cup of tea, chortling! Thank you! What an excellent take on life! Who is it?

  6. British Flapways! I love this airline and its inventor. When I read about young folk with these inventive and inquisitive imaginations, I regain my hope for the future.

    Of course, a flyworthy Kate, bounding, Tigger-like toward her slightly green husband has me in fits of giggle.

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    1. Phil wasn’t quite as impressed with the approach, being a shade of green, Penny. It was a polar role reversal: I hate rides in parks and he goes on all but the most hair-raising….

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  7. oh how i laughed! we are a pair in loving space and flying. how i longed to be the first woman in space, only to be beaten by a russian bimbo

    i think this morning i’ll fly to work on SA flapways and see if i enjoy the trip. i’ll line up the teddies on the dashboard.

    off sidey goes, humming ‘those magnificent men in their flying machines’

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  8. I agree with how you felt – There is something about that moment when the plane leaves the tarmac; when speed conquers the unlikely bulk that is a plane full of hundreds of passengers, and the great hunk of metal leaps into the air with the agility of Rudolf Nureyev. I find I just want to cheer raucously in support of the peerless laws of physics which make such a leap possible.

    Gorgeous, stimulating, wonderful!!!

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  10. Great post! Many years ago, we did that Space Ride twice and then were in the queue first thing the next morning to do it again. As far as I was concerned it was by far the best thing at Euro Disney.

    In light of next week, I hope that Air New Zealand is rather more reliable than British Flapways!

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      1. Just clicked it and it’s gone through like clockwork 😀 Wonderful clip. Brings back so many memories, of which the owls are only the most recent…thanks as always, Pseu….

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