Voyage of the Southern Sun

by Michael Smith

  That was exactly what I wanted to do!

  ‘Affirm,’ I radioed back. ‘November Four Seven Three X-ray Papa requesting special VFR departure for Ahmedabad.’

  ‘Stand by,’ he replied. About ten minutes later the call came through: ‘November Four Seven Three X-ray Papa cleared for special VFR, cleared for start-up, report when ready.’

  A special visual flight rules clearance is like official permission to break the normal rules of visual flight when conditions are marginal. The guys in the Gwalior tower weren’t so bad, I decided, although up in the air the visibility was more like 10 kilometres, which was well within the rules.

  It was a long journey, in increasingly hot desert conditions. I had to track a long way south via Bhopal, which added over an hour to the flight. There was not a lot to see, but the heat caused turbulence, which made it difficult to maintain the altitude I’d been allocated. The air-traffic controller didn’t seem to appreciate how much a small plane can be thrown up and down.

  At Ahmedabad I was directed to park on the edge of the airfield, where my team of handlers were waiting, among dozens of parking bays, mostly empty. No sooner had I shut down and climbed out than a large helicopter landed right next to the Sun. The wash from its huge rotor would have thrown the plane around like a dandelion if four of us weren’t there to hold it down. I looked around at all the other empty parking spots and thought, Really? The helicopter pilot thought it was hilarious. To me, his moustache was the joke. Grrr.

  I had been looking forward to Ahmedabad because it was the site of Mahatma Gandhi’s Sabarmati Ashram. It was a sprawling yet incredibly humble abode. What most caught my attention was a display of the loosely addressed mail sent to Gandhi over the years – the envelopes bore addresses such as ‘Gandhi, India’, but had nevertheless been faithfully delivered. Mail was not only part of the backstory of my trip, but I have been an enthusiastic ‘postcarder’ all my life. One of my favourite things is sending them with pictorial addresses and seeing if they arrive; thus far they always have.

  After some wandering, I stumbled across what would be one of the cinematic highlights of my whole journey. Ahmedabad has an amazing drive-in cinema. Who knew? Indian indoor cinemas still use the pricing structure of cheap seats down the front, and the drive-in took the same approach. There was a grass area in the front for the cheapest tickets, then rows of concrete seating, car spaces, and several hundred seats on either side of the projection box, which was framed by a huge balcony with more seating – the most expensive tickets. A full house would probably be 10,000 people.

  And the place was pumping. With prices starting at forty rupees, the equivalent of eighty cents, I was not surprised. The cheapest movie ticket elsewhere in India was 140 rupees, and the average was 180 rupees. With the evening temperature in the mid-thirties, it was the perfect way to see a film, and hundreds of families clearly loved it. Cheap, open-air cinemas could have much broader potential, I realised, and are a wonderful communal place for shared storytelling.

  The border with Pakistan really worried me. With the Southern Sun’s engine being the same as those in Predator drones – a Rotax 914, in the same backwards-facing configuration – I was very conscious that the India–Pakistan border is highly militarised, and therefore I was concerned about the Sun’s sound signature. The two sides have fought four wars over seventy years. More than once during that lonely flight I wondered what radio call I should make if someone started shooting at me. Friends were concerned for my safety, too, which added to my anxiety. But in the event everything was fine.

  The arid landscape in the border region was spectacular. Comprising vast stretches of sandy land, it was even more desolate than anything I’d seen in the Australian outback. There really was nothing out there.

  On the ground at Karachi, Pakistan’s largest coastal city, I was approached by a group of men who had a small truck carrying a 44-gallon drum of avgas. They insisted I had to refuel there and then. I always preferred to refuel just before departure, and something about their attitude made me uncomfortable. So I asked a question I’d never thought to put before: ‘How much is the fuel?’

  The answer came back: US$6 a litre, an outrageous four times the standard price, and eight times the cost of local petrol. I asked to buy regular petrol, which they said was not possible. We politely argued a little. I was starting to lose hope when I asked how they could justify such a high price. They answered simply: ‘We have a monopoly.’

  Part of me admired their frankness, but there was no way I was going to agree.

  In a moment of inspiration, I remembered that the Rotax engine manual referred, somewhere, to petrol being its preferred fuel. All the Sun’s manuals were stored on my iPad, and I quickly searched for ‘petrol’ and found the paragraph.

  Shown written proof of my need for petrol rather than avgas, Karachi airport’s monopolists folded. The Subcontinental respect for paperwork had saved me. I was relieved but weary: it was going to take me another four hours to get into town and buy petrol. To my huge relief, though, and for the first time on the trip, there was a petrol bowser at the airport. Not only was it one of the quickest refuels of the trip, the price was only US$1 a litre. Bravo!

  This was not the first fuel fight I’d had along the way. At Chittagong a petrol station sold me low-grade fuel that could have damaged the Sun’s engine. It took an hour to return it and instead fill my eight canteens with premium petrol. At the airport, security guards insisted the containers be X-rayed with my regular luggage. One of the lids wasn’t screwed on tightly enough and some fuel leaked into the machine, which was nerve-racking. Surely leaking fuel in an X-ray machine was a fire hazard . . .

  Before I got to Ahmedabad, the airport staff there informed me that petrol from the town was prohibited on the airfield, and I would have to buy their expensive avgas. After arriving, I asked a local agent to help. They arranged the petrol in a very helpful way: it was both much better for the Sun’s engine and a fraction of the price. Often, despite the supposedly rigid rules, people on the ground were simply happy to help their fellow man.

  Karachi’s Nueplex cinema was hailed as the best in Pakistan. Its reputation lured me to make a dicey trip to the city’s new outer suburbs. It took about fifty minutes in an auto rickshaw, which broke down twice on the way.

  In Pakistani and Indian cinemas, much like we once did back home, the audience is expected to stand when the national anthems are played at the start of films. Both governments had created wondrously nationalistic and chintzy video clips to go with their scratchy mono recordings. I loved them. They brought back childhood memories of ‘Advance Australia Fair’ at the local town hall.

  For such firm enemies, Pakistan and India have remarkably similar taste in film. The Nueplex was showing Gabbar Is Back. As much as I was a fan, after fifteen minutes looking around I was ready to leave. I wanted to get to the Capri cinema in town by 10.30 p.m. to see the last thirty minutes of Furious 7. I couldn’t imagine that seeing it dubbed in another language would make it hard to follow.

  Out on the street, my rickshaw taxi driver was lying on the ground, trying to fix his vehicle. I waited for a taxi. And waited. It dawned on me that there were only private cars on the road. It was a new suburb with great facilities, but had been built, I later learned, mainly for senior members of the military, who all had cars and drivers. Someone advised me to wait at a petrol station up the road, where a cab might stop to refuel. There was no way of calling for one, he said.

  By now I was starting to feel stranded. Pakistan has a serious terrorism problem, and Westerners have been targeted in the past, although Pakistanis are overwhelmingly the victims. After an hour of fretting, and wondering which shrub I might have to sleep under, a well-dressed man in a new BMW approached me. ‘What on Earth are you doing out here at this time of night?’ he asked.

  I gave him a thirty-second explanation.

  ‘You’re taking a huge risk,’ he said. ‘Please get in. I’ll give you
a lift to your hotel.’

  I got into his BMW, all the time wondering if I was doing the right thing. Why didn’t he ask where my hotel was until I was in the car?

  But I soon relaxed, and my visions of sleeping behind the petrol station quickly dissipated. The man was the Karachi manager of SC Johnson, a manufacturer of household cleaning supplies – Mr Muscle and the like. He had worked with many Australians throughout Asia, and he insisted on giving me a tour while we chatted. When I mentioned the ruins I had seen in Ahmedabad, he helped design me a tour of sites for the next day.

  After forty-five minutes, as we approached my hotel, I thanked him and asked his destination – it turned out he lived just two minutes from the petrol station we’d started at. Now that I was safe, he would go home to his family.

  The generosity of strangers, which I had already experienced a number of times – being lent a car in outback Australia, taken on a motorcycle food tour in Patna, and rescued in Karachi – had a powerful impact on me. I saw similar kindnesses all along my journey. And it was so often the people with the least, or in the places that the evening news would have us nervous to visit, where I was met with the greatest goodwill. Our governments may argue at the highest level, but on the ground we are all just trying to care for our families – and, from time to time, a solo traveller.

  Thank you, Ahmed Naazer Minhaj.

  12.

  The Kingdom

  ‘Do. Or do not. There is no try.’

  YODA, STAR WARS EPISODE V: THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK (1980)

  Pakistani air-traffic control seemed determined to end my trip. From Karachi, I needed to fly due west, over the Arabian Sea, skirting south of Iranian airspace over the Gulf of Oman to Dubai.

  It wasn’t uncommon for flight controllers to reject the first route I filed. Usually they wanted me to fly higher than the 4500 feet I requested, or to follow the IFR airway routes used by commercial aircraft. Often, after I’d agreed to these longer routes, and was well away from the airport, they would allow me to switch to a more direct route.

  The officials in Karachi didn’t object to my flight plan, which I estimated would take eight hours, seven of which would be over the waters of the Gulf of Oman. But after taking off I was directed to fly south-west. At first this didn’t raise any alarm bells. I was used to being directed out of the way of commercial flights near airports. But as I neared the edge of the Sun’s radio range, my protests were ignored. The controller insisted I follow the heading for 70 nautical miles, or about 130 kilometres, away from land and towards the middle of the ocean and, ultimately, war-torn Somalia. Then, after I was handed from one control zone to another, a very agitated controller came on the radio.

  ‘November Four Seven Three X-ray Papa, confirm you are VFR.’

  ‘Affirm, VFR, November Four Seven Three X-ray Papa.’

  ‘November Four Seven Three X-ray Papa, that is not possible – VFR flights over water are not allowed. You must follow the coast; turn heading 350.’

  I couldn’t believe it. They seriously wanted me to head north, towards Iran, when I was trying to get to Dubai, on the south side of the Persian Gulf? Given that the Sun was a seaplane, this was ludicrous. It was also dangerous, and triggered a deep sense of dread in me. Presumably, they wanted the Sun to fly west along the Pakistani coastline to Iran, when I would no longer be their responsibility. I did not have clearance for Iranian airspace; I hadn’t even sought it, assuming it wouldn’t be granted.

  A quick calculation on my iPad navigation software indicated that, as a result of flying south-west for 70 miles, it would be 80 miles north to the coast – an hour of flying, which would take me further away from Dubai. When I reached the edge of Pakistani airspace, I would have to fly due south for half an hour to get around the Iranian airspace, before resuming my route towards Dubai. And all for no sound reason!

  There were headwinds in the area, and even with three hours’ worth of spare fuel loaded, this would add a couple of hours. The Sun might not make it to Dubai.

  I asked the controller to confirm his instructions. He was adamant I should not be over water. I explained that the Sun was an amphibian aircraft but he didn’t care. I told him I didn’t have Iranian airspace clearance – again he didn’t care. Then I played my big card.

  ‘Karachi, Three X-ray Papa, proposed course may cause fuel shortage; request direct TAPDO.’ This was the waypoint at the airspace boundary between Pakistan and UAE airspace.

  The fuel warning should have sealed it, as safety is the top priority of every person working in civil aviation. Air-traffic controllers, who have thousands of lives in their hands every day, carry this responsibility more directly than anyone else in the industry.

  He didn’t care. ‘Three X-ray Papa, you must not be over water; turn right, heading 350.’

  I asked to speak to his supervisor.

  There was silence. A few minutes later, another voice came over the radio: ‘Three X-ray Papa, track direct TAPDO.’

  Sanity had prevailed: I had been cleared to fly direct to the international boundary. Phew.

  Several dull hours over water ensued, but I was pleased by the sense of routine I was now feeling about longer flights. Just a couple of years back, a three-hour flight seemed almost unbearable; now, seven to eight hours passed by quite comfortably. I had worked out that it was better to attend to the plane and myself regularly. On the hour, every hour, I would check the fuel status and transfer fuel as needed, and then fuel my body. Rather than having lunch, I ate a small amount every hour. Perhaps a handful of nuts, a piece of fresh fruit (or dried fruit if it wasn’t available), maybe half a muesli bar. I also kept up my liquids, drinking two to three litres of water each day. This made my energy levels very even, I found, and I never suffered the mid-afternoon nods so many of us get each day, particularly at work! In fact, I think this practice helped me physically and mentally. Especially on the long flights over water or desert, it gave me something to look forward to each hour. I could take one hour at a time, breaking the journey into bite-size pieces, so to speak, and staving off boredom. I was also losing weight along the way, and had taken in my belt a couple of notches. Maybe it’ll become a new fad – the Circumnavigation Diet!

  Eventually we crossed the Arabian coast at Muscat and continued over the desert to Dubai. The contrast in air-traffic control was as vast as the sands below. An Australian voice welcomed me and said I could fly to the runway without delay. As the airport came into view, I saw a multitude of circling roads below. It looked more like the sprawling freeway network of Los Angeles than how I imagined the Middle East. One minute out from landing, I took a deep breath as I absorbed the sheer size of the place, and started counting how many planes the controller had waiting while I landed.

  There were nine queued up to take off when the Sun finally touched down at Dubai International Airport, including a huge Airbus 380. Given the size difference between us, I imagined that the controllers, the other pilots and perhaps even thousands of passengers were smiling as they watched me arrive. After clearing customs and immigration, I was met by long-time Dubai resident and Emirates pilot Pete Forbes.

  Contrary to the common perception, Dubai doesn’t have as much oil as some of its neighbours. The city’s wealth was primarily built over the past century from its position as a trading and travel hub between Asia and Europe. The massive airport is the physical embodiment of that longstanding function. The city’s international reputation is shaped by its seven-star hotels, property developments, busy container port and indoor ski field. Beyond the reinforced concrete, though, Dubai has a rich history that should have been experienced by the Qantas Imperial passengers and crew who stayed there from 1938.

  That history is why, although tired after the long flight from Karachi, I agreed to Pete’s suggestion that we explore a boat yard on the bank of Dubai Creek. Old-style cargo still thrives in the Persian Gulf. There wasn’t a shipping container in sight, and I imagined the place looked similar in 1938.
Today, traditional timber ships are still hand-loaded (often with a few cars on top), and ply their trade from Kuwait and Oman to Pakistan and India. Several ships were being built at the yard. Pakistani and Indian labourers worked by hand on timber milled on-site from trees delivered by boat. It was incredible to see traditional craftsmanship being deployed on such a large scale.

  I was determined to find out where the Qantas passengers stayed. Pete knew that Dubai’s original airport was in neighbouring Sharjah, and had heard something about a museum. We decided to head there. The airport was built in the early 1930s, when Britain’s Imperial Airways first started an airmail plane service to the outposts of the British Empire.

  The original Sharjah airport terminal is now an aviation museum, though it resembled an Arabian fort. The flying boats had landed on Dubai Creek, 15 kilometres away, but the Qantas Imperial passengers and crew stayed in Sharjah, where there were basic motel-style rooms. The museum suggested that there had been nowhere suitable for the passengers in Dubai, and that the security of the fort-like grounds was needed at the time. It was a shame to learn that the pampered passengers had missed out on experiencing a unique part of the world.

  My next departure brought a mixture of excitement and terror. I planned to leave Dubai at 5 p.m., when the worst of the desert heat had dissipated, and arrive at Abu Dhabi thirty minutes before sunset. Dubai’s terminal for private aircraft is a glorious building, befitting the wealth of those who see the world from private jets. Then, for contrast, there was me in my overalls. In these splendid surroundings, I was handed the bill for storing the Sun at the field, and I nearly collapsed to the floor: it was almost US$3000. I’d only been there one night!