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29 August Sri Lanka to Singapore
Pleased to be on the way we took off with an overweight plane in hot hot conditions. With virtually 3 44 gall drums of fuel in the bladder plus us and a 100 Kg of life raft and luggage even a powerful plane like this climbed slowly, with me watching oil temp all the way. The shortest route was straight back over the mountains of Sri Lanka then South East to Indonesia , Malaysia and Singapore . The air traffic controllers didn’t want us to go that way though, not being sure that we were smart enough to judge our altitude and pick our way safely through the mountains. To expedite our route, and thinking they didn’t have altitude radar Brett told made a mistake with our height, hoping to be turned south early. Well didn’t that cause a stir!! Caught, they left us North for longer than necessary to teach us a lesson!
Eventually we rounded the island climbing to 15,000 feet and using oxygen we headed down to Indonesia, I soon developed a splitting headache, Panadol didn’t help neither did a migraine tablet, I deduced it must have been sinus so after we cleared the mountains near Banda Acheh we requested a descent to 9000 ft. After a while I came good, it was sinus, and the cause was an ear infection I had picked up along the way. Fortunately Julie had packed a medical kit for every eventuality so out came the antibiotics! By the time we were routed over the Malacca straight between Sumatra and Malaysia it was getting dark, the night was incredibly still, and the lights of the fishing boats in the straight and the lights of Kuala Lumpur were absolutely magic. It really felt as though we were on a magic carpet. A view and flight we will remember. Soon, we were headed into Singapore airspace and the efficient controllers vectored us into Seletar , Singapore ’s general aviation airport, a British air force base before, (and for a while) during the war. It was a landing requiring full attention as this was a strange airport and no landing flaps! All went well though. I had been in touch with a cirrus owner there, Jean Jacques Beley and although he was away on business he had emailed through a lot of tips and instructions for Seletar and arranged for his friend John Giddens to meet us. John did and guided us through the immigration formalities with his local knowledge. He had booked a hotel and dropped us off there at 10.30 Pm or so. We hadn’t eaten and reception said there were some local restaurants just up the road. We had a wash, walked 30 meters and ordered a cold beer, sat out the front with the locals and ate two Singapore crabs, one Chilli one black bean! A great finish to the day! Singapore was looking pretty good.
John was picking us up at 4 in the afternoon so in the morning we had breakfast (Unusual for us) went on a river cruise to see the sights of Singapore and got off at orchard road. Not intending to buy anything Brett ended up with a camera and a Breitling aviators watch! John met us at the Hotel and took us to the airport to fill the plane and talk to immigration. With all the paperwork organised, and flight plan lodged we went to the aero club for a beer and a meal with some of the club guys. It was great night and 10 Pm came around too quickly, but with an early start again John dropped us back to the hotel.
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