South African Safari part 1

[thindog]

African Safari Part 1 (3 Parts wait for the finish)
I decided to showcase a collection of SAA aircraft old and new and what better way then a South African Safari, so get to Heathrow and I will pick you up and fly you to my country.



1. Well while you are all getting your stuff together I am flying from Cape Town to Heathrow in the Boeing 747-200 Combi.



2. I have to admit he 747 is a very classy aircraft and that is from an Airbus fan.



3. The Helderberg was a lovely looking bird.



4. Heading into the evening and I will see you all in the morning for an early departure.



5. I said early... The Airbus A340-300 and we are heading back for Johannesburg. I remember seeing SAA’s top gun pilot Skully Levin flying this aircraft over the Cricket fields at the South African version of the 50 over a side World Cup on its delivery flight to South Africa.



6. Now that is a pretty sight.



7. Almost a tad early on the touchdown.



8. And we are down without too much fuss.



9. Next day and its time to go way back in time. The Avro York in a very early SAA livery.



10. She flies so beautifully for such a big old girl.

Part 2 follows

[thindog]

11. 45 minutes later and we are doing a visual into Bloemfontein no namby pamby ILS horse pucky because Bloemfontein doesn’t have that stuff, so this is the real thing!



12. O.k. so I didn’t centre line it but at least I got it down on the black stuff...




13. Leaving Bloemfontein for a short hop to Kimberly in the Embrair 135.



14. A very sleek looker she is, this is the same as the one that overshot the runway at George early last year. The aircraft was written off, thankfully no casualties.



15. Nicely down in Kimberly and no I won’t overshoot.



16. Back to another old timer the DC3 also in early SAA markings.



17. Kokstad is a town 70 kilometres from Matatiele and it sits in the shadow of Mt Currie a dormant Volcano that last erupted as recently as 1614. A pilot flying an SAA DC3 in about the 1930’s insisted on flying VFR in very cloudy conditions and crashed into Mt Currie resulting in the loss of all souls on board.



18. I won’t make that mistake and look, we are back in Cape Town, last one on the beach is a damp squib!



19. Aah the lovely De Havilland Dove is taking us to George.



20. It may look a bit like a bus but it flies like a dream.

Part 3 follows

[thindog]

21. Almost down. A few years back South Africa’s fallen cricket hero Hansie Cronje was on board an aircraft that flew into a mountain above George, a lot of speculation surrounded the crash as the aircraft was on finals but flew over the runway at right angles to crash into the mountain, and this while it was on an ILS beam?



22. Okay here we go again thanks to Jan. The SAA Hawker Siddeley HS.748



23. And this one carries us uneventfully to Port Elizabeth



24. From Port Elizabeth to East London on a 737-800



25. I was stationed at a little town called Grahamstown during my military service just 70 km inland from Port Elizabeth, oh and we are in pineapple country.



26. Leaving East London on a Vickers Viscount. The little town of Bathurst is not far from here and it boasts a huge pine apple shaped building that houses a museum containing all artefacts relating to pine apple farming in this area.



27. East London is the only sea port in South Africa situated on the mouth of a river.



28. The end of part one finds us at King Shaka International situated in between sugar cane fields a few km’s outside the city of Durban, South Africa’s deepest sea port .


Join me next week for part 2


FINISH

[NMLW]

Very nice selection of aircraft and liveries Rory. Great set of pix.

[pappy55]

Intresting shots.. I have to admit I have never really flown in Africa.. Think I have flown about twice to the north coast in all my years of simming..

[aircav1970]

Great variety of planes Rory,enjoyed them all!

[lifejogger]

Well done Rory, I enjoyed looking at all the aircraft. Again nice job.

[thindog]

Thank you NMLW all the liveries are SAA through the years.

Pappy South Africa is a trully beautiful country to live in, and there are no lions wondering in the streets.

Aircav this is only half the aircraft the rest are comming next week, and that will be just as varied.

I am glad you enjoyed these lifejogger.

[peer01]

Beautiful collection again, I had to find this threat after viewing part 2.
Do I miss the Vickers Viking?

[thindog]

Yes Jan I did not include the Viking as I have featured it many times before in other threads. BTW WELCOME BACK JAN