MAD1

Now, boys, is there, and if so, a 'mustering point' at Perth where we'll assemble to 'start engines', 'clear prop', at Perth Airport?

Indeed TPD. Same to you and yours. At 68.5 years old, the 'senior's moments' are starting to kick in.

YCAG Caiguna. Last post from me for today. Gee you learn a lot about your own nation from this FS hobby. Good luck with landing on this dirt strip in the middle of nowhere. Real World (RW) image. At least there is a Roadhouse nearby, food, bed, comfort. I don't see any infrastructure at the strip, so no av fuel etc. (Might have to pack a few jerrycans of juice into the Cessna.) If you want to make it realistic, perhaps the comp should disallow refuelling there.

YCAG Caiguna. See Wikipedia 'During the 1960s and 1970s, Ansett and Trans Australia Airlines domestic flights used a VOR station at Caiguna as a turning point on routes between Perth and eastern Australian capitals such as Adelaide, Melbourne, and Sydney.'. In that article it mentions 'The Readymix logo geoglyph, created during the sealing of the Eyre Highway, lies around 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) north west of Caiguna.'. Maybe you'll be able to see it 'At the time of its creation the Readymix logo geoglyph was the largest such signage of its kind, and appeared in the Guinness Book of Records between 1972 and 1991, first as the world's largest advertising sign and, later, as the world's largest letters.[2][3][4] The 3.2 kilometres (2.0 mi) wide, 1.6 kilometres (0.99 mi) tall logo consists of the words "READYMIX" surrounded by a diamond. Each letter is 240 metres (790 ft) high by 180 metres (590 ft) wide, with a line thickness of 12 metres (39 ft).'. A good history of Caiguna and the Readymix logo. (I'd never heard of it before): 'About 1965, probably in winter , a decision was made to construct a giant rendition of the Readymix company logo virtually exactly halfway along the Eyre Highway, north of the 225 mile peg. One of the quarry surveyors was given the task of marking the logo out, and Allan Hoare, a grader driver, graded it into the plain over a holiday weekend. The grader easily cut through the few inches of soil, revealing the white limestone bedrock underneath. The absence of trees or large rocks obviated any need for bulldozing prior to grading, or rolling afterwards ... During the 1960s and 70s, Ansett and TAA domestic flights (Qantas was then a purely international operation) used Caiguna's VOR station as a turning point on routes to and from Perth, so the logo was beautifully visible to crew and passengers on flights between Perth and the eastern capitals. ... Increases in aircraft size, coupled with modern navigational technology, allow aircraft now to fly direct to Perth from the eastern states, across the Great Australian Bight, no longer needing to remain over land for navigation purposes. So by the 1980s scheduled domestic flights no longer overflew the logo, and it was left to deteriorate unseen, except for occasional scenic joyflights over it offered by the John Eyre motel. By 1998, the diamond was barely visible, and the letters all but overgrown'. So you won't see it today. What is the strip, again in the Nullabor Plain desert, that is very long, and is the emergency landing strip for large commercials? Is it on the route?

Hi Joop, season's greetings to you. Have set up my cockpit again and done a preliminary couple of flights. Am very happy again! See my new thread 'FS2002 Mazda'. Also, have you seen this 'The 2024 Australia Rally'. Am thinking to join the group and do part of it, perhaps you might be interested also. What are your flying plans for 2024? Do you have any big adventures planned? Re Oz weather, yes, we're experiencing some extreme events across the nation, and up in northern QLD, where you flew into in the Cape, they had a cyclone (hurricane), which itself was 'normal', but an intense rain event followed it, which caused unprecedented flooding especially in parts of Cairns. And in south-eastern Queensland, violent thunderstorm on Christmas day caused severe damage to the electricity network, 120,000 people were without power for a day or so, and now some thousands still don't have power, the electricity authority says they can't simply reconnect things as some of the infrastructure was so severly damaged it'll have to be rebuilt. It seems climate change is causing these more extreme and more frequent extreme events ongoing. Hope the Netherlands is not experiencing anything bad.

Glad you were able to fix it. Must be very, very frustrating, and you obviously had to spend a lot of time and effort fiddling, to get your system back as you want it.

Just saw this thread for the first time. Well, this is an epic adventure. It's a long way from Perth to Cairns via Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane. Am thinking to join in for part of it. I live near Kyogle, a country town in the Northern Rivers on the 'far north coast' (as settlement here was from Sydney, the term 'far' relates to Sydney) of New South Wales, about 2.5 hours driving time from Brisbane (which is over the border in Queensland). Per my new thread in the FS2002 forum, 'FS2002 Mazda', have finally got my cockpit set up again. Is all very old school, just an old laptop and it's screen, a yoke, and the default scenery etc. Used to fly out of Lismore YLIS. Have never been involved in a group event. Will be interesting to do it all in my default Cessna 172. Have never used the FS2002 flight planner nor ATC controlled flying. So will a good learning journey for me. I like the ethos of the group. By the way, as the event runs from Monday January 15th to Thursday February 29th, Australia's National Holiday, 'Australia Day' is Fri 26 Jan, two weeks in, nice timing. So those who haven't finished by then can enjoy a barbeque with the locals. No, we don't 'throw a shrimp on the barby', that was just for the film and the tourist advertising, but we do throw on heaps of beef - sausages, steaks, fried onions. And of course beer is compulsory! Shall investigate all the info and put in an entry. PS: Now I have the burden of having to come up with a very good, convincing story to tell my wife how this is very important for my mental health etc. etc., when she will keep asking me '... darling, do you really have to spend all that time out in the shed in your old car playing with that silly flying thing, when the house needs work ..., you promised me ... blah, blah, blah'! Answer will be something like '... yes I do, because [insert some list of reasonable excuses]...'. [Apologies for the large pics, had reduced them to about 100 kb each, thought they'd appear small and all in one frame, but they haven't. Will try better next time!]

Have started in this forum a new thread 'FS2002 Mazda' to record my adventures. Has video and pics.

20231214 Thursday 14 December 2023. Hello world, as mentioned in thread 'FS 2002 Graphics in middle', post Dec 14 'G'day boys. Am 'back in the saddle again'. ... ', am starting this thread to share my new adventures. 1 video and 15 still screenshots (taken with handheld camera, screenshot quality isn't good). At the risk of annoying the FlightSim.com gods ('act now, seek forgiveness later') have done for my first time, uploading the .mp4 video file to the Files section of the FS site. As I did a 58 second video of the old, retired, 1981 Mazda 929L car that I'm using as my sim cockpit, didn't seem possible to upload the vid to a post, but could upload it to Files. Put it in 'FS2002 Misc.' category. I just took 4 screenshots from the vid as .jpg, and am posting all 19 .jpg's here. (I did reduce the filesize of all for proper Internet upload.) After suffering a life-threatening flood in Feb 2022 that flooded my house to the ceiling, and going through the stress of looking for and buying a new property, this time 2 hectares (5 acres) in the country, flood free, am finally able to settle down and enjoy this flight sim hobby. It has and does give me great satisfaction, joy, peace and community fraternity (via this FlightSim.com website). Intend to post here my new journey. First fire up of the sim was 14 Dec 2023, the default Meigs, flew two circuits, didn't crash! Next will be Brisbane International, Australia, with AI traffic and ATC. Enjoy, and if interested, say 'g'day mate'! (By the way, by pure coincidence, when doing the video, on the local community (non-commercial) radio 'COW FM' ('Casino's Own Wireless' 107.9 FM, we're cattle country here, was a great Aussie soft-country singer Graeme Connors, with his 1996 (27 years old) hit 'A Road Less Travelled', very apt. So that afternoon was a halycon moment here in the Kyogle hills!)

Thanks David2510. Glad somebody has read my post. Been a long time since I looked at the FS site, noticed yesterday that there doesn't seem to be much recent activity in The Outer Marker, or here in FS2002 channels. Maybe David2510 we could buddy up, via this channel, and share some flying stories, with anybody else who is still active in this FS2002 channel. Have taken a short video and some pics of my setup. Once I decrease the pic filesizes, I'll post my little story here. Having done my re-inaugural flight from Meigs, Chicago, I switched airports over to Brisbane International, Australia, ready for my next adventure. Will do a circuit there and post similary vid/pics. Yes, indeed, it's lovely to have my 'toy' back again. Just gotta remember all the keyboard keys needed to press, it started coming back to me yesterday, and I had the back cover of the FS2000 handbook (has a graphic of Concorde on the front) which has the cheat sheet of keys etc. So as my wife is overseas currently, I know what I'll be doing Christmas Day, home alone, simply being very quite at home enjoying a mega flying session!

To JSMR who said 'My wife thinks I’m crazy.', you are, by definition, we all are, by definition!

G'day boys. am 'back in the saddle again'. Installed FS2002 on an old laptop Compaq Presario with Win Vista Home Edition on it. Amazed, it all just worked, great smooth frame rates. Just did my second flight from the default Meigs Field, Chicago.

Well, whatya know! Finally getting 'back in the saddle again'! Just set up again the old Mazda 929 retired car as a sim cabinet, with the old yoke, and neigbour's throw-away laptop (was in their garbage, asked if I could have it), installed FS2002 from the CDs. Works like a dream, lovely smooth frame-rate. Didn't expect it to work. Pure joy. Did a nice circuit from the default Meigs, Chicago in the Cessna. Couldn't believe it, lifted off at 65 knots, kept speed to 70, very gentle turns, came back around to finals, runway in sight and lined up, gentle touchdown. Been about a year since played with the sim. Pure joy! Ain't it great that old gear works on old gear, no fiddling needed. And no cost either. Hello boys, am back!

Hi all, am I not looking correctly in this newish FlightSim website, but I don't see any recent activity in 'Newcomer Services' or here in 'The Outer Marker'. Has the world gone quite? Oh, maybe it's partly due to the northern hemisphere summer vacation period just ending? I always enjoy browsing the forums over my morning coffee (often more satisfying then the news on TV, I don't read newspapers anymore, they're really old-fashioned!) I noticed this a couple of years ago. Presume all you northern hemisphere blokes get more active once the season changes and it gets cold, time to get active indoors etc. Re history, just finished reading a good read, 'Sully', 340 pages, Chelsey B. Sullenberger III landing his US Airways Airbus A320, flight Cactus 1549, in the Hudson River, New York, 15 January 2009, a 5 minute 34 second flight, after hitting geese which shutdown both his engines!. I remember watching it all on TV.

Have driven north up part of it in 1992, as an Aussie tourist, in a beatup old Forde campervan. Lovely country. Yes, would love to fly up it sometime.

First time Nels to look at this section of the FS website. Very nice article, have only quickly scanned it but it's great, will read it carefully for enjoyment later. I flew at least once on a 727 in Australia, perhaps more, so long ago now in the 1970s I think. Glad that you're still active on the FS site after your 'retirement'. Keep going mate!

Hi Joop and everyone. Will look at your XPlane vids. Got a book out of our local library recently on Amelia Earhert, good book, lots of pics. As others have posted, and as in the book, her disappearance is fascinating near to Howland Island, her intended landing spot. A very lonely place in the Pacific, as I'm sure Joop you appreciated when you flew that leg from New Guinea. A lot of ocean and nowhere to land.

Hi Joop, long time no talk. Finally, am starting to look at your videos, from where I stopped when you arrived in Bamaga, Queensland, Australia. Your leg 15 Bamaga to Honiara, Solomon Islands is interesting. I open up Google Maps and Wikipedia to find out about the places. A great way to learn world geography. Funny thing, very few Australians, including me, have any knowledge of our near neighbours to our north. So, I didn't know that the Solomon Islands is the location of Guadal Canal. I knew about the big WW2 battle there, the 'Battle of the Coral Sea'. Honiara International Airport was Henderson Field in WW2, built by the Japanese, captured by the USA. So much history in that little known part of the Pacific. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henderson_Field_(Guadalcanal)

Congratulations, a huge effort. And you didn't crash once, is that correct? (Or did you but you just didn't tell anyone about it?). By the way, your flight route map is your original one, perhaps you could post your final route map (which would show that you did go to Australia, to the tip of Cape York.)

Been awhile since I've been online. I like this thread, my thoughts precisely re all posts. 1. Joop: Glad to hear you've seamlessly gotten FS9 running on Win11. (And today am going to enjoy watching all your videos of your 'Around the world in a Learjet' that I haven't had a chance to watch yet. 2. PhrogPhlyer: love your saying 'Always Aviate, then Navigate, then Communicate. And never be low on Fuel, Altitude, Airspeed, or Ideas.'. I'd add the extra phrase 'especially all at the same time!'. In that scenario, the pilot's future is very limited! Ha, ha. 3. Question guys: I haven't got my sim going again, will need to build a new PC (or buy an older one). I have FS2000 and FS2002 (including the original boxes, perfect condition). As I'm only an occasional simmer, don't have much time or inclination to fiddle with stuff. Years ago I visited VATSIM and did lurk for a few sessions, in the proper manner, in my Cessna parked on the grass and observed traffic taxing and taking off. Was a good training experience. Then I couldn't connect anymore via FS2002 into VATSIM, they changed the connection infrastructure. So I believe that you can do group flying using FS2004, perhaps including within VATSIM. Is that correct? 3.1. If you can still connect into VATSIM and group fly via FS2004, is that situation likely to persist for some years, or are there plans to drop FS2004 out of connectability sometime? Anyone heard anything on the grapevine. (Of course, I'd be very disappointed and angry if I went to the trouble of getting FS2004, installing it, in the hope of getting into VATSIM group flying, only to find again my setup is 'too old'. (If there are any plans to drop it, I think there should be a world-wide protest to keep so-called 'legacy apps' being able to be used, for the 'greater good' of the worldwide sim community.)

Hmm, glad to hear FS2002 still lives, at least for some people. I haven't got my sim back up and running yet, need to build a new sim PC. Because I'm cheap, and got FS2000 and FS2002 for nothing (got the original boxes, all more or less pristine), and also philosophically, like the others in this thread, I just want to fly, not fiddle, and imagination is better than eye candy, and also the fact it runs on old hardware and operating systems, low demand on resources, it's good enough for my needs. So perhaps I'll keep it and not chuck it in the bin. Would like eventually to get into group flying, so was thinking to buy off e.g. eBay, FS2004, but unsure if can still connect into e.g. VATSIM and fly with others. Any thoughts guys on the lowest end / simplest /cheapest way I could get into group flying on the major sim networks?

Am enjoying catching up on your vids. Have started at Stage 15 Bamaga to Honiara. But meant to say in my previous comment about your tour of the Torres Strait islands, great that you used the DC3. It indeed has been a workhorse in the past in the remote parts of Australia. Being a DC3, it'll take a lot of punishment and was trusted as a reliable aircraft in those remote areas where airports are scarce and there are vast inhospitable distances.

Yes, Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines is a classic movie. And back then when making movies, no computer graphics, the 'props' were often real aircraft (perhaps newly built mockups, perhaps flyable) and filmed for real in the air. Yes, I remembered last night the 'little black book' was Jeppesen's (as the Wikipedia article explains), read about that in my FS2000 book that came with the CDs in the package.