Practice Day #1 Tuesday

Up early for a 07:15 breakfast call. Several people slept in and missed a great start to the day with hot & cold cereals, juices, coffee and a hot plate of eggs, bacon, tomato, mushrooms and toast.. all very tasty.  It's cold this am with about a 4C temp... it will warm up though.

Nice art work in the Manor House.

 Adele, the Chef, was kind enough to show Will and I the local Hobby Shop where we met the proprietor Bob Lloyd. Had a nice chat about access to the local field and the protocols required to fly there. Bob explained the field situation and we came to an arrangement for the team's use.  All good!

We then headed over to the practice site as it is very close to the hobby store and our accommodations for that matter. It was empty of flyers with only a lone security/operator Lawrence holding down the fort. We met and then said we would be back.

Will and I had a quick look around the facility and then headed back to the VGH. We rallied the guys and in short order were on our way to our first practice. The guys were pretty excited and soon had the planes up in the light NW winds. We also met Team Israel's flyer Shlomi Chester and his helper Masayo (who was also Japanese).

Practice facilities

Chariandy's planes get ready for the first flights SA.

Will and Shlomi talk props

Michi is ready!

All eyes on Chad as he set the pace with the first Team Canada practice flight.

Our team interpreter at work.... well actually she is fluent in English.

Everyone flew and the winds pick up to at least 30+ k giving everyone a chance to not only test prop combinations, but tweak expos as the planes were all too crisp in the thin air. We need a better day for trimming. Agnes and I headed back to pick up Kelly and head into Vereeniging to pick up some chairs and supplies (Cooler) at the Game store. It was like a Walmart in our country... with checkers at the door like Costco :-)

Mission complete we headed for the Midvaal Raceway to see the main Worlds site.  Not a lot going on so we headed back to the practice site and then home to VGH. The guys had just arrived and we decided to head back a short drive to the Henley Arms for dinner. This is very close to the Oprah's girls school. The food and service was very good and we enjoyed the ambiance...  nice fire etc.

Dinner at the Henley Arms

Back home we found out that Michi's bag was delivered to the Manor House. He was very happy and almost like a kid in a candy store..... or in this case, a man with fresh underwear!!

We lounged around the Manor House for the next couple hours and also made contact with the US team that have some batteries for us. We will meet up sometime tomorrow. That's about it until next update. Good night form South Africa.