Midsummer 2008, at 71 degrees north, 26 degrees east and less than a thousand feet above the cold, slate grey waves of the Barents Sea; the mountainous Norwegian coastline was shrouded in low cloud to the south, and visibility was deteriorating. We had already flown past the North Cape, the most northerly point of Europe, and were now planning to fly down Norway’s rugged western coastline.

Then, through the spinning disc of the Cheetah’s propeller, little glistening shards of ice appeared. It suddenly dawned on me, we were flying into a snow shower, the OAT was hovering around freezing, and this was not the place to be! In less than a minute all 5 aircraft in our Viking formation had agreed that any hope of reaching our goal of Tromsø, over 100 nautical miles to the south west, had gone; a final victory to the weather gods that plagued our expedition. Reluctantly our little formation turned 180 degrees, to return to our airport of departure, ENMH, that serves the tiny fishing port of Mehamn in northern Norway. The undertaking had been planned several months previously.

Following the success of our 2007 trip to Morocco, the European Chapter of AYA decided that, for this year, the aim would be to fly opposite to the limits of northern Europe, aiming to meet up in southern Denmark and then fly up the west coast of Norway, around North Cape and return through Finland and Sweden. As with the previous year, Jörg put a lot of effort into the detailed planning and 5 Grummans plus a Glastar (whose owner had once had a share in a Grumman) eventually embarked on the trip in mid June. The weather prompted a change of plan from day one. The presence of a persistent low pressure system meant that our intended outward trip through Denmark and up the western Norwegian coastline was effectively blocked, and we decided that east about was the only practical option.

Thus it was that on Saturday, June 14th the Viking squadron, so our callsign, descended on the Danish island of Bornholm, situated in the Baltic Sea, half way between Germany and Sweden. The cast had changed somewhat from the previous year.