The Mach Loop and an impatient girlfriend

[Collectingbrass]

The boss and I have a couple of days leave to take by the end of March and given her fascination with fast jets I thought a couple of days in Wales taking in some time at the Mach loop might be a nice break. The trouble is, as with most potential SWTs she won't have the patience to sit on the hill side all day just in case, not without it costing me a fortune in Chester the next day anyway.

How accurate are the flight schedules published by the MOD?

[Pete102]

Not at all seems to be the general opinion.

[ecsrobin]

It's very much hit and miss what is published is only the tango area (authorised down to 100ft) which is south of the Mach loop and does not guarentee aircraft.

[Craig85]

I have a love/hate relationship with the mach loop. When it comes together there is no better place to be, when it doesn't the frustration and boredom can be hard to take. To be fair, I think it is because you have to taste failure to truly appreciate success that makes it so...

I have been with the wife, and for what it's worth we done corris and cad west in glorious light and blanked. It cost me quite a lot in new clothes, meals out and probably some home improvement so I was pretty annoyed, but I would have been more annoyed if we were there in Wales and front liners were going over all day and I wasn't on the hill...

[Stuck In A Lift]

I was there for most of the day today, two Hawks went over but nothing else. They were together though, sounded good enough. I may have missed other passes as I went to forage (sp?) for food.

[blinkythefish]

Collectingbrass said:

The boss and I have a couple of days leave to take by the end of March and given her fascination with fast jets I thought a couple of days in Wales taking in some time at the Mach loop might be a nice break. The trouble is, as with most potential SWTs she won't have the patience to sit on the hill side all day just in case, not without it costing me a fortune in Chester the next day anyway.

How accurate are the flight schedules published by the MOD?

The key here is how you prepare for it. Don't say that you are going to sit on a hill all day just on the off chance a couple of jets go buy. Get a picnic hamper, make up a decent picnic - not just a couple of sainsbury's sausage rolls - with a few bottles of wine and sell it as a romantic picnic in the valleys, with the occasional fast jet overhead. If the weather's half decent, and/or you've taken the right clothing, you'll get 2 or 3 hours before she starts to notice you've been there that long.

[Collectingbrass]

blinkythefish said:

Collectingbrass said:

The boss and I have a couple of days leave to take by the end of March and given her fascination with fast jets I thought a couple of days in Wales taking in some time at the Mach loop might be a nice break. The trouble is, as with most potential SWTs she won't have the patience to sit on the hill side all day just in case, not without it costing me a fortune in Chester the next day anyway.

How accurate are the flight schedules published by the MOD?

The key here is how you prepare for it. Don't say that you are going to sit on a hill all day just on the off chance a couple of jets go buy. Get a picnic hamper, make up a decent picnic - not just a couple of sainsbury's sausage rolls - with a few bottles of wine and sell it as a romantic picnic in the valleys, with the occasional fast jet overhead. If the weather's half decent, and/or you've taken the right clothing, you'll get 2 or 3 hours before she starts to notice you've been there that long.

I like you're thinking, although she is a high maintenance southerner so I don't think she'll see a picnic for a couple of hours on a Welsh hill side in March as "Romantic"...