President's Chatter
October 1, 2005

September was my busiest month since taking over the Presidency. Following on from the Benelux meeting in Amsterdam, which I wrote about last month I attended the German/Austrian and French Section meetings on successive weekends. After a weekend at home it was our District Conference.

The German/Austrian Section meeting held in Kitzbühel in Austria was one of the most varied that I have attended. Our arrival airfield, 2200 ft up in the Tyrol was approached between peaks, which rose to 7600 ft.  A spectacular arrival but, thankfully, one in totally clear conditions. Our options the next morning were to take an alpine balloon trip, visit a copper mine or have an introduction to alpine flying. We chose the flying. Our instructor Reinhard Haggenmüller was a most remarkable pilot – undoubtedly the most skilled that I have ever flown with. He had our aircraft doing things that even it didn’t know it could do! Friday evening saw the Gala dinner held in the hangars of the Red Bull organisation in Salzburg. Here there was an outstanding collection of aircraft, which were maintained regardless of cost. The next morning a cable car ride took us to the famous Hahnenkamm ski run. The day finished with a dinner at a mountain lodge with lively musical entertainment. When I tell you that one of our members showed his skill as a player of an inflated rubber glove you’ll get the flavour of the evening!  Next day we flew home in crystal clear conditions.

We were not so lucky with the weather the next weekend. Morning fog delayed our departure with the result we arrived late for the French Section’s Strasbourg meeting. Unfortunately we missed visits to the Maginot Line and a military radar facility. No matter, we soon got into the spirit of things at the local wine tasting when we joined up with the party in the evening. The following day we toured the Alsace countryside visiting the impressive Haut Koenigsbourg castle. The day concluded with a gala dinner on a cruise through Strasbourg. Unfortunately the forecast for Sunday was not particularly good so that a number of the more distant flyers to decided to leave early. The wisdom of the decision was confirmed the further west we flew – eventually however we outran the bad weather and landed home in CAVOK conditions.

The month ended with me addressing our District Conference on “Rotary’s Biggest Secret” – the Fellowships – and of course IFFR. There I had the privilege of meeting our sole Icelandic member, Ómar Steindórsson, who was the RI President’s representative. Another great month – thanks go to all those who made us so very welcome.

Tail winds,
Angus Clark
World President