Whales and Rats

It's quite reassuring to be working once again, especially considering the present state of the offshore exploration market.  And of course, after almost four months at home, it's invigorating to be taking these noisy beasts to the skies once again.  With a few thousand hours of Puma time under my belt, I'm surprised that it took me as long as it has to regain that feeling of being at ease, especially in a bird that I've shared many an adventure with.  But after many hours spent sitting in the seat, reviewing manuals and procedures and systems, playing with the myriad of buttons and switches, and flying long trips most every day, it all comes creeping back eventually, reconnecting all those Puma related synapsis firing off in my addled head.

The L2 variant of the French Super Puma is considered a stepping stone between the L/L1 variants that I'm well versed in, and the all singing, all dancing, ultra modern 225.  Yes, the L2 has a Flight Management System, but it's one the oldest ones you could possibly find in any aircraft, and while it functions just fine for enroute navigation, you can easily get lost in the depths of pages and key combo functions, as simplicity was not a priority when they put this puppy together.  There are glass displays, called Smart Multifunction Displays, but being first generation glass, I don't find them to be a huge improvement over the old steam gauges.  Managing the flight directors is a tad archaic, as it's very far behind the AW139's simplistic functionality, and in my humble opinion, the L2's technology is not much of an improvement over the L/L1's 4-axis system.  In many ways it's more complex, and thus, a higher workload, not something that's very desirable.  But as any Puma pilot will tell you, this is a "Pilot's Helicopter", one that needs to be flown and requires the pilots to have their shit together.  I must admit, I quite like it!

So we depart most every morning out of Gabon bound offshore for the deep water of the Atlantic, and I look towards the North-West and home, my house being but one hell of a swim.  We pass an area brimming with sea life, as schools of tuna and dolphins frolic amongst pockets of swimming sustenance, and playful hump back whales launch themselves high into the air and come crashing down in massive plumes of white water, and once again, I'm reminded of offshore Nova Scotia and home.  Any day you see a whale is a good day, and we've got the best view there is.

Evenings are spent together with other crew members in any one of the many restaurants serving Port-Gentile, some amazing, some not so much, but I thought I had found a quaint colourful favourite, serving huge mounds of fresh tuna at quite reasonable rates, only to have a rat scamper across my feet one night.  In defence of the restaurant, I was eating outside on their patio, so rats be damned, I'm still eating there regularly.  Tonight we've got a base BBQ in the works up on our hotel rooftop.  Life is good!