Masoala in Zurich / Introducing a new toy

A zoo can be a very sad place. All the animals locked up in cages not bigger than a couple of telephone-cells – for those who still remember what a telephone-cell is. The zoo in Zurich had to deal with a considerable loss of visitors probably due to the lack of modernisation of its facilities. So they came up with a completely new idea: Why not build a hall as big as two ice-hockey stadiums and plant rain-forest in there? All the animals that live in such a rain-forest should also live in that hall, and the visitors can walk through the hall on walk-ways and see the animals without glass or metal bars in between. Of course some animals were considered too dangerous for such an exhibition, so no tigers, poisonous snakes and other ‘fierce creatures’ were let in the hall. The whole project is called ‘Masoala’, as is the name of the rain-forest in Madagascar. See some impressions here...

Chameleon catching a fly

Gecko posing for the picture

Unknown bird - there are hundreds of these orange things!!!

Chameleon stalking

With this post I’m also introducing a new toy of mine. Yes, I did it: I bought the brand new Nikon D300. Although it's a rather expensive camera, I think it's worth each penny. It took me some time to get familiar with it, but now, after almost a month, I know what the main menues are - of course I still haven't tested all the 400 or so sub-menues... See sample-pictures here.

Sparrow greeting a snail

Dragon-head flower - can't remember the correct name...

Cherry-tree

Flightforum Flight Rally / Spacecaptain Claude Nicollier

It’s April and the Flightforum has carried out the annual flight-rally. This year’s destination was the airfield La Blecherette at Lausanne. It was the seventh rally, and this year we had 60 planes taking part. And as if it was magic: The seventh time the weather was with us!

I flew with my ‘long time rally-pilot’ Jeff again this year, a man who earns his money flying A321’s for a large German carrier, and a man who emanates confidence like no other pilot I’ve ever met flying a small plane. This time we flew with HB-KOE, a french Robin DR-400 equiped with the latest avionics. Also joining us were Melanie, Jeff’s girlfriend, and Martin, one of my former YMCA-mates.

We took off in Birrfeld and headed south first, towards Lucerne. Turning right we passed the Pilatus Mountain, the airfields Alpnach, Kägiswil and Meiringen. Next we passed Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen and entered the Jungfrau Region. The flight track then lead us over the Schilthorn and Gruyerre. Then Jeff asked Martin who sat in the co-pilots seat to take over the controls – Martin was happy as a clown, as this was his first time flying an airplane on his own. We followed the motorway towards Vevey and then entered Lausanne airspace and enqueued the Lausanne approach pattern. After an interesting landing on the upward sloped strip we taxied to our parking and took a short look at the other planes.

The highlight of this year’s rally was a lecture of four-time Space Shuttle astronaut Claude Nicollier. The lecture was very interesting and held a wealth of information about the Space Shuttle and its missions. Mr. Nicollier also brought in funny things like: ‘There are written procedures for everything in the space shuttle – even for using the toilet...’

On the way back we flew more or less directly to Birrfeld. We overflew Romont, passed by Fribourg, did a circle over Bern and Staufen and then landed safely at our homebase. Our team will most probably fly together again next year - unless Jeff has other duty with a larger plane.

Lucerne with the famous Chapell-Bridge

North face of the Eiger

Turning final at Lausanne La Blecherette

The Bundeshaus at Bern - including about 8'000 people who demonstrated for a free Tibet

Claude Nicollier and me

See the whole album here.