Plane Distraction

The real estate people used to bring potential rich buyers to look at land using a sea plane. Watching them land on the water was a common sight for my littlies but just how common didn't hit home until our first vist to my parent's new location on the Sunshine Coast.

As we drove past Brisbane airport for the very first time a hysterical commotion broke out in the back seats of our van & a little voice shrieked,''Mummy! Mummy! That plane's going to crash!'' I was a little bewildered. The plane engine sounded just fine & I could see the landing gear coming down as the plane lined up the runway but Dino was getting frantic. And then it hit! None of my kids had ever seen a plane with wheels! Planes came with skids so far as they knew! It took some convincing & they had to watch one or two planes land safely before they actually believed us but I realised then living on an island had given my kids a distinctly lopsided view of life.

Some years later my father began taking my kids gliding with him. Just as well we cleared up the skid problem. Gliders come with neither wheels nor skids & are shot into the air slingshot fashion using a truck & a tow wire but the kids were well over it by then. They were more interested in getting their grubby paws on the glider controls & flying the thing.