Braithwaite, nr Keswick, Cumbria

(1) Tod and I arrived at Berrier Airfield and met Roger, an experienced helicopter and gyrocopter pilot and instructor. A friend of his, Chris, landed later in his aircraft with one of his pupils. It was decided that I would fly with Chris and Tod would be in Roger's aircraft. Here, the two pilots discuss the flight plan.
(2) Roger's aircraft parked in one of his fields, fuelled and ready to fly.
(3) 11:30 am: Nervously, I'm now sitting in the front seat of Chris' aircraft. I have to attend to one or two tasks prior to take-off and I'm in radio communication with my instructor in the seat behind.
(4) 12:06pm: Take-off, climb and now in flight, the instruments show we're at about 1500 feet and our airspeed is 80 mph. We are heading north-east towards the western end of Hadrian's Wall.
(5) 12:15 pm: Roger and Tod were leading the way, here they are on our port side as we head towards Hadrian's Wall, passing close to Carlise Airport. We listened in to Air Traffic Control chatter on a different frequency as we passed this airport.
(6) 12:28 pm: We reach our objective, the Housesteads Fort. The last time I saw this site I was walking the Pennine Way in 1987. Great to see it this time from 1000 feet!
(7) Crikey, I've just flown an aircraft (though the rudder was under Chris' control). This should count as an item ticked on my bucket list.
(8) 12:41 pm: Now with Roger's aircraft, Tod took this photo of the cockpit instruments. He has a satnav and the plane is moving in a westerly direction.
(9) A shot of Chris' gyrocopter taken by Tod. We weren't really this close, I have zoomed in to show more detail.
(10) Heading south back to Berrier, another shot of our aircraft taken by Tod.
(11) 13:12 pm: Now both gyrocopters are safely back on terra firma.
(12) After returning to Braithwaite from the airfield, we decided to stroll up the fells to unwind. Here I am approaching the top of the fell called 'Stile End' to the west of Derwent Water. We've had quite a day to remember!