Maxi Gainza's Birthday Party
Bremgarten
15-21 Sept 2011
On 16th September, 2011, some 20 aircraft of The Air Squadron, carrying 28 members and around the same number of guests, arrived throughout the day at the old German Air Force Fliegerhorst of Bremgarten in south-west Germany to begin a long week-end of aeronautical and motor-racing extravaganza as guests of Maxi and Paula Gainza. The week-end constituted a belated celebration of Maxi and Paula’s wedding which took place earlier in the year and fulfilled Maxi’s wish to show his friends in the Squadron how real men should play with their toys…..
Departures from England were spread over two days. The really low and slow brigade, consisting of two Tiger Moths, A Super Cub and a Curry Wot (a curried what?) and led by Ralph Hubbard, left on Thursday morning and enjoyed a leisurely flight through lower French airspace, overnighting in the champagne capital of Epernay. At the other end of the Squadron’s fleet spectrum was Viktor and Lorraine’s Bombardier CL300 which consumed upper airspace at 472 knots to land at nearby Basle (Bremgarten having no landing aids) after a flight of only 63 minutes from Biggin Hill.
The array of toys which greeted those who flew into Bremgarten was mouth-watering. Parked in front of the hangars used by the Meier Brothers, Maxi’s partners in Max Alpha, were a Focke-Wolfe 190, Mustangs (including Robs Lamplough’s “Miss Helen”), Yak 3, Harvard, Spitfire, Corsair and half a dozen Bugatti racers that would have had early members, Patrick Lindsay and Sam Clutton, weak at the knees. And all except the single-seaters were for Squadron members to play with…….
Most stayed at the Landhotel Krone where sturdy members of the Malteser Fanfarengzug Heitersheim Oompah band gave the Squadron a brassy welcome before dinner in the Krone’s beautifully restored barn.
Saturday was to prove unique! All meticulously planned by Maxi and managed, in the face of continuous weather adversity and last-minute plan changes, by his delightful and efficient assistants, the flurried David Plaz and unflurried Jolanda Ferrat-Fluri. During the morning a steady and assorted stream of Squadron aircraft flew over the misty hills of the Black Forest and down to Friedrichshafen on the shores of Lake Constance. There we visited the Dornier and Zeppelin museums and then took a lazy luncheon cruise on the still waters of the lake in the beautiful and immaculately preserved paddle steamer “Hohentwiel”, to the strains of a delightful jazz band playing dreamily on the stern.
Sadly the Zeppelin flight was cancelled owing to unserviceability (I always thought gas-bags were suspect) and as adverse weather was coming in from the west a hasty return was called for. Bounced by a pair of Mustangs and left in their slipstream, the vintage wing found the return flight interesting as the tops of the Black Forest disappeared into cloud and rain, pressing them ever lower and slower until they found themselves navigating down south and west facing valleys to make a very circuitous and wet return to Bremgarten.
Sunday was for serious play. The group was split into three, with the younger bloods staying on the airfield to sample Robs’s and Maxi’s Mustangs, Maxi’s and Stefan’s Harvards and Maxi’s Yak 3. (Maxi, you’re a married man now, you shouldn’t be allowed all these toys!) The more mature among us were offered the choice of a trip to Colmar or a visit to Mulhouse to inspect either the Textile Museum or the Schlumpf’s Car Museum, the ladies opting for the fabrics while the mature pilots chose the machinery. Each world-class museum on its own warrants a special trip to Mulhouse. Meanwhile, back at the airfield the heavy metal was being fired up for the Squadron’s fighter-jock wannabees, all who came down with far broader grins than the rather nervous smirks with which they got airborne. Briefing for the afternoon’s flying took place in Maxi’s sumptuous rest-room above Max Alpha’s immaculate toyshop, and everyone who put their name down for a flight was accommodated despite one Mustang propeller oil leak and a rare Harvard directional divergence on landing. And all the while the Bugattis were burping and screeching their way round the peri-tracks at truly alarming speeds which created mayhem with the nerves and hairstyles of those Squadron members still blessed with both, and hanging on for dear life, which would have caused Formula One chief Max Moseley to suffer cardiac arrest.
The climax to this wonderful week-end was reached on Sunday evening with a dinner/dance in Hangar 2. There are hangar parties and hangar parties and this was neither; it was quite simply jaw-dropping. A chequered table cloth dining area had been set in the middle of the hangar surrounded by subtly illuminated Spitfire, Mustang, Focke-Wolfe 190 and Yak 3, presided over by Maxi’s black Corsair in front of which played a quintet with singer from the live band who had so royally entertained the Squadron at Le Touquet on its 40th anniversary. Happy memories. Cavernous roofs and service piping were hidden by blue drapes suspended in bomb-burst style across the entire hangar; the champagne flowed and the party began. It is a bit difficult to remember exactly what happened after the superb dinner but this old goat suspected that Maxi had some entertainment in store for us when two very pretty young ladies who had been discretely socialising with the guests disappeared behind the scenes. The lights dimmed and right on cue two helmeted, oxygen-masked and flight-suited figures popped out of the Corsair’s cockpit. Now all service pilots know that in warm weather not much is worn under a flying suit and as the temperature was rising perceptibly in the hangar so it behove these two pilots to remove their flying kit. To thunderous applause a dark-haired Rhinemaiden clad only in Janet Reger and parachute harness shimmied across the stage followed through the dry ice mist by a statuesque blonde Brunhilde trailing her flying gear and clad in - masterstroke - a Squadron badged bra that later disappeared mysteriously into the Chairman’s safe-keeping and is now rumoured to be a hot number in Agent Provocateur. The band struck up; the singer beckoned and the dancing began. Robs Lamplough, in newsboy cap and newly acquired black bomber jacket danced as good a tango as you will see this side of Buenos Aires and which would have guaranteed him a place in the final of Strictly; the music, the rhythm and the singing carried the stalwarts well into the wee hours……………..
Departures later that morning were hampered by bad weather coming in from the west again as if willing us to stay longer, and the low and slow had to return to Bremgarten for a second attempt to leave German airspace after the Tiger Moths failed to out-climb rain, cloud and icing at 10,000 feet – a little higher than their normal comfort altitude. The Meier Brothers’ German engineering efficiency had the Chairman’s Baron on its way after a puncture required a quick wheel change and by the evening everyone had left; everyone that is except for those who stayed to enjoy the Shauinsland Hill Climb, and Robs with his “Miss Helen”. Robs had flown his Mustang to Bremgarten, flown to Friedrichshafen and back, flown half a dozen trips with passengers, and all the while with an ever-increasing propeller oil leak which had thwarted all the efforts of the Meier engineers, and was to ground “Miss Helen” at Bremgarten for the next five weeks while Robs sourced new oil seals for her - a truly cruel reward for his enterprise and his generosity.
What fun it all was. Maxi and Paula, your magnanimity, and that of the Meier brothers and the Bugatti owners, was magnificent, unforgettable and unrepeatable - when can we do it again?
Martin Barraclough
