airborne, Bob reduced power and levelled off until Mike and I had come up on his starboard side. As soon as our climb was established, we entered cloud and remained there throughout the climb to 29,000 feet.
Soon the cloud gave way to cirrus and then cleared completely. It was a joy to open out into battle formation and feel relaxed after flying hundreds of miles in cloud. Below us was endless desert, which I was seeing for the first time in my life. The barren land of sand and rocks supporting a few clumps of brown scrub looked so uninviting that I found myself wondering why so much blood had been shed for this vast desolate land called Somalia.
The desert seemed to go on forever until we reached the mountainous region in the north. We crossed the coast at Berbera with Djibouti visible on our left. Out over the Gulf of Aden a surprisingly large number of vessels, trailing long wakes, headed to and from the Red Sea. Our descent commenced long before the Arabian coastline was visible.
When Aden Bay and the distinctive mass of Mount Shamsham came into view we remained in loose formation, long enough to take a look at the peninsula on which Mount Shamsham, Aden town and the suburb of Crater stood separated from the mainland by a narrow isthmus.
Across the entire width of this isthmus lay the runway of RAF Kormaksar with beach and sea at both ends. The only road linking the mainland to Aden ran right across the centre of the runway with RAF buildings spread out over a large area on the Aden side. Apart from the sea, everything looked just as dismal to me as the brown African desert behind us.
We ran in along the runway in echelon starboard for a standard formation break onto downwind. Whilst in the descending turn for landing, I noticed that the water was shallow for some distance out into Aden Bay. Later I was told that sharks favoured this particular patch, but in all the landings I made thereafter I never spotted one.
The moment I switched off the air-conditioner on landing I became aware of the heat and high humidity that had me sweating during the long taxi run to dispersals. The Commanding Officer of RAF Kormaksar and our ever-cheerful, shirtless sweating technicians welcomed us. The CO then led us to our poorly lit, dull-looking crew- room.
Next we were shown the aircrew changing-room. The stench from the sweat-stained flying overalls hanging on lines of hooks was overpowering. My first impression was that our RAF counterparts were not up on their hygiene but within a week I realised that our kit looked and smelled the same.
It was late afternoon so we were taken to our billets to settle in and clean up. We then went to the ‘Jungle Bar’ adjoining the Officers’ Mess. This was a large area under a trellised canopy covered by creepers where one could sit and enjoy a drink in good company under coloured lights with a gentle breeze coming from banks of electric fans. The RAF officers insisted that this was a cool time of the year and suggested we try Aden in July when sweat ran so freely that one only needed to urinate every third day, no matter how much one drank.
Our accommodation was good; four men sharing a room with plenty of fans and decent ablutions. Apart from the Jungle Bar, there was a large air-conditioned bar where drinks were served at amazingly low prices, Aden being a duty-free port.
It was in this bar that I first acquired a taste for beer because it was inexpensive and I found it to be the most effective thirst quencher. I enjoyed the fact that the beer did not intoxicate me at sea level as it did in Rhodesia at 5,000 feet. Presumably the high rate at which one’s body sweated had a part to play in this.
Some distance from base, beyond Aden town on the southern end of the peninsula was the Tarshayn Officers’ Club where we could take a swim in the sea in safety behind rusty pole-borne shark nets. The beach was clean, the water crystal-clear and tepid but the sun made daytime swimming so unpleasant for me that I only swam at night. Most of my visits to this club were with Bob Woodward who did not seem to be too popular with the other squadron pilots. I never did get to know why because I got on well with him. Bob, a thickset man of medium height, displayed amazing agility by frequently executing a string of seemingly effortless flick-flack somersaults along the beach.
All travel to Aden town and the club was by taxi. The cost was not high but the driving habits of the Arab drivers were maddening. No Arab driver I met could cruise at a constant speed. It was a case of foot on accelerator to speed up and foot off to slow down. The continuous forward and rearward force on one’s body, about every three seconds, sometimes turned annoyance into hysterical laughter. Vehicle maintenance was poor and only when the hooter failed was a vehicle considered seriously unserviceable because it was used constantly, even on deserted stretches of road.
The only driver I encountered who could cruise was a fellow from India who had spent time in Britain. He complained about Aden drivers. He said that in India nobody obeyed the rules of the road so every driver knew where he stood. In Britain everyone obeyed the rules so, again, everybody knew precisely where they stood; but in Aden some obeyed and others did not which made driving plain dangerous.
There was a peculiarity about shopkeepers in Aden; they could spot a Rhodesian way off and would start shouting, “Hello Rhodesia. Hello Rhodesia, come see my shop.' How they distinguished us from the RAF people we could not tell. Our clothing was the same as our RAF counterparts, we wore the same wristwatches and sandals yet even ex-RAF Brits serving in the RRAF were immediately identified as Rhodesians.
One particular shopkeeper called Smiley gained most of our business because he had the best shop in town. I was there one afternoon when the most beautiful woman I have ever seen, even to this day, came gliding through the door. Dressed in white and obviously Eurasian, everything about this tall lady was so absolutely perfect that I wondered if I was looking at an angel. Moments later, her husband dressed in white slacks and jacket, came in. He was impossibly handsome and so neat despite the heat that I felt doubly sure that God had sent down His angels—but why to Aden?
When the couple, whose English-speaking voices and accents matched their looks, left the shop to return to their ship, I could not remember why I had come into the shop. Smiley, realising I was in a tizzy over the couple, laughed and told me that they were film stars from India who stopped over in Aden from time to time on their many sea cruises to the USA and Europe.
Having been brought back to earth, I remembered that I had come to buy something to take home to Beryl. One item I bought was an elaborately painted, hand-operated sewing machine called a Lion, a direct copy of the Singer sewing machine. Yvonne Stajer, Beryl’s sister, eventually took this machine to Canada where it is still rated as a good collector’s item.
Smiley talked me into looking at some special German brassieres that he said were tops in women’s underwear. Knowing no better, I took him at his word and looked at them; but I had no idea what size to take. He was gesturing cup size with his hand when I noticed an RAF wife in the shop who was about Beryl’s build. Much to my embarrassment Smiley called the woman over and I left with two pairs of bras and a set of seven knickers embroidered for every day of the week. When I gave these to Beryl she laughed, saying the knickers would not fit a ten-year-old; but she said nothing about the bras. For years they remained amongst her underclothing until, I guess, she found someone to give them to, unused!
We were instructed to attend an Officers’ Dining-in Night that was quite unlike any I had known in Rhodesia. There were four RAF squadrons on base together with all the supporting services; so about a hundred officers sat down in full mess dress at superbly laid tables. Even before the main course was over, large quantities of salt tablets, ever present in bowls on the dining tables, were being thrown up into the fast rotating overhead fans that propelled them around the room like shotgun pellets. Next came little balls that exploded when thrown at any surface offering moderate resistance. Hilarious laughter, flying tablets, bangs and smoke filled a room that seemed more like a Goon Show set than a gathering of Her Majesty Officers. I must say we Rhodesians found it great fun, probably because such behaviour would never have been condoned at home.
We received our flight briefings in the Station Operations Room where the air-conditioning was so cold that having to return to the hot air outside was like walking into a blast furnace. Doctors had told us that going from cold into the heat was more likely to bring on flu than moving from hot to cold, but none of us was any worse off for the twice daily Ops Room visits.
The first briefing was for those of us who were new to the Aden Protectorate. This was for an orientation cruise up the eastern coast to the Oman border, along the northern border with Saudi Arabia, down the western border with Yemen then out to Pemba Island in the Red Sea.
Along the route the features we would use in the following days were pointed out. Radar-controlled anti- aircraft guns along the Yemeni border presented a threat which necessitated both height and distance separation,
