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Landing at Mouse Hunter’s.

John Lynch was an accomplished pilot and aeroplane builder. He lived outside of town. A hermit who kept his front gate padlocked to keep visitors out of his property on which he had built an airstrip to fly from.
I knew John as “Mouse Hunter well". He had during a recent mouse plague bragged he could shoot a mouse at 20 yards off the hip. Originally know as "The Great White Mouse Hunter". The handle being bestowed by Christine Riley. Mouse Hunter owned a Tiger Moth, an RV6 and a glider. He was once an engineer on a freighter ship. He lived a sort of Santa Claus life building toys, mostly models just for his pleasure.

I’d visit him by landing on his strip and I would pull up at his front door. Myself and my friend Terry Walsh did that once in a De Havilland Beaver. In the late ‘80’s. What a disastrous landing. Came so close to a crash. It went like this. The Beaver has one pole and that can be flipped from left hand side to right.. It has one set of peddles which are a fixture on the left side. I had the pole on the right and Terry had the peddles on the left. One or the other of us must have both because they must be co-ordinated.. What a disaster. Off to the left we went, then to the right and we kept up this totally uncontrolled landing until we came to a stop at his front glass doors. The propeller about to trash this front entrance where Mouse Hunter had been standing. Mouse Hunter didn’t waste time standing around, he was off.

Conclusion of the story. The brain that controls the pole must also be the brain that controls the pedals.

I did my own laundry that afternoon. I didn’t want my secret to get out.

This is Mouse Hunter in his MG. Note his number plate. Merc man submitted it in a big picture earlier on.