I remember going to Kelynack when the helicopters first arrived to be shown round.
I was duly impressed and also received a few BEA promotional brochures including one with a table of currencies, climate stats etc. for lots of exotic holiday locations which I treasured for years.
I think the helicopters were only there for a few months in the summeer of 1964 before the heliport was completed. How things change, I can t imagine many 10-11 year old boys being quite as enthralled as I was by being shown round a helcopter on the ground and those exotic holiday destinations would probably seem rather mundane nowadays.
Another aspect of this that has changed, I got shown around because we knew a member of staff at the airport,that s how things worked then. We took many visitors for a tour around the mill at Geevor, just a matter of asking one of our neighbours who was on the right shift. Imagine the insurance implications of such things nowadays, but then all we locals used to wander through the site on our way to the cliffs etc. Nobody bothered so long as we didn t get in anyone s way or fool about.
Madness ... so now before the reduced time flights we have to toil our way along the Penwith roads to get to the airport, may as well travel by ship? Oh, wait a minute, is there going to be a ship, or will we have to go to Falmouth? Hang on a minute ... what the blazes is the fare???? Maybe another year, when I have won the Lottery ... that is if I boughta ticket !! This is plain daft ... a number of people will be put off a holiday in the Isles of Scilly, if they cannot heave out of the train and then a quick jaunt to either ship or helicopter, having trained all the way down from Birmingham or crossed from Japan, to be crammed in a bus under the luggage.
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