On the 5th day we headed back to Vietnam. Our C-47 was packed with purchases and GI's. Our flight plan had been filed in Hong Kong so I felt safer knowing that Red Chinese authorities would almost certainly know our intended non-combat route on the return trip. We followed the same basic navigation procedures for the return Airways-Route on the way back to our "home away from home." It was very quiet for all 33 of us on the trip back to Vietnam.
I don't remember whether we were undercast this time or not when crossing that reef near Hainan. Seems like we could see it. This inexactness of memory underlines my not having kept a regular journal for later when finally deciding to expose inner thoughts to the population of the world. (I didn't know how much they would help, then.) We DID have lots of crap (stuff our GI passengers had bought) loaded in the back of the airplane; thankfully, our flight engineer and pilots figured the weights & balances sheet correctly. We didn't crash on takeoff, and everyone still got to bring all their purchases back. See -- I COULD have brought back that uniquely beautiful ivory chess set, after all! Damn!
You know this makes me wonder how many extra, little passengers had caught rides on the bodies of our pax in the form of STD's from selected Hong Kong prostitutes!? It is worth mentioning the "PCOD" -- a very important date to each GI in Vietnam. That was the "Pussy Cut-Off Date" after which no G.I. wanted to have sex because it would be possible for him to catch an STD, & have it undetectable when leaving Vietnam for "the World" (home), and wind up giving it to his wife or sweetheart(s) back home. Now, lest you think I am "projecting" my personal involvement & desire for that counter girl at the China Fleet store, nothing happened there! I am sure, with a little more effort on my part, I could have found the world of Suzie Wong. I only stopped into one regular dance club for a little while one evening, but felt so alienated because of my newlywed status that I just went back to the hotel. Of course, there, I looked out the hotel window at the high-rise tenements across the street . There were a lot of little late-night family businesses operating in their apartments even on the higher floors! Of course, some were relaxing and having supper as families. I don't think I ever DID see a Suzie Wong undressing in high-rise anonymity. Too bad.
Well, back to flying the southern route across the South China Sea! The only noteworthy event was when we were approaching the coast of S. Vietnam, two American jet interceptors with Delta tails (F-102's or F-106's) started buzzing us. They came so close, it made our little propeller-driven plane pitch around rather erratically (like entering weather turbulence) because those jet fighters crossed directly in front of us disrupting our wings' airflow. I was in the cargo compartment looking out the windows of the C-47 along with 30 other goof-ball Americans waving and laughing. We could see the faces of the single-seat jet pilots looking us over to make sure we weren't bad guys invading! Who else but a bunch of American GI's would get ecstatic about the military fun of actually being intercepted by planes prepared to shoot our asses out of the sky if our plane had the wrong insignia on it? I guess our flight plan made it to China's Hainan Island but not to Da Nang AB's U.S. interceptors! I just hoped that the pilots HAD filed our official flight plan or the "front-end" aircrew (pilots & nav) would be tagged for the jet fuel costs of an unnecessary scrambling & intercept!
posted by Richard A @ 10:36 AM
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