William
William, a friend and previous co-worker of mine, is a member of a radio controlled model aircraft club in York, SC. He’s always looking for new places to fly his aircraft so we invited him to come out and spend a Saturday with us here at Southern Hills Lavender. William rolled up in his Prius on a what turned out to be a clear, cool October day. He opened the trunk on the car and revealed the aircraft.
Look at that controller!
Man, the adult version of radio controlled aircraft is a whole lot cooler than the RC stuff I used to get from Radio Shack as a kid! This copter had 6 rotors, GPS hold, a camera, a claw, and could even land itself if need be! After a few minutes of setup the copter, or aerial entertainment device as I like to call it, was ready to go. William took the machine up for a flight and showed us what it could do. It all seemed simple enough until he asked if I would like to fly it. I agreed and took the copter for a spin. It was not that hard to fly after William switched on the GPS hold, throttle control, and a number of other featured designed to help a novice like myself take flight. An old pro like William does not need all those features, but I was sure glad to have them when I was at the controller.
As I mentioned earlier, this copter has a camera mounted on it for taking aerial photos. William agreed to do a few fly overs of our property and got us some excellent aerial photos of our place. He was even able to recreate an aerial photo of the land taken decades earlier. Interestingly, the old photo and new photo look nearly identical except for the size of the trees.
If you decide to get aerial photos this way, please honor a few simple rules. Respect your neighbors privacy; do not take images of your neighbors or their land without permission. Be aware of birds of prey and any nesting areas near the flight area. Don’t try to operate in secrecy; be prepared to answer questions about what you are doing and the aircraft itself. Afterall – it’s recreational flying and the pilot is having fun flying and you’re having fun watching it and getting photos of your property!
This day was so much fun. We can’t wait to have William come back to fly and take more photos once the lavender is in the ground!
– Tim
