A Blast From The Past
 

Back in May 1983 the RAF decided I deserved a holiday, so I was packed off to The Falkland Islands for five months. This was exactly the time of year that the northern hemisphere was getting warmer and the southern hemisphere was getting colder, so effectively I had three winters in a row with no summers in between. Gits. The first two photos where it looks hot (and it was) were taken during a one day stopover at Ascension Island on the way to colder climes. Note the high tech urinal - thankfully the outlet pipe was positioned downstream from where we got fresh water! The luxurious accommodation was an assortment of portakabins and shipping containers, while the mess come dining hall come bar etc was built from the packing crates that the radar was delivered in. This was a long time before digital images so the photos are scanned from prints, hence they're a bit cr*p.

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Wonderful memories?
Friends of mine were there in 1982.
Some didn't come back.

I went but only saw land through a scope. Was one of the longest patrols i went on.

oops, duplicated post, how did I do that?

Thanks for this, Andrew, funnily enough, I’ve only today been scanning a photo onto the “We Walked the Sands” Facebook page of my time with the RAF in the Gulf in 1970/71.

Somewhat opposite to you, I had, in effect 3 summers, as I was there over the winter, and though the accommodation was sort of permanent (a Twynham hut), we still qualified for ‘sub standard accommodation allowance” - mainly as it wasn’t centrally heated! There were a few small AC units spread around which helped a bit.