All ranks are settling down happily to their new surroundings. Arrangements are now in hand for daily swimming parades in nearby LAKE TIMSAH —and there is no need to make these parades compulsory. ISMAILIA is but 2 ½ miles distant and all in all we are beginning to wonder why we could not have found this place a lot earlier, instead of having to put up with the dust and dirt and general lack of amenities at our former base landing ground for so many months.
There are certain disadvantages in the present 'drome - the runways are on the short side and are flanked by soft soil and it cannot be denied that it will not be able to serve as an operational 'drome. Trucks have been bogged in the yielding sands off the runway and a reminder of the unsuitable nature of this landing ground to perhaps all but experienced pilots was the sight of a Hurricane which had left the end of the runway on landing and plunged, nose first, into the sand as its wheels left the hard surface of the tarmac.
However, for a squadron awaiting aircraft – our last two Baltimores which were flown here have now been “vouchered off” to No. 55 Squadron, R.A.F. – this site could not have been improved upon. Showers, running water supplies, permanent offices and buildings which are being employed as living quarters are among the luxuries we now enjoy and the men can spend the warm afternoons bathing, boating or fishing. Yes, we seem very far from the war at the present moment!
Notification has been received from Headquarters, S.A.A.F., that seven Air Gunners, who have completed their term of operational service in the Middle East, are to be sent on the morrow to ALMAZA en route for the Union. A suitable party to mark the passing of the last of the "BENGHAZI OLD BOYS” from the squadron was held in the Sergeants’ Mess tonight. We are sorry to lose them but they are one and all eager to "get cracking" on Pilots’ and Observers' Courses down in the Union and after many months of enforced idleness they have experienced after intensive operations one cannot blame them for chafing at the delay they have experienced.