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RAF Coltishall (aka Colt) was the last operational Battle of Britain base. It was only 13 miles north of Norwich, but along some of the narrowest lanes and roads, and that's once you had battled your way round or through the city. It wasn't somewhere you passed by accident.

But it was just 45 minutes from home, and my house later once it became clear that I would be leaving the mob after 15 years.

There used to be a tradition of when you finished your course at RAF Cosford, you would drive your car round the base on your way out blasting your horn in celebration. We had been told this was now frowned on and we should leave quietly when our time came.

No one was going to tell us what to do, so on the Wednesday afternoon I lead the convoy round the narrow roads of the base, dodging marching courses, a-tooting as we went, driving past weapns squadron for the last time to the main gate, hand in our car pass and along to the M54, turning east for Norfolk.

Colt was a quiet backwater, and apparently largly forgotton by the MOD, little inprovements had been done in decades, the domestic side was ssall, bith barracks surrounding the central parade square, later turned into a car park.

You drive out of Norwich on one of the two roads to North Walsham, heading over the bridge in Coltishall village, before taking the narrow lane leading through Little Hautbois, past the end of the runway, over the old railway bridge and onto the base, past the NAAFI to the main gate.

After leaving Cosford, I drive home to spend the night at Mum's, before driving to base the next morning to report for duty, get assigned a room and begin the arrival process.

I go to the station admin flight, PSF, get an arrivals chit, and go round getting signatures and having my name added to various lists, before finally arriving at my new section, AEF, Armament Engineering Flight. I walked in, said hello to some familiar faces, and walked to the admin office. I had to fill in a next of kin form, and when the sergeant saw the Lowestoft address he asked, Norwich or Ipswich? This could be make or break, but I told the truth: Norwich.

Welcome, and Gaz called out that another Canary had been posted in. I met another fan, Ian, who I would go on to be firm friends with, and indeed still am.

I would be working in the bomb dump, would be my third such posting, so held no fears. The thing about bomb dumps was thet there were quite dangerous places, so usually placed the far side of the airfield, meaning you had to get across the other side of the active runway to get there. You needed a special pass to drive on the airfield, and obey the traffic signals, so until I had that, I would need a lift. Gaz called the dump and they would send the duty driver over.

We talked about football and meeting up before the next home game and them trying get me to go to away games as well. Gaz, Neil and especially Ian relit my passion for Norwich, and I was soon travelling to most away games. Meeting up or travelling with them too.

Colt had no HAS sites, but jets used to be serviced in areas with tall concrete blast walls separating each plane. The revepments still stood, ut were no longer used. The four squadrons of Jaguars were serviced on pans beside the crew huts near the centre of the airfield, opposite the huge hangers, only used to store the aircraft at weekends.

The driver came, and took me round the ring road, along the perry track, across the piano keys, along the perry track the other side to the crewroom and offices, in a portacabin. I would work from here for the next five years. Four and a half as it turned out.

I was shown the tea bar, changing rooms, given foul weather gear and told I could go home, or to my new room, and be in work in the morning at half seven.

My room was in a prefab block, not perfect, but I had my own room, there was space for the bed, wardrobe and the huge TV I had bought the previous weekend, which I had to get a taxi to deliver. A 28 inch Sony super Wega, 100hz, and deeper than it was wide, it took half the free space in the room, was quite a pain until I moved into a block of lats near the Family's club after a few months, where I shared a ground floor flat with two other guys. As the one in the largest room was posted or left, the one in the next biggest took his room, and I would move from the smallest to the middle.

So after a year I had the living room, more than eough room for the TV, a new futon bed, a wardrobe and my hifi and huge speakers.

Life was great, and would have continued like that but for two things. The first was the second Gulf War, and that being an old lag, was one of the first selected to be on standby to fly out to support operations. The second happned after that, when it turned out I had upset my chief, and he gave me average marks in my assessments, thus killing my career.

That was in the future.

I came back to work after Christmas and New Year at the start of 2003. I was duty armourer, and on the first afternoon back not much was happening, I was in the crewroom, when I was told the Flight Sergeant wanted to see me.

The FS was a good old sort, once you got to know him, he was the spitting image of the character Grouty from the sitcom, Porridge. So, we called him Grouty. He was a Wolves supporter, but suffered us Norwich fans with good grace.

I was told that although nothing had been announced, there was to be operations against Iraq, and I was being put on stand by to fly out. Go to stores to pick up desert kitting, and there was a training day two days time to "refresh" our ground defence skills in case we were to operate from contested air strips.

All the jokes you hear about the RAF staying in hotels are true. We are spoiled, or were. Even in most wartime situations, airfields are usually hundreds of miles away from the front line, and so none of really exected to use the rifle we had been trained with, or the bayonnet at the end for anything other than being on gate guard.

But this was serious shit. It was Friday afternoon, we were due to fly to somewhere on Monday. We were taught how to pitch a tent, do patrols, cook using a hexi-block burner and all the other things we thought we needed. Kitting had been a disater, as half the stuff we needed was out of stock, but we were promised it would be waiting for us "in theatre". I went to the Army Surplus store over the weekend to get the things I knew I'd need.

I couldn't sleep, not without a lot of booze.

The weekend passed.

Monday came.

And went.

No news.

Turned out that Turkey would not let us operate from their bases, and so there was no space anywhere else for the Jags.

We were to wait.

We were on four hour notice to move, so nowhere more than four hours from base, and had to have our mobiles on at all time. The stress was huge, more of the unknown rather than being at war.

We were asked to take antrax tablets, I refused. When I explained to the SMO and he could not answer my questions, no one else in the room did either. I was always a trouble maker.

Days stretched to weeks, weeks to months, and with the ground war over, after 73 days, we were stood down. Just like that. It had become obvious weeks before we would not be deployed, so life had returned to normal, but the chaos of those weeks stayed with me.

And then I got my assessments, and my Chief gave me average marks, and while my friends off my course from 99 were already getting promoted, I wasn't even on the list, let alone near the bottom. I had done something to upset him, he wouldn't say what, but that killed my career, in the two years left, I could not get get enough marks to get on the list, let alone near the top. But I had two and a half year's notice, so got used to it.

In time.

But I was angry for a long time.

I still am.

If would have stayed in to 2012, I would have got a full pension and probably be able to survive on that without havig to work. Full time at least, so leaving after 15 years would mean having to find a job.

There was money for courses, so I did an HGV course, did well, and never felt more confident in going into a driving test. Needless to say, I failed and the thousands of pounds I invested in that was wasted.

I had to evict the lady living in the house in Lowestoft, and with a year to serve, I moved back into the house, having to commute to Colt there and back each day.

It gave being in the RAF a different experience, driving out of the gate at half four and being in my own place each night, no uniform was worn, just my protective gear when at work. Not like being in the mob at all.

My second Grandmother had passed away, s I got some money, so I furnished the house and fitted out the small kitchen to make it my perfect pad. I got the internet connected, got Sky TV, my neighbour mowed the small lane out the back. And the paper shop and corner shop were still there, I would want for nothing.

So passed my last year of service, me counting the days when I would get my clearance chit, take three lazy days getting it signed, before taking to PSF that last time, handing my my ID card and that was it.

I was out.

It was June 2005, I had a house, a mortgage, a huge car I had to sell, and needed a job. But would be paid until the middle of September. So, lets play a while.