T A B L E_T A L K Are cruises a great way to travel in style or overpriced schmaltz? Sail the friendly seas in the Wanderlust area of Table Talk R E C E N T L Y Insider's guide to Paris By David Downie Paris insider: The hottest places to eat, stay and play (08/05/98) A midsummer night's bacchanal in Moscow By Jeffrey Tayler Inhibitions -- and underclothes -- are tossed into the air on Ladies Night at the Hungry Duck (08/04/98) Coming down By Dwight Garner For the first time, Jon Krakauer talks about the bitter controversy swirling around "Into Thin Air" (08/03/98) Mondo Weirdo The deep A chance encounter with a seven-foot shark (07/31/98) Tallest Tree epiphany By Simon Firth A father and son make a rainy redwood pilgrimage (07/30/98) Browse the Wanderlust Feature archives		___O _ V _ E __ R _ _ A _ F _ R _ I _ C _ A _______A frequent traveler discovers what flying is _______really about -- swooping above Kenya _______in a reproduction 1935 open-cockpit plane. BY MARYALICIA POST | I'm not normally a nervous flyer. I eat the meal, drink the wine, watch the film. On long flights, I even sleep. It's much like being on the ground. But is that because I don't realize I'm flying? Through the air? Take away the tranquil decor, take away the meals and the film -- take away the roof while you're at it -- and that's flying, and then I'm nervous. So I was nervous, sweltering in equatorial heat on a sunbaked airstrip in northern Kenya, flapping at the flies, as a tall, good-looking English-American pilot put the finishing touches -- not to mention the cowling -- on his shiny red biplane number 5YCAG. Andrew Garratt is the owner and main man of the Classic Aerial Safari Company, whose aim is to offer the genuine "Out of Africa" experience to tourists in Kenya. For passengers in his reproduction 1935 open-cockpit plane, he orchestrates the complete works, fitting them out with a brown leather flight jacket, white silk scarf, leather helmet with goggles and earflaps with radio receivers through which they listen to Mozart. But Andrew had flown to this airstrip in Navaisha to have his Waco biplane serviced, not expecting to pick up a passenger on her way to the Mount Kenya Safari Club. A friend had lent me a black leather jacket to keep me warm at 11,000 feet and my sunglasses would double as goggles, but I had nothing to protect my ears. "Not even cotton wool?" Andrew worried, fearing I might wind up deaf after the 50-minute flight over the Aberdare mountains. That particular concern wasn't even on my list. Two hours after we'd arrived at the field, the newly serviced plane had been checked and double-checked and was ready for takeoff. It had been pushed out onto the airstrip, and the Jacobs motor (nickname: "shakin' Jake") was sending tremors from the Waco's nose to its tail. Ostriches, who probably don't realize what strange-looking birds they are themselves, patrolled the other side of a chain-link fence, eyeing the quivering 5YCAG suspiciously. N E X T+P A G E | Give the thumbs up from time to time