Landaways – FlyerDavidUK

18th November 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Another daytrip to Le Touquet and landing back at night

Some destinations you can never tire of visiting. I’ve flown across to Le Touquet a fair number of times since my first trip during my PPL training in 2010. On a good weather day, it’s hard to beat. My co-owner Nic and I hadn’t flown together for some time, and both were missing CORB while it had been down for maintenance. He had scheduled a weekend away with family, so

25th September 2022 IFR Flights / Landaways

Oban direct by Airways

Munros are defined as Scottish mountains over 3,000 feet (914.4 m) in height, and named after Sir Hugo T. Munro who published a list in 1891. The Scottish Mountaineering Club officially lists 282, most of which are clustered around the north-central Scotland mainland. There are a dozen on the Isle of Skye and one on Mull. Some are fairly inaccessible, requiring a long walk in and out and a few require a

14th August 2022 IFR Flights / Landaways

Inverness, Colonsay, Coll and Tiree

A weekend trip to Scotland in our shared TB20 from Gloucester, meeting up at Inverness for a PPL/IR group fly-out. The intention was to fly up to Inverness on Friday afternoon, fly down the Great Glen to Tiree for lunch on Saturday, and visit the Orkneys on Sunday before returning home. I shared the flying with my co-owner John, who frequently flies to and from Alderney but has done fewer

14th May 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Millau bridge, Limoges and Gloucester

It was a fair distance to fly back home from Carcassonne, but we had the advantage of gaining an hour from the timezone change. The weather looked very good, a warm sunny day throughout. I added one last planned deviation – we thought it worthwhile to fly across to see the Millau bridge – a wonderful feat of engineering – which wasn’t too far out of the way. My preparation

13th May 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Cannes and Carcassonne, France

Our flight today was from Albenga (aka Riviera Airport) in Italy, westward to Carcassone in France. With no fuel available at Albenga, I planned a “technical” stop at Cannes (LFMD). The short flight along the coastline looked fairly straightforward, although I read some reports of harsh noise abatement penalties about Cannes that sounded quite severe. There is a mandatory pilot briefing on the airport website which required you to register

10th May 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Albenga/Riviera Italy

The Italian Riviera lies on the coast at the furthest west of Italy, close to the border with Monaco and France. The area was very popular with English nobility towards the end of the 19th century, transforming it from a fishing village and now boasts many Art Nouveau buildings. The airport itself sits deep in a valley surrounded by high terrain. While there is a localiser, you couldn’t really consider

8th May 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Venice Lido

Definitely the highlight of my trip and one for every pilot’s bucket list. Today we flew south west VFR from Ljubljana over the mountains then down the Adriatic coast with great views of Trieste and the Venice lagoon to land on the grass strip at Venice Lido beach. This was the first commercial Italian airport, opening in 1926, and is named Giovanni Nicelli airport in honour of an Italian air

7th May 2022 Foreign / IFR Flights / Landaways

Ljubljana Slovenia

Saturday was to be a busy day for flying, first a local flight with our hosts followed by a hop across the mountains to the south east to land at the capital of Slovenia, Ljubljana. I had been keeping a close eye on the weather and wasn’t definitively able to say whether we’d fit in a local VFR flight or not. I had originally planned to fly in the morning

4th May 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Vienna

Next stop is Vienna where we planned to visit and stay with friends for a few days. Landing at Vienna’s main airport is possible but expensive. There are several GA airfields in the vicinity, especially Voslau (LOAV) and Wiener Neustadt Ost (LOAN) which seemed most appropriate. LOAN is the home of Diamond Aircraft and might well be worth a visit, but LOAV was closer to where our friends lived. Since

3rd May 2022 Foreign / Landaways

Ceske Budejovice

Draw a straight line from Gloucester to Vienna and you will find it passes over the southern tip of the Czech Republic. It was about an hour’s VFR flight today south west from Bamburg towards Vienna, landing at Ceske Budejovice – the regional capital of South Bohemia, about 75 miles south of Prague and most famous for its Budweiser Budvar brewery. My original plan was for an early afternoon departure