A flight you wish you could do

[Admin]

12 minutes ago, Russ said:

The Alaska thing, lots of it, the more remote the better, and some hairy landings to boot.

That would be interesting

[kasper]

Flight London to London via the coast of Africa - down the west cost and up the east cost.  I got as far as permissions for all bar 5 countries back in 2012 to do it but the foreign and commonwealth office lady kept calling and advising against any of it past Spain ... even I was not feeling too good about Somalia but I couldn’t over-fly it as I only had 1400km of fuel onboard with George the fuel buddy in the rear seat. 
 

maybe when I retire I’ll choose a slightly less difficult continent to circumnavigate. 

[kgwilson]

I did it 20 years ago in a C172 with 3 others. Takeoff from Queenstown on a crystal clear calm Autumn day & fly up Lake Wakatipu climbing all the time to Glenorchy, then follow the river still climbing until the pass towards the Hollyford valley across the mountains that top out at around 10,000 feet & spend 20 minutes or so descending past snow capped peaks with hanging lakes & incredibly steep rocky descents to bush clad mountain sides with waterfalls pouring water thousands of feet into Milford Sound. Finally land at Milford Sound airport, take a trip on a boat up the sound, return to the pub for an amazing lunch, then do the whole thing in reverse back to Queenstown. The most awesome flight ever. I wish I could do it again but I think the likelihood is pretty small.

[Bryon]

I did mine a couple of years ago as well

Flew a Mk9 Spitfire dual control out of Biggin Hill along the South Downs to Thames Valley

Flew over Sheppey and Dartmouth then returned to Biggin Hill doing THREE victory rolls along the way

I now have officially 20 mins of Spitfire flight in my logbook

[Thruster88]

This thread has made me commence planning for operation fly kilo hotel alpha around Australia. A quick plan shows about 50 hours flying. Step one, obtain bs asic card. Refresh controlled airspace. After planting may 2021 launch.  

[Bryon]

1 hour ago, Thruster88 said:

This thread has made me commence planning for operation fly kilo hotel alpha around Australia. A quick plan shows about 50 hours flying. Step one, obtain bs asic card. Refresh controlled airspace. After planting may 2021 launch.  

Thruster,

dont wait, do it as soon as you can. Life is too short 

Cheers

Bryon

[rgmwa]

On 28/09/2020 at 9:35 AM, Old Koreelah said:

My dreams of flight started with watching magpies at dusk after the day’s work was done. They’d skim down our gently sloping paddock for a hundred meters or more, then pull up into a dramatic stall and touch down. Then they’d strut around enjoying the glow before flying back up the hill to do it all again.
 

I always wanted to do that as well. 

Funny you should say that! When I was about 9 or 10 I’d spend school holidays at a farm owned by family friends in southwestern Victoria.  I’d look over the cowyard fence in the early morning as the sun came up and watch the magpies landing in the paddock by the swamp exactly as you describe. I imagined being able to fly like they did.

Six decades have passed since those days and  I’ve been lucky enough to learn how to fly a plane and also to build one. Since then I’ve done a couple of long trips that have covered a lot of Australia, but I’d still like to cross Bass Strait to Tas one day. I’ve also been lucky enough to have flown in the outback but flying the old Qantas routes through Qld and the NT is still on the bucket list.

[shajen]

40 years ago I flew around Australia from Vic to Townsville, across to Darwin, Broome, Ailce Springs, back to Lilydale. In a Cherokee 6 with a couple of other aircraft. Was an amazing trip!  We thru a tarp over the wings most places (you could do that in those days) hired a car wherever we were and saw the sights. We took around 3 weeks.

Funny how I can’t remember being worried about xwind, or radio calls etc.  Since starting flying again, I think about all these things and can’t really see myself doing that again.  But would love to get a flying buddy and fly round Tassie. That would be awesome!!
 

[facthunter]

It well might be awesome,  but there's lots of wind and very changeable weather. Around the southwest is particularly challenging and I've had over 30 knots crosswind at Devonport and Wynyard  off the water and an over 30 ton plane climb 3,000 feet above my chosen level with throttles fully closed between Launceston and Hobart. It's not called the Roaring forties for nothing.  I think the S/W has an annual rainfall near 190 inches. Nev

[Jase T]

Ok this one is a bit of the wall. I have already flown 80%of the Australian coast line (not in one go but most of it below 1000' only bits of TAS and the top of WA I didn't do)  as well as most of PNG and every inch of Bougainville several times (are you a WW2 buff? thats the place to go!).

But the flight I always wanted to do was one I couldn't swindle the ADF paying for even though we were almost there a few times. I want to fly down to Maralinga. Find the old Emu field, and do a tour of the place. My father was seconded to the RAF from the RAAF down there when they were letting off the big ones. He has so many stories about life in the camp down there. About the "Australian ingenuity" that went into making it liveable within the "Very British" regulations they had to follow.  I want to fly down, have a good look around form the air, land and go over what's still there from the camp. It's odd I didn't get to considering I spent time at Woomera testing things that made much smallerler bangs!!!

[Old Koreelah]

58 minutes ago, Jase T said:

... My father was seconded to the RAF from the RAAF down there when they were letting off the big ones. He has so many stories about life in the camp down there. About the "Australian ingenuity" that went into making it liveable within the "Very British" regulations they had to follow.  I want to fly down, have a good look around form the air, land and go over what's still there from the camp...

At risk of thread drift, how many of us are drawn to retrace the journeys of our fathers? I know next to nothing about what mine did in the 40s. A couple of place names are all I ever got out of him.

[tillmanr]

Just get into the air. Premier Dan has confirmed the opening of the Melbourne ring so we can go to our aircraft tomorrow.  Woohoo. Here’s to clear skies.

[facthunter]

Take care, if you are a bit out of practice. Don't be afraid to go round if it's not where you like it. Nev

[tillmanr]

Sure thing, no commercial necessity here.

[Kununurra]

On 04/10/2020 at 4:55 PM, Thruster88 said:

This thread has made me commence planning for operation fly kilo hotel alpha around Australia. A quick plan shows about 50 hours flying. Step one, obtain bs asic card. Refresh controlled airspace. After planting may 2021 launch.  

Hi Thruster,

sounds like a great trip.

Have you considered the option of doing a group flyaway and or meet other RV's along the planned route who may do some of the journey or all of the journey from their point of departure.

The positive is safety in numbers and a few ASIC cards so you don't need to get one if you don't really want to.

 

The only negative could be too many chiefs but I guess that would sort itself out.

 

I am considering a lap around Oz next year from Perth to fit in with my plans for the year.

If you do get serious about it send me a PM. I fly an RV7A out of Bindoon YBHL

 

All the best for your adventure.

Cheers

[Thruster88]

Hi Kununurra, wife and I will probably just travel at our own pace but it would be good to catch up with you and other members. Have got the asic under way. Is late may or june a good time to fly in the top end, have no northern experience.  

[Kununurra]

Late May-June will see the wets season gone from the Kimberley & be a good time for travel.

It will be getting cooler by then and the thunderstorms well gone which will help with your flight planning.

 

 

[WayneL]

When driving in the car, flat paddocks and open spaces always have me imagineing having an airstrip or flying low there. When on the Newell Hwy around Narribri, Moree plains where the horizon seems so far away...I imagine I am in A P51 Mustang flat out ten feet of the deck!

Wayne