EGHE Isles of Scilly Trip report - August 2017

At the end of July, a friend who goes on holidays every year to St Mary’s was looking for a way to go there and back to France quicker. I was enthusiastic to fly there (and put my PPL to use, the having-a-mission thing) but I had to cope with some difficulties:
• First, I have never been to England
• Second, I have never overflown a large body of water
• St Mary’s EGHE is not the most standard airfield in the world to say the least: short and steep runways, intense CAT shuttling to the mainland…
I had passed my FCL 055 ELP for my trip to Bragança, Portugal LPBG (I could write a trip report for this one from memory if someone is interested) but I needed to know the UK specific stuff: Basic Service, LARS, VFR FP managing etc… I used two main sources: EuroGA of course and Youtube, my best ground school (especially a channel called Plane Old Ben) [if I shouldn’t write this name erase it Peter].
After talking to my dad (VFR PPL for 30+ years), we decided it would be better to do this flight together as a safety measure.
Airplane : We started looking for a plane able to:
• Get the three of us out of EGHE in a no wind condition (unlikely but as a worst case scenario)
• Get us to France the quickest way possible (speed and range needed)
• Ditch safely (it is a long debate, but we preferred low-wings for that)
So we chose the DA40 TDI 155 (130kts, 5-hour endurance, GNS530, good glider) of Deauville’s flying club. So my Dad would have to be PIC. We agreed I would do all the planning, FPLs and part of the radio to gain experience into “UK flying”.
To choose my route and my fuel stop, I asked on EuroGA and several memebers kindly answered me. Thank you guys.
Plan :
• day 1 : Deauville LFRG –Newquay EGHQ for a fuel stop – Scillies EGHE.
• Day 2 would be EGHE – LFRG. This last leg is 280nm long but I considered it doable after a refuel at Newquay (still one of my longest flights ever).
All planning, including all FPLs and GAR was done via Skydemon (I am becoming an addict !)
Route filed for LFRG – EGHQ: DCT BENIX DCT ALD DCT SKESO DCT BHD DCT (Peter, I preferred Bosco’s route)
Day 1 : after final planning and refuel, we went airside, by foot, to the Customs office. They welcomed us and checked our ID cards. It took 2 minutes and we came unannounced (apart from the FPL just filed). Then I requested startup clearance on a portable radio (my way to ensure they have received my FPL even if I entered their AFTN address into SD). All went well. As I expected from reading the forum, London Information was super busy so I went directly from Jersey to Exeter Radar which covers part of my channel crossing. I then took the habit of switching from LARS to LARS (like Peter ) which worked pretty well.
Newquay was very welcoming from the Radar ATCO to the fuel guy who came few minutes after we parked. Flynqy offers a mini FBO service with tea/coffee/wifi/restrooms which was enough for us while we eated our picnic. I filed our second FPL, called Scillies ATC for PPR and were let airside by flynqy. Quick and friendly service, I recommend them ! Several brand new SR22 arrived within 20 minutes, maybe a COPA fly-in ?
The flight to the Scillies was uneventful. Apparently, the light CAT to the Scillies stays below 2000ft so above this altitude ATC is happy. Land’s end coordinates all traffic with Scillies TWR (requesting us an estimate and several position reports), Scillies was very welcoming for a French first visiter. We parked on the grass among 15 or so a/c, from the light MEP to the ultralight. We walked around the field (5 minutes) and climbed to the tower to pay fees and sign the Sunday departure form. There was some spotters shooting landing traffic so we may come up on a spotter website!

We had a wonderful dinner on St Agnes, a island next to the main one, at sunset. It was a blast!!! If you never went to the Scillies, go there!!
Day 2 : I filed the FPL just before walking to the field (a 25 minutes’ walk from the main town). Nice mini-hike too. After startup, we saw a family walking on the runway with their dog, which seemed a little bit strange ! As advised by the ATC guys, we did our runup at the runway intersection to “make some noise”. We took off runway 14 which descends steeply towards the water. You feel like on an aircraft carrier of some sort !
After a tour of the islands, we called Newquay radar which kindly activated our FPL. We took roughly the same route eastbound than westbound. At some point, I had a interesting exchange with Jersey :
ATC “xxxxxxxxx(couldn’t understand) accept direct Deauville ?”
Me (surprised) “That’s not the route filed but we would accept direct ALD direct Deauville for sure”
ATC “ Cleared direct ALD direct Deauville”
Nice being treated like an IFR !! I love it !

Approach and landing was uneventful.
Conclusion and lessons learned :
Thanks to EuroGA and Youtube, I was not surprised at all by the RT stuff. My way of calling only LARS seems adequate. My way of FPL routing (navaids and IFR points) and addressing (adding departure and arrival TWR addresses manually) worked again. Getting real confident ! The welcome was superb everywhere. I wasn’t disappointed by british hospitality (maybe the whole PPR stuff is worth it ?? ) I had no news from my GAR so I assume there was no problem.
What surprised me was the GA traffic not flying but parked. There was at least 15 transient GA A/C at each EGHQ and EGHE, which is a lot in French terms (like L2K or Deauville). Are these destinations really popular or is it the norm in the UK? Brits seem to really use their aircraft to travel compared to the French.
If you have any questions, I would be pleased to answer.
If you hesitate to go to the UK because of GAR/FPL/PPR stuff, go for it!! There are plenty of good destinations and people are very welcoming.