@MedEwok
If you are new to flying in the alps, I would suggest
-only fly in perfect weather.
-ask locals at the airfield north of the alps where you arrive (club presidents, club flight instructors, flying schools that offer mountain initiation) the evening before the crossing about their opinion on weather and the planned route. If the answer is “at the weather tomorrow, don’t worry, just do it!” you are good to go.
-plan several routes
-stick to the gafor routes
-only fly in perfect weather.
Weather is way more important than the route. If weather allows only one route, think twice.
Some suggestions: EDDV to
—east route LOGM Mariazell, LOWG Graz, LJMB Maribor, LJLI Ljubljana, very scenic flight along the italian coast in 1000ft to LIPV
Lowest route, easy to fly, not that spectacular as mid-alp-crossing, very scenic coast flight to Venice
—Großglockner/Tauern: LWOZ Zell am See-zwischen Großvenediger und Großglockner durch, LOKL Lienz, LIKH, LIPV
scenic and spectacular
—Brenner was mentioned earlier
—LSZR, Vierwaldstättersee, Gotthard, LSPM Ambri, LSZL Locarno, southboud, Po-plain-LIPV
The Lago maggiore is very beautiful, Gotthart spectacular…
The first crossing of the alps will be a lifetime memory, do it! All the more if you aren’t that experienced actually.
The alps advice by us all is meant with best intentions but it is nothing that should be dramatized too much. Anybody can do it.
The best „alpine flyers“ are those who’ve done it many times and have actual experience to judge and assess.
As said before, there’s a big difference to flying over vs. in the alps. Flying over the alps = climbing to 9500+ feet and flying in a more or less straight line. If you pick two airports north and south with longer runways that’s an easy mission compared to landing at some grassfield in a deep valley with steep mountains on every side.
Thunderstorm18 wrote:
it will be only 15 minutes longer than going
I highly recommend to take a little detour to the east and then fly along the adriatic coast passing all the beachtowns (max alt 1500’, keep distance to shoreline/beach/people/hotels) from LIPQ westbound to LIPV.
There are a dozen or so grassfields in the LIPV area and lots of traffic (UL even without transponder) so be aware. It helps to announce the vfr waypoints.
PQSW1 (LIGNANO)
PHE2 (CAORLE)
PZE1 (JESOLO)
etc…
Flying over the alps = climbing to 9500+ feet and flying in a more or less straight line.
Yes, exactly.
Dimme wrote:
Although I’m thinking of taking a detour to the Balkans the days prior to the meet-up, it’s not often we fly that south from Sweden, so I would like to take advantage of that.
Fill up in Belgrade with cheap fuel, and from there depending on your endurance you can fly this straight down to Montenegro and to LIPV via ADRIA1 route, or have an overnight stop in Dubrovnik (LDDU) which is even better.
Take the scenic route ;)
In the last 10% portion I think he has seen it all 
Coming from the north to alps I can suggest LOLS. There is a cabin with some rooms to rent right at the airport.
Avgas, Mogas and JetA1.
800m Asphalt.
Open 7 days a week.
30 nm north of the alps.
Positioned just so one can fly south between the airspaces of LOWL and LOWS through the alps. When entering the alps one can go east or west (LOWG or LOWI) for the easiest routes or cross via LOSM and continue straight south.
My personal favourite is the Gafor-Route from Mittersill to Matrei.
Be aware of nature reserves in the area of Großglockner mountain. It is not an actual airspace and therefore not in the icao-chart, but still valid and you can get prosecuted for penetrating it (Skydemon shows the area though). You can only fly in a small corridor that spits you out in LOKL, but it is impressive terrain.
For this route you should comfortably get up to 9000ft (reference altitude is 8500 ft going from Mittersill to Matrei).
I was at Lido a few months ago. They have a really nice well taken care of grass runway. Even a PC12 landed right after me. I didn’t stay there. I took a lunch break on the way to portoroz.
If you are all coming from UK, I would recommend a stop at LFSH for fuel. They have one of the cheapest fuel prices in the region. I think it was about 1.80 eur a liter. From there you have two possible routes to Lido. You should be able to get there non stop.
First is via LSZR – Resia lake min altitude 7000. The 2nd option is via Innsbruck and Brenner pass min altitude 6000. In mountains it’s all about ceiling and winds.. be careful out there.
