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Shoreham EGKA to Krk / Rijeka LDRI July 2020

Weather outbound looked good, and with a strong tailwind for the first part of the route

On the way back the forecast looked iffy for the UK but probably ok, with a few diversions possible (Biggin and Lydd, mainly)

IR image was clean, showing that cold front didn’t have any wx around it

Nice departure wx

Once settled in cruise, 39 USG computed at destination, and a nice ground speed of 174kt

Mostly cloud cover over the Alps, as is usual nowadays

FL170 to cross the Alps. I had climbed to FL140 ASAP after departure to get more tailwind, and FL170 got me even more, with a GS of 185kt at times. Makes one want to buy a Jetprop which would be doing 300kt+ then

There was a fair bit of IMC on the way down, but no icing due to really warm temps. Even at FL170 it was -2C which is ridiculous…

The island of Krk and the bridge to the mainland

Final

Hand flying the ILS now, visually


Nice new looking airport. In normal times they get a few airliners per day but were still really friendly, and at €63.75 the price is OK too

The computed fillup was 199 litres and the bowser (which arrived immediately) said 200

3 other GA planes there including another TB20

The main tourist thing on Krk is the old town






Lovely coastline with lots of places one can get into the water. Not sure about sea urchins; normally Croatia does have them so shoes are recommended


I think Mali Losing (the Cres end actually) is just visible in the distance. You can get a day trip on a boat which includes Cres

Tourism was mainly local, and clearly the coronavirus has devastated their tourist trade. The first post-UK-lockdown Ryanair was arriving 1hr after I did… OTOH, having been living in the countryside in the UK, I would not have done a trip to a place full of potentially infected people! Croatia has managed the situation very well. The hotels all take it really seriously, with the breakfast procedures modified, etc.

A mountain bike would be great to explore the long coastal path, a lot of which is hidden in the trees

Fish is not cheap in any tourist spot – €25 – but fresh and tasty

A serious gym for serious people and lots of loud music

That was my exercise, having done the coast walk for a few hours

The day before the airport called me to say strong winds were forecast during the night and would I object to them moving the plane to a sheltered spot, and checking brakes were off. It was actually G57 at times… amazing how fast it changed from the almost totally calm daytime. 57kt would get a TB20 airborne. They moved it back out as I arrived at the airport

Again great wx locally but I already knew the UK end would not be fun


TAF AMD EGKK 080349Z 0803/0906 23008KT 9999 -RA BKN020 BECMG 0803/0806 BKN014 TEMPO 0803/0906 4000 RADZ BKN006 PROB40 TEMPO 0803/0809 BKN004 PROB40 TEMPO 0815/0906 BKN004

and this was the windy.com wind forecast (for FL100), so fuel would be an issue also

The MSLP also showed the warm front having moved south a bit, compared to the original one

I moved the FP earlier by 30 mins because I had time to spare, and luckily didn’t get a CTOT; they are much more likely if you file at a short notice.

During the flight the UK wx gradually improved e.g.

EGKA 081150Z 23011KT 9999 SCT008 18/16 Q1015
TAF EGKA 080927Z 0809/0817 25010KT 9999 SCT007 BKN020 TEMPO 0809/0817 6000 -RADZ BKN007 PROB30 TEMPO 0809/0812 4000 RADZ

which is actually landable from 02 also; I have landed at EGKA with a 10kt tailwind. The DH is much lower on 02. Also the wx over the UK was clearly worse further inland, and Gatwick EGKK did have a lower cloudbase than say Bournemouth, Shoreham or Lydd.

This time the LFOB is showing 19 USG; contrary to windy.com forecasting nil wind… This is OK but much stronger headwinds were forecast further down the route, so I started looking at alternates for fuel, starting with Colmar, and reviewed them all along the flight

Venice Tessera airport

I pestered ATC for every shortcut possible. Didn’t get much from Italy but Swiss offered me a VFR leg DCT all the way to HR in France, crucially adding that they would give me IFR back after the Alps. The result, at FL140, were some great pics


This runway has XXX on it – don’t recall which one it is. What a waste!










The end of the Alps

France – the top 2/3 looks like this

I worked constantly on shortcuts, and post-Alps flew at the lowest possible IFR level, which was FL100 and later FL070. French ATC would not do anything through the mil zones, and told me the Paris airspace is totally prohibited which I know is not the case because I have had (rare) shortcuts before. To minimise headwind (it eventually got stronger nearer the UK as per the windy.com forecast) I descended, leaving France at 5000ft

Lille handed me to “London 124.6”, which is FIS, not London Control, but at 5000ft that is expected if you know the UK game… I already knew that this is how you get busted hence the 5000ft and not say FL060. London Info were not really interested so I changed to Shoreham with about 50nm to go.

The UK South Downs well covered in cloud, and heading for the IAF for the EGKA 20 RNAV procedure, descending to 2200ft

Popped out of the bottom of the cloud at 1100ft.

It was nice to be on the ground, avoiding the ~£300 (including taxis) diversion to Biggin, and the wx got worse in the evening as forecast. Actually taxis are another problem right now, with the infection risk…

I landed with 15.7 USG which (11.5USG/hr low level cruise) is easily enough for a diversion to Biggin Hill EGKB. Of course, that diversion would be a mayday, but that’s what a diversion is; you don’t need to have fuel for trying out half a dozen diversions!

The Golze ADL150 proved its worth yet again, delivering wx data with 100% reliability, even just for tafs and metars on this occassion, although there was intermittent 4G over France which is a new thing (normally you get nothing at all, like over Belgium).

Outbound flight

Return flight

Flight times 4:40 out (tailwind) 6:00 back (headwind); airborne times. Landing fuel on board 33.1 USG and 15.7 USG. Actual pump fills were 200 and 270 litres

A great trip and the second Croatia outing (previous was LDLO) since the lockdown has been eased. Croatia ticks all the boxes: attractive destination with nice friendly people, easy well organised airports which don’t cost a fortune, and much less virus going around since they have not yet got the return of mass tourism. I even got a haircut in the Krk old town

And a new airport for me – the 167th I think – and it is a good one.

EuroGA airport database report

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Peter wrote:

The island of Krk and the bridge to the mainland

Used to be “Tito’s bridge” in the old days

Peter wrote:

Fish is not cheap in any tourist spot – €25 – but fresh and tasty

If it’s 0.3-0.4 kg then that’s usual price because 1kg of such fish is around €60 in restaurant (without side dish).

Last Edited by Emir at 10 Jul 08:09
LDZA LDVA, Croatia

The airport shown is Ulrichen. Indeed, a (recently) closed (military) airport. But a few miles further back, you can actually see Münster airport. That one is civil, although open only in June, July and august, due to planning constraints.

Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

Wonderful photos

Some time back I posted that Ulrichen would be a serviceable airport for visitors to the revitalized Andermatt. Lots of development money has gone into Andermatt in the last 10 years, and there is an existing and very scenic direct train line as shown below. A waste indeed. It would be a beautiful place to fly.

I was initially confused by photos of a LDRI airport at ‘Rijeka’. The one I know (Grobnik LDRG) is colocated with the race track just up the hill outside of town.

Both areas are on my A-list.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 10 Jul 15:16

Once again a great report and great photos, Peter! I really envy you for the freedom of having your own, capable aircraft and the freedom to put it to use when the weather allows.

Would this trip, apart from the UK end maybe, have been doable VFR?

Low-hours pilot
EDVM Hildesheim, Germany

Thanks

Outbound certainly.

Return, actually the real cloudbase, over the coast, was probably 1000ft, and anything above 500ft above the sea is doable VFR Actually anything above the sea is legal VFR so long as you are 500ft away from any boat. One could have flown at 800ft and flown a downwind join onto 20 and a low level circuit at 800ft (the minimum circuit at EGKA). Or done a landing on 02 with some tailwind, which is OK if very carefully configured way back to approach at minimum speed and full flap. And the IMCR supports a UK IFR arrival anyway. However one would not have flown to the UK to start with, if limited to VFR… and VFR wx was not forecast for a few more days.

The effort would go into route planning because you can’t be sure of getting a CAS transit. It is many years since I did my long cross-Europe VFR trips and I always had loads of fun and games on them. If one ATC unit wasn’t letting me in, it would be another one. And a fully-OCAS plan across say 700-800nm takes some working out. The first pic here is what I used to do. Tape all the charts together on the floor and then crawl over them, drawing the route, avoiding CAS. Reading other reports I get the feeling that things have improved, however. OTOH I always did my VFR flights as VMC on top (with oxygen usually) because it avoids getting caught up scud running. Flying below cloud is a lot more wx planning and the chances of VFR wx over say 800nm are not good. Plus you burn more fuel flying low down.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Nice pictures, another serious trip to the new “neighbour” country Croatia

I am trying to locate the lake & dam between clouds on one of your pictures
Looks on outbound leg on top of Austria, is that the Weissee glacier lake?

Peter wrote:

OTOH I always did my VFR flights as VMC on top (with oxygen usually) because it avoids getting caught up scud running. Flying below cloud is a lot more wx planning and the chances of VFR wx over say 800nm are not good. Plus you burn more fuel flying low down.

800nm of VFR at 1000ft agl scud running UK-Croatia next time

Paris/Essex, France/UK, United Kingdom

I can give you the GPS track, in GPX format I think… the names of some of the mountains would be interesting too. I recognised some of them.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Ibra wrote:

I am trying to locate the lake & dam between clouds on one of your pictures

This one?

The return track goes right over the west end of Furkapass and the Grimselpass. This lake is 10 miles southeast of the intersection between those two passes.

Last Edited by Silvaire at 10 Jul 18:57

The TB20 is impressive, but I liked a Decathlon being a ramp neighbor. G57 might have it doing loops!

In the medium weight tailwheel category an early 185 with long range tanks might just about manage this non stop, but with block speed of 135 KTAS. The return headwind requiring a fuel stop.

I applaud your stamina, after around 5 hours in a GA piston I might need a longer lay over.

Oxford (EGTK), United Kingdom
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