My initial plan to arrive Thursday by the end of the day somewhat slipped, so I was the last one to land at Tannheim before the first air show on Friday. The tower used the radio very sparingly, but the arrival was fully comfortable. When I landed, there were already several rows of aircraft parked on both sides of the runway for its entire length.
In the middle sat the classic beauties:
The shows run for 15-20 minutes every hour.
For myself, I prefer low-wing aircraft, but the high wing has its own undeniable advantages.
There were quite a few gyroplanes. In the air, these gizmos look very unusual.
Those too young for a pilot license still had a circuit of their own.
And this is yours truly having fun on the ground, too.
After sunset, Tannheim closes as an aerodrome, but the night life just kicks in - from flying model aircraft shooting out fireworks while in flight to a hangar with live-music dancing till the early hours in the morning and infinite amounts of beer offered by dirndl-clad girls carrying 12 mugs at once.
On Saturday, the forecast wasn't very good and the meteo guy on site told us in no uncertain terms that we'd have to get out by 1400Z or face being stuck until Monday. Most people, including air show participants, decided to leave, so when I got in line for departure, I was approximately no. 80. Dark clouds kept coming closer and closer and the wind started to change, so after about 40 minutes in line the runway was reversed and everyone rushed to taxi to the other end. After departure, the radio traffic with Munchen Information was quite dense, so it took me several minutes before I understood they just don't hear me. The COM radio in my GNS 430 simply quit - most likely because of thunderstorm activity nearby. I managed to reach them on COM2, a fairly tired KX155. In the meantime, seeing no other way to go around the weather but towards the Memmingen CTR, almost 120 degrees off my planned track, I first circled around Tannheim up to FL60 or so, then flew above the CTR climbing fo FL95. From there, getting around the nastier stuff was somewhat easier, yet I saw a couple of lightnings down below me, a few miles off my track. Further on, the flight was uneventful, and even COM1 rose from the dead once I was away from the thunderstorm.
