Iraklion, Greece to Stuttgart, Germany

For the sake of completeness, a few pictures and notes on the last day of my flight from the Red Sea in Egypt back home to Germany.

After a night landing in Iraklion on Crete, we came back to the airport at 0500Z. It does take some time to get to the aircraft through the busy airport maze. First of all a General Declaration needs to be filled out (why, I have no idea), then through security and a crew bus to the parking apron. Again, the handling girls were top notch and I was willing to follow her for much longer...

The aircraft was prepared for the flight and we taxied to the Avgas fuel station where we received prompt service. In about 45 min from arrival at the airport, we were ready for departure which is rather good for this size of airport. Even though the airport had a lot of traffic, we received our startup clearance right away and taxied to the runway. Due to some military exercise, we were assigned a less than optimal SID. There is always massive military activity in Greece, much more than in any country I've flown to. While in Germany, fighter pilots spend their time polishing and waxing the airplanes, it seems that in Greece they actually get some flying hours. A lot of it is NATO though, Crete is one of the biggest NATO bases.

3 minutes after starting the engine, we were on the runway and cleared for takeoff into blue skies.

Shortly after takeoff, we switched to Heraklion Approach and were taken off the impractical SID with radio vectors. The ATCO apologized for the detour due to a military exercise and promised to make them as short as possible. Excellent, she knows how to make pilots happy! After about 3 minutes we were back on our direct routing to Athens.

Most of the time, a forced landing would mean ditching in the sea. There are a lot of small islands, some of them inhabited, some not but they are very rugged and any attempt to land would surely get you killed. Here you can see Milos.

Our routing went via Athens, almost direct and still Greek ATC supplied us with additional shortcuts by omitting a few waypoints. Athens is a massive city with more inhabitants than Berlin, a very impressive view from high above.

North of Athens the potential forced landings turned into ditchings again and the landscape got a lot greener with a few very nice islands.

Next we reached Thessaloniki, Greece's second largest city which is also a pretty view with a large harbor.

Shortly thereafter, we passed the border from Macedonia to Macedonia (whomever you ask) and were back in the rugged country with zero options for forced landings.

As we were fighting our way against the 30kt headwind that we've had from takeoff in Iraklion, we eventually reached Serbia and passed by the airport of Nis were we stopped on the way south. This time we wanted to try Belgrade, partially because it would allow us to buy more of the cheap fuel and because our experience in Nis was not entirely positive.

The whole south of Serbia is without radar coverage and everything is based on position reports. As we approached Belgrade, radar service started and we got several vectors and a good descent strategy worked out for us. Belgrade is a large airport and the procedures are not simple so I was thankful to hear "expect radio vectors for ILS 12" and I knew what to prepare for.

The weather was great, the approach prepared and I spent some time looking at the city. A few radar vectors came and I started wondering what the ATCO was planning to do with me, this was a very strange way to put me on the ILS 12. Just when I was about to ask, he told me "expect ILS 30". I was already rather close and had not studied the procedure for 30 nor setup anything. If the weather had been anything but CAVOK, I would have asked for delay vectors to prepare for the approach but in this case I decided to do it rapidly. GNS was programmed, KX155A, too, a quick look at the chart and ATC further pushed my limits: "D-EDGK, what is your maximum speed?". "Aehm, 160 indicated". "D-EDGK, maximum speed". "Lufthansa 1406, what is your minimum speed?". "220". "Lufthansa 1406, minimum speed". In front of me was a landing Airbus and I was sandwiched between it an the Lufthansa doing 220 while I was flying the approach like a madman at full speed. The runway was very long but we agreed that once we fly over the river, we would slow down, throw out the gear and flaps and land, no matter what. Also we asked where our taxiway would be so we can touchdown shortly before it and vacate quickly.

When doing this kind of approach, there is no way to maintain the glideslope, slowing down rapidly in short final, dropping the gear and flaps turns it into a rodeo ride but it is a rare thing that big airports go the extra mile to fit us small GA aircraft into a busy sequence so I did not want to disappoint him and give him reason to not do it again in the future. I had asked my copilot to check the gear indicator and put my hand on the gear lever in the middle of the approach. Doing these kind of crazy high speed non standard approaches is when you forget about the gear and land on the belly. There was no time for checklists of course.

The technical landing at Belgrade was superb, I posted about it in another thread. This airport is right at the top of my list. It's always nice to find yourself on the arrival display of a large airport.

We were airborne about 1h later with a flight plan on an almost direct route via Croatia, Slovenia and Austria to Stuttgart, Germany. Belgrade approach vectored us elegantly onto our route and soon thereafter, we met the first few clouds. Our 30kt headwind started to get stronger.

The lowest possible level for our Alps crossing was FL110 and we chose that because of the headwind.

Several times I had my doubts whether the mountain tops in front of were actually below our cruising level but all 3 terrain warning systems, the altimeter, ATC and the map told me they should be.

The wind constantly increased in velocity, from 30kt to 50kt and starting around Salzburg, the clouds become more numerous. We asked for a descent to the lowest level possible which was FL080 hoping for a bit less wind but this put us right in the clouds.

At first I was playing the "request 10 to the left due to weather" and "20 to the right" but I was getting tired of it so we said let's try flying through the clouds and if this is no good, cancel IFR and continue VFR. The clouds were harmless and we were in and out. When the clouds cleared up, we saw a hot air balloon at our altitude and very close. I asked ATC about it and they said they are in contact but the balloon was 4000ft below us. I was puzzled because I could have sworn it was exactly at our altitude. Just when I was ready to believe that something must be wrong with me, I noticed another balloon way below the one at our altitude. I asked ATC about the 2nd balloon and they said there was only one balloon they know about. Flying a hot air balloon at 30kt wind must be fun but you need a good friend on the ground to drive all the way to pick you up!

For the first time ever, I was routed directly via Munich, to the Maisach VOR and I was able to admire the city of Munich from the air. Usually they route you with a lot of distance around Munich because of the busy airport. Here's the football stadium of FC Bayern.

We spotted something strange and only after some time realized that it must be the rowing installation of the 1972 Olympics in Munich.

Half an hour later we landed under a broken cloud cover at our destination Heubach EDTH near Stuttgart at calm winds. The landing was a real greaser after all those crosswind landings in Egypt and Greece and the rushed sandwich landing in Belgrade.

About 27h of flying, done in two days each. This was a lot of flying and took a lot of force. The weather was excellent on the trip back and only a bit difficult on the first leg from Stuttgart to Serbia with icing and several hours in IMC. The aircraft performed very well and everything more or less worked out as planned. All in all a great trip, exactly to my taste.