After cancelling Hamburg in April, it was time to plan the first big trip of the year. Whilst originally we would repeat last year’s trip to Prague & Erlangen, we would extend this year’s adventure to Košice, Slovakia.
I’d also purchased a new oxygen system (more on this soon), which would enable 40 hours of endurance, roughly 20.5 hours per person with the EDS system. On a full bottle, this meant we could comfortably fly at the highest levels for the whole trip if needed.
Comfortably the forecast for this whole trip was benign, with the fine and settled weather stretched across Europe since early May. The only notable weather was the heat storms building over the Tatra Mountains and towards Hungary, including a humungous cell well south of our route. But this time we had the endurance of both fuel and oxygen to make massive deviations to get to our final destination, Košice – roughly 76 km (47 miles/40.84 nautical miles) from the nearest city Uzhhorod on the Ukrainian Border.
One of the most adventurous trips I’ve done to date, flying to the far eastern border of Europe, near the edge of a war zone. Flying across Slovakia’s mostly mountainous territory and revisiting a favourite location, Erlangen for the berg. This trip was a memorable experience and many miles were flown, and it was great to complete the furthest distance I’d ever flown. This trip gave me the overview effect – the appreciation and perception of beauty, unexpected and even overwhelming emotion, and an increased sense of connection to other people and the Earth as a whole. This was just the start of a big flying year using my Instrument Rating, and this was just the start.
Read more in the blog: https://www.theflyingvlog.uk/a-thousand-mile-journey-to-the-edge-of-europe/
Trip to the edge of Europe
Trip to Erlangen and home
Hi Robbie
Why was your stall warning sounding on takeoff from Prague?
RussSheffield wrote:
Why was your stall warning sounding on takeoff from Prague?
RussSheffield wrote:
Hi RobbieWhy was your stall warning sounding on takeoff from Prague?
Arun wrote:
RussSheffield wrote:
Why was your stall warning sounding on takeoff from Prague?
Interesting topic discussed here
Hi Russ,
Can be a bit of a weird one to experience, but it’s simply not fixable unless it can be done with Diamonds say so. (AFAIK) I think even in our newly installed AoA function on the Aspen if I pull back in the green range for rotation, you’ll still hear it chirping.
Finally watched your videos.
Those planes can bring you a long way, as long as you have €€ to put in the tanks 
The weather was so nice on this trip, it must have felt too easy. It does from an armchair
I enjoy your long blog posts too.
Good luck with editing all your trips.
Thanks for watching :)
The DA40 is a very capable aircraft. The limit I find is about 5-5/5 hours to then have at least 60-90 minutes reserve for diversion, depending on weather or airport availability. It’s JetA1 so reasonable cost, except in the amazing EU where they tax it for NCO.
I do find that with IFR, it’s pretty easy but I have a process in place that I’ll try share in an upcoming vlog/blog of keeping on top with things by checking various in-flight aspects to be ahead of the game.
Glad you enjoy the blogs too :)
Jujupilote wrote:
Finally watched your videos.
Those planes can bring you a long way, as long as you have €€ to put in the tanks
The weather was so nice on this trip, it must have felt too easy. It does from an armchair
I enjoy your long blog posts too.Good luck with editing all your trips.
When will you publish your next big trip vlogs ?
Hi Robbie,
Looks like a great trip!
You appear to have lost weight and you look good on it. Always good for keeping the medical safe.
EDIT: Careful of that yellow line in non-smooth air…
Jujupilote wrote:
When will you publish your next big trip vlogs ?
There’s a VLOG/BLOG coming out for Zurich in the next 24 hours.
Graham wrote:
Hi Robbie,Looks like a great trip!
You appear to have lost weight and you look good on it. Always good for keeping the medical safe.
EDIT: Careful of that yellow line in non-smooth air…
Hi Graham, Definitely need to loose more (85kg would be a nice figure to have ;) I may get more subscribers ;D)
Yes, it’s definitely one to be careful of. When I start jostling against the belt I start to reduce the power massively, but the thermals can be quite rough at any speed I find in the DA40.
Thanks for following along, glad you enjoyed it.
It looks like a very nice trip, to a nice area. I was in Vysoke Tatry last summer, my furthest point east in Europe so far and really enjoyed a couple of days there before heading south. I’d recommend it and it’s also quite inexpensive.
I’m sure the Slovakian locals like the term ‘central Europe’…. this area is not really ‘the edge of Europe’. The Black Sea is another 450 miles through Romania, an EU country I’d like to visit, and Ukraine is in geographical Europe.
