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VFR cross-country from EDFM (Mannheim) - LFSN (Nancy) and back

This is a write-up of a short (solitary) VFR cross country that I did yesterday in some marvellous weather.
Even though this is nothing too special, I will still put a little extra detail in, as I know many people appreciate it.

Generally speaking, in the southwest of Germany, this winter the weather has so far been outstandingly good. I reckon that from the 15th of november until today, one could do least some VFR flying all on but maybe 10 days. On most days, even serious cross countries were no problem… proof that all people saying that VFR is not reasonably possible in winter are seriously wrong. Well, at least as long as pilots have a little bit flexibility schedule-wise.
The only downside of this winter is that there has been very little or no snow, which of course, when the conditions are right, can make for some wonderful landscapes.

It is my experience that in winter, the very best VFR weather is not found when there is a giant high pressure area around, as this normally brings about lots of fog, and even when the fog has lifted, visibility is usually poor. Plus, it is normally freezing cold, which makes preflight etc. a pain.

Rather, the best winter weather one could wish for is when there is (in german) a “Zwischenhoch” (don’t know the english word for it). Basically, that’s when, after the passage of a low, there is a small area of relatively high pressure (but still below 1013) before the next low moves in. This usually also means pleasantly mild temperatures. Downside is that these conditions usually only last one day, so again, a little flexibility is called for.

Yesterday, the 17th of January, was one of those days in the west of Germany. Here is the sat image from early in the morning:

As you can see, at that time, the “trailing edge” of the passing weather system was approximately over Frankfurt. It was moving east and so a flight from Mannheim (just south of Frankfurt) west towards France sounded good.
Obviously, in the winter, when the weather clears like this – especially when this happens early in the morning – there is always a good chance for fog. So I had a look over the METARs. One tool I really like for european VFR flying is Orbifly’s “METMAP”, as it usually allows me to make the go/no-go decision within a second. Here it is:

So: “green” METARs all the way (even to the east of my route). And no fog in France.

As some of you may remember, on my last trip in December, I stopped at Nancy-Essey (LFSN) for fuel, but didn’t have time to visit the city. This was a good opportunity to remedy this.

I filed my VFR flightplan using Rockroute, which is really painless.
The distance between Mannheim and Nancy is just a little over 100 miles. As far as the route goes, I just put “DCT” into the RR route mask. With very few exceptions, I always plan totally direct when VFR, even in the most complicated airspaces of Europe.
RR is very helpful in this case, in that it automatically inserted a custom defined waypoint at the FIR boundary.

This serves two purposes:
1. It satisfied the requirement for a waypoint at least every 30 minutes of flight on VFR flight plans
2. It defined the exact border crossing point, which is something the French are very keen on.

In case you wonder about the airspace structure for the French part of the route, well here it is :

In that part of France, the airspace is really “as bad as it can get”. Anyway, I didn’t really worry. More on that later.

Mannheim airport is just 5 minutes from my home, so that’s always very convenient.
At the hangar, the first look at the real weather conditions was totally reassuring. Whilst over the airport there was still some overcast, one could clearly see the blue skies towards the west:

Here she is in the hangar, one of the club’s C172s. This one is a 1980 (Reims-built) C172N. (That’s my birthyear!).

This is the cold cockpit.

Some fuel was called for.

Actually, I was able to measure the fuel in the tanks quite accurately using a dipstick, and I figured that – even without refuelling – I would have had a bit more than one hour left upon my return to Mannheim. However, this is – as we say – too little to live and too much to die and I don’t like that, so I just topped of the tanks with some 50 litres of 100LL.

In case you wonder why I didn’t plan to refuel in France in order to get some money back from my club (the price is about 20% lower in LFSN than in EDFM)… this unfortunately doesn’t make sense in case of a club aircraft because in case of fuel receipts from abroad, the clubs can only refund the (german) price of the fuel net of VAT , which makes it a wash after all.

Just after departure on runway 27, here I am over the beautiful city of Mannheim. You can see the train station as well as the river Rhine (to the left) and the river Neckar (to the right).

The Rhine separates the “twin-cities” of Mannheim (right) and Ludwigshafen (left).

Set up in cruise at 3000 feet, proceeding west-southwestbound. Unfortunately, there was a strong headwind, leaving me groundspeeds in the 78-80 knots region.

I was now in contact with Langen FIS for some traffic information service, but there was apparently no traffic at this time of day.
After crossing the Rhine valley, approaching the Pfälzer Wald. This is Neustadt an der Weinstraße.

The edge of the Pfälzer Wald, looking North. BTW, this region is famous for its white wines.

A town in the middle of the Pfälzer Wald.

Occasionally, there was some fog in the valleys, but other than that, the sun came out more and more.

Cruising along nicely, even though the groundspeed was occasionally down to 75 knots.

This is Pirmasens, close to the french border.

Shortly after, we were handed over to Strasbourg Information. Remember what the airspace looked like? Well, I can tell you that it was an absolute non-event. I mean…everybody knows that it is usually half as bad as it looks on the chart, but this flight was really the proof that the french charts all pretty much BS.
Strasbourg simply said “transit approved, direct Nancy”. And don’t forget: this was on a weekday, at 10:45 local time! No need to call the relevant military controllers either as it seems that FIS coordinates with them. Really, really a non-event.

Once in France, there wasn’t really a lot to see for a while…

…so I had this guy do the work for me.

I cannot stress enough how much I think that at least an old basic autopilot is a wonderful thing even in a simple VFR aircraft.
A little bit of flooding here and there.

Another look at the flightdeck. As you can see, I navigate using a knee-mounted ipad and I really have come to like this setup. No blocked views like when using a yoke-mounted unit. And the reception, in my experience with any high-wing / low wing aircraft (both metal and plastic) has been perfect as far as satellite reception goes.

After a while, the city of Nancy came into view and I changed over to Nancy Information. BTW, Nancy’s AFIS is manned every day, except between noon and 2 o’clock, so it is rather easy to plan the flight without any troubles relating to language proficiency.

There is the airport, right in the middle of the picture.

Short final.

Taxying in.

Parking at apron 1.

There she is.

Most French airports belonging to the major cities have decent bus connections to the airport, which is nice as taxis tend to be very expensive there.
In this case, it was a 5 minute walk down the airport entrance road to the main road crossing where the bus stop was.

OK, here is a few impressions from Nancy. The “vielle ville” is really nice. Most notable though is the Place Stanislas, which is really beautiful. Also, as always in France, I went to the “marché” and bought some picnic.

Back at the airport, at around 3 o’clock. BTW, the landing fee was a modest 11 Euros.

In the meantime, an ultralight had joined me at the parking.

Beautiful light.

Any wrinkles on the skin?

Back in the cockpit.

At the holding point for runway 21. In the afternoon, the airport had become quite a bit busier. A Tomahawk was doing touch’n go’s.

There even was a cue at the holding point!

A look at the city, after departure.

And a last look at the airfield.

The return flight turned out to be just as easy as in the morning; the weather was now totally CAVOK all around. What’s is nice about eastbound flights in winter afternoons is that the sun is in one’s back, allowing for some very nice photos.

Given the headwind, I chose to climb to FL55. Again, even though this meant crossing the Lorraine TMA, Strasbourg was able to issue the clearance directly to me. Fantastic. Climb rates also weren’t half bad.

Happy cruising.

At FL55. Given the headwind, I chose to fly at low RPM, thus “saving” tach time. GS was 120 knots.

What’s not to like?

This is Sarre-Union airfield (LFQU), a nice little place that I visited twice last year. Unfortunately, due to the stupid implementation of the ICAO language proficiency requirements, flying to these places – even for people who speak decent french – has now become a little “borderline”. Shame on our authorities.

Some very isolated puffies.

Back in Germany, some nice afternoon light shining onto Pirmasens.

The enormous Pfälzer Wald ahead.

Now some beautiful photos of the Pfälzer Wald in the early evening sunshine.

Crossing the Rhine valley again. In the distance, you can see Mannheim.

And a few more shots of these beauties called Ludwigshafen and Mannheim.

“Local” people will be able to spot the airport on this photo (I was cleared for a straight-in to runway 09).

Crossing the Rhine again. The vast BASF plant can be seen in the background.

Mannheim.

Lining up on final 09.

Taxying in with the “terminal” ahead.

Here we are.

The same shot I had taking early in the morning.

Last Edited by boscomantico at 18 Jan 13:13
Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany
Nice report. The photos even made Mannheim look good!
Last Edited by JasonC at 18 Jan 12:17
EGTK Oxford

Thanks for sharing – it is nice to see a report of a flight that could (perhaps!) have been mine.

But that 09 finals gave me the shudders, all built-up area. There must be places near finals where there’s no plan B in case the engine quits, one would really have to approach from high up so that a glide-in becomes possible.

(btw if you still have time to edit, I think you meant a ‘’queue" at the departure, rather than a “cue”. Though of course, we don’t want clueless pilots in the skies!)

EBZH Kiewit, Belgium

Yes, indeed. I am not too worried about engine failures when on final, but the departure from runway 27 at EDFM is criminal. Downsides of a “city” airport. If you ask a local instructor what he would do in case of an engine problem at 500 feet, he will shrug his shoulders…

Last Edited by boscomantico at 18 Jan 12:39
Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany

thanks for the nice report. Haven’t been to Nancy so far though I always wanted to go there VFR. Zwischenhoch is most probably a high pressure ridge.

EDxx, Germany

Beautiful pictures and very nicely put together report (Apologies but I think you had a tailwind on the way back not a headwind)!

jxk
EGHI, United Kingdom

Lovely report, thanks a lot.

Pity that Essey is one of the airports which lost their customs clearance recently so no direct flights from / to UK or Switzerland.

LSZH(work) LSZF (GA base), Switzerland

Must see more of France – I’ve mostly been in the Alps and Corsica. Thanks for the very nice photos!

Great trip report – French airspace does look forbidding, previously I always filed airways, but now am mainly VFR, so good to hear there were no complications in getting crossing clearance.

Nice 172 well above the typical UK warhorse on a club rental line.

Oxford (EGTK), United Kingdom

Ha! Since you mention it…yes, I too have the impression that in the UK, the club and rental aircraft are (aesthetically) among the worst in Europe. Worse than in Germany and also worse than in Italy.

Maybe a bit of a cultural thing?

The aesthetics of this Cessna here are in fact a bit sub-standard for the average german aeroclub aircraft. Generally, they are decently taken care of over here.

The most impeccable club/rental aircraft I have seen were in Switzerland… . Most of them look almost as new.

Last Edited by boscomantico at 18 Jan 16:30
Mainz (EDFZ) & Egelsbach (EDFE), Germany
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