Parked on hard surface
View from the west
I got some shortcuts on way back
Good to meet some more of you on this trip, and Calvi proved to be a great location. I’d not visited Corsica before but it’s certainly somewhere I’ll return.
When we departed on Sunday morning I asked the shuttle bus driver to give me a hand to pull the plane over the dirt to the hard surface. He wasn’t overly happy but he did do it!
Also a plug for Le Castellet LFMQ, just east of Marseilles. Because of the Avgas shortage on Corsica we used it to refuel and do customs (available on request). Really efficient and friendly refuelling and admin, 1750m hard runway. Will go there again.
This shows the condition of the sand/dirt “GA apron” at Calvi airport
We actually offered to help that SR20 driver to tow him off the dirt, but he could not be bothered. So he covered everything else on there with sh*t, not to mention having a load of it sucked into his cockpit as he was holding the door open.
I told the man in the office that the surface is not suitable for aircraft, due to the impressive range of stones and rocks which are all over it. He agreed but it sounded like nobody is going to do anything about it.
It’s fine if you don’t taxi on it under power, but there will probably need to be two of you pulling the aircraft manually. We needed 4 to pull the filled-up TB20 off it.
Anyway, some pics from the next leg to Corfu:
and this is the cause
Final for LGKR
What a nice photo of Corfu !
Strange how whenever I go there it is dark and I get to land on the other end……… Oh and it also fails to show the appalling undulations in the runway surface.
Nice reports… sorry we could not make it.
Norman, what airplane was this? Interesting avionics too.
It was nice meeting y’all in Calvi on Friday and Sunday nights. We managed to escape the worst convective activity although we had to go around some build-up to the South-West of Lyon. Other than that we had perfect flying conditions until we neared the Paris area which was covered in haze. Also we chose to tow the a/c onto the asphalt, but barely made it.
My wife was thrilled by the week-end too, so I guess I will be allowed to do this again!
what airplane was this?
Van’s RV9.
We needed 4 to pull the filled-up TB20 off it.
I recommend visiting gym 
I can pull filled-up TB20 myself alone and it does not to be pefect tarmac with 0 elevation.
Emir, you mean you found the knob to release the parking brake
I find it personally too hard to move a fully loaded TB20 (fuel + bags) by muscular strength of one person alone – flexing one’s muscles bears the risk here to tear a muscle …
Emir, you mean you found the knob to release the parking brake
Exactly
I do it very often alone. Not that I wouldn’t use the help but when I land or when I have to move the aircraft from parking to startup position and there’s nobody to help, flexing muscles is the only option.
