Best international airport, NE Spain, S France?

[Sam Rutherford]

Hi, looking for the best airport with customs/immigration for GA around corner from NE Spain into France.

Perpignan? Carcassonne? Girona?

Thoughts?

Cheers, Sam.

[Jude098]

checkout this site French Airfields Map (http://www.arthurandarthur.co.uk/AA/index.php/french-airfields-map.html)

[echobeach]

Perpignan I have used a few times and parked overnight. Usually in transit to and from Spain. Last year on way to Mallorca. Good service. Cheap parking. Avgas was no problem.
Cacrcassone had no avgas when we stopped there. It was not as easy to get in and out of as Perpignan. The coastal flying there makes perpignan a favourite. They were always very friendly and helpful.

[172driver]

Girona gets very busy, as it's a RYR base. They come in waves, but if you hit one of those, you'll be holding for a while.... Also, Avgas is a fixed installation on the apron's far side of the transient parking. If you go, taxi straight there to fuel up and only then to your parking.

Have only overflown Perpignan (and been there on CAT), might well be the better place.

PS: check the current landing & parking fees in Girona and indeed all Spanish airports. AENA have hiked all their fees by ridiculous amounts in the past couple of years and also introduced mandatory handling at many airports. Don't know if Girona is one of them, but if this is the case then it gets pretty pricey pretty quickly.

[A and C]

Another vote for Perpignan !

[TRY2FLY]

Flew into Reus a few times a couple of years ago in a PA28. Found them fairly helpful. No problem parking getting fuel, wx, or to file a VFR flightplan.

[overandout]

Avoid Perpignan .very slow and bureaucratic on leaving.
Carcass one much easier.

[maxred]

Avoid Perpignan .very slow and bureaucratic on leaving

I have used both Perpignan, and Carc extensively. I have never had any issues with either of them, both arriving, and or leaving.

Arrived one night at Carc, mind you, FP stated a 19.30 arrival, guy in tower acknowledged my call on final, then said good night, he was off.

Landed, taxied to the GA bit, and all gates were locked up. I could only go through the - one way turnstyle, 2 kids, my wife and bags. The airport had also been closed up, along with the car hire company where I had to uplift the hire car. Ooops.

A very kind German private hire taxi guy, came and rescued us, and got us a hotel room for the night.

Other than that, great.

[Russell Gulch]

Girona <> Avgas is a fixed installation on the apron's far side of the transient parking. (much snipped from post)

Summer 2012: Avgas for GA was by Bowser at Girona.
They don't have any GA tiedown facility (or chocks, so be aware). Despite acres of grass, they don't know what grass is.

Mandatory Handling was € 70 plus landing fee of €100 for little GA types in Summer 2012, so as someone else says, check the current rules & regs.

I would suggest either Carcassonne (€5 land incl 2 hours parking, but check fuel availability) or Beziers, or a small french GA field like Grauhlet for fuel, if you have landed Schengen-side already. Avoid Perpignan; airport = small willy, much willy waving.

Or go direct to Sabadell.

Russ

[Sam Rutherford]

Thanks for all of those. Seems fairly even split Carcassonne-Perpignan - so going to Perpignan as it's on the coast (so an easy 'in' from Algiers, VFR).

Anyone there on Friday?!

Thanks again, Sam.

[pfeinstein]

Girona is an excellent airport. Handling is expensive, but approach and surroundings are great and easy to handle. ANd once on the ground, you have a lot of options: mountain, beach, and (generally speaking) sun!

[silverknapper]

Just a curve ball but Pau is always a decent stop for us.

[Sam Rutherford]

Just landed Perpignan.

Friendly enough, though getting from the apron to groundside is a bit odd:


Turnstile exit, very difficult with luggage
Bit of a walk (with same luggage)
Deposits you at the car park - no customs or immigration at all :eek:
Cheers, Sam.

[maxred]

Last time I was there, we arrived at 19.30, walked through the gate, jumped a taxi, and twenty minutes later, was sitting in a nice wee Italian having a pasta.

Had not spoken to anyone other than the taxi driver.

We had flown in from Jersey...

Enjoy:cool: