The CTAF bit sounds pretty normal and “ international “ to me. That is NAS and great!
An “ area frequency “ for VFR is unknown in international procedures. After all ICAO has no radio requirements for VFR in E or G.
Are you listening on the area frequency so you can answer IFR aircraft and organise “ radio arranged separation “ ? How often have you had to do this?
No doubt there is a constant barrage of calls on the “ area” frequency. Are your passengers forced to listen to those calls ? Is that relaxing for them?
Or do you just monitor the calls yourself?
How many times on the flight - say from Bankstown- did you have to look down at the panel to change the area frequency? Was it six or seven times or more?
As you flew right on the frequency boundary west of Forbes what frequency did you monitor?
Would you be prepared to try the US or Canadian system where there was no such thing as an area frequency and therefore no requirement to listen ?
Last edited by Dick Smith; 1st Jan 2018 at 09:29.