Hi all
This is my recent flying experience in spain: Wrong timing, high expectation , came back empty handed. I wonder whether I would do better if I had gone to America.
I had about 100hour in training over 3 years. Due to weather and other reasons had not flown for the last 3 months. The plan was to take 9 days time off and flown intensively for a week to revise, complete the qualifying cross country and then the skill test.
After considering the apparent hassle of the american visa and other comments on this forum, I had decided to give it a go in Spain.
Paid 1000 eure deposit for 15 hours in C172. Booked air ticket, hotel/parking and hire car. Got direction to the school,names of CFI and instructor and the time to report. Couldn't wait to go to the sunny spain.
Day 1: flight from gatwick to Seville. 1 hour delay departure. otherwise it was OK.
arrived Sevelle late evening. got the hire car and the trip to south no problem. toll hightway very good. but finding the hotel was difficult as the google map and direction pointed to an industrial area instead.
Day 2: woke up to bad weather, blusterly wind. drove to the airport. The school was in a single storey out building with a small sign on the door.Not very impressive. Mentioned the names of all my contacts, none available. The office manager was minding his computer in the corner of his office, and instructors dealing with the students. Not much creature comfort in the briefing room, couple of bench tables and a few plastic chairs.
Did the check in and filled in paper work with the manager, who didn't know who my instructor was supposed to be. Apparently there were a couple of German instrutors and a newly recruited UK instructor. So it was then decided that the UK one was my instructor. I felt that there were some sort of tension between the office manager and the instructor on how and what to do with me.( later found out that the manager himself was there only a few days earlier.) The briefing for new pilot was fairly "brief", 5 minutes may be, not the sort of two hour briefing on airspace,dadio and procedure differences etc,as had been described somewhere on this forum before. Quite a few documents and facility were written in german.
No flying today,so went out to see the A/c. about 20 shiny pa28 nicely parked on the ramp. But no, these were for the commercial pilot training school on the same airport. For this school only 3 a/c available, 1 pa28, 1 normal c172 and 1 antique c172 (50 years old). seems to be in good condition, except the old c172 was leaking a bit of oil from engine.
day 3 : better weather and flyable. but no c172 available. instructor suggested pa28. it's more expensive, although my previous experience with pa28 was with a different engine and not current, I reluctantly accepted as I wanted to fly as much as possible. Needed to file flight plan at least half an hour before any flight.
Fairly stiff cross wind, a long single tarmac runways,took off to local area with a fellow student at the back for some exercise, then return.
after a snack at the terminal, fellow student returned offer for a ride along to local training area. After that it was my turn, this time in C172 doing circuits. Felt rusty
day 4 :
flyable with strong wind. Normal c172 not available, had to fly the antique 172, different layout and manual flap control, airspeed in mph instead of knot. More circuits. Second session in the afternoon, this time back in pa28, flew to local area for vor tracking, instrument flying and unusual attitude recovery. Hood on, and with instructor throwing the a/c around the sky, felt a bit sick but managed not to throw up. then back for more circuit work.I did not seem to cope well with swapping around different type of aeroplanes. requested to stick with c172. Other student moaned and refused to fly the antique 172 and considered it a cheap alternative for the money.
Met for the first time, the general manager and the CFI, very pleasant to talk to, and they seem to know their stuff very well.
day 5: weather ok. given maps and plan nav ex to north. struggle to get info on weather, notam etc. filed flight plan and off in the antique 172. going out OK. on track and identified all major features.destination only had air to air radio, but for about 5 euro to land on a nice tarmac runway, nothing to compalin about.
On returning, missed the preflight checklist item of switching on the radio master. taxi after announcement of intension, and needed to vacate runway quickly, as one a/c was approaching final and obviousely not able to hear our announcement from our radio which was off. probably due to lack of concentration, and with stronger wind and indicated airspeed of only 90 to 95mph, went off track,and only managed to avoid flying into cloud at the last moment.
day 6; strong wind and heavy rain. no flying and nothing to do. then off to the local motorcycle racing circuit. its a official MotoGP test day, but not many people there and not a lot to see. bought an umbrella at the gate, and as expected, did not last 30 seconds.
In the evening, walk around in the old city center, stopped by 2 plain cloth policeman, shown their badge and demanded to see my passport, fortunately i had it with me. they had a look then said thank you. no problem and no hassle. But I wonder what might happened if I did not have the passport with me.
day 7: strong wind again. took off and attempted to leave the area.but too bumpy and returned. drove down to south coast and had a tour in the area for the day.
day 8: weather ok with low cloud. Went out to find some clear space and did some steep turns, and then back for more circuits.Then wait for the afternoon sessions, more vor tracking and circuits, quite a bit of waiting and orbits due to commercial traffic. flying finished.
time to settle the accounts. asked for the invoice. but instead I was asked to sign the credit card slip first,as it was otherwise difficult for the manager to do it on the computer. felt a bit odd but signed it anyway. got the invoice, noticed that there was an extra flight charged which did not happened. Manager promised to credit it back to me straight away.
day 9: left hotel and drove to Sevelle airport. traffic ok but had to wait for about half an hour to return the hire car. checked in, OK. hanged around and pick up a small clear plastic bag on the floor. Oh my goodness, a thick slab of 50 euro cash note. What to do? Handed it to the check in counter staff. May be i should have handed it to the police instead. return to Gatwick ok and back to the more predictable grey and damp weather.
comment:
weather: disappointing as the area was supposed to be one of the best region in Europe. Only 4 days flyable(some marginal) out of 7 days.
facility: Many UK local flying club fare better and with only 3 aeroplanes of different make and model available to cater for the supposedly international customers in-adequate. Not very well organised, might get better when the new manager settled in.
instructor: Did not fly with german instructror, looked mature/career instructor and not the hour-biulder type. Only 1 new UK instructor, not the style I am comfortable with, may be just a clash of personality.
aircraft maintence issue: There did not seem to have any one to do the line mainainence. e.g. defective compass and beacon light remained u/s and did not get fixed. A helicopter instructor and student arrived, but could not get the helicopter to start, and had to come back another day for the training.
customer service: Email response were prompt but once I paid the deposit, it became far and few in between. When I was back in UK and querried about discrepancy on the invoice, no one seems interested to response to my email and phone call, and now it's in the hand of my credit card company, and see if the 3% surcharge worth its money.
During my stay I had not been asked to sign the 2500 euro credit card voucher (supposedly insurance excess for student solo flight ), whether it's no longer required ,or they just knew that I am not going to fly solo.
Value for money: not cheaper than in UK. e.g.
take a pa 28 an hour for circuit training, the cost break down:
pa 28---------------- 150 euro
instructor --------------40
6 touch and go---6x11= 66
landing ----------1x11= 11
total------------------ 267 plus 3% surcharge
equal ------------------214 sterling pounds
In my case, 10.5 hr of flying revision, plus accomodation/ air fare/ hire car/parking costed about 2300 pounds. Food and drink not included.
All in all, an expensive trip and not achieving the goal.
May be I should bite the bullet and get the American visa, any comment welcome.