european tour

[pil]

people of pprune.

in april, i am planning to do a tour of europe in a light aircraft. my planned route is uk-belgium-holland-germany-czech-austria-italy-switzerland-france and then back to blighty, possibly taking in denmark a bit of sweden and spain. however, my furthest jaunt abroad has been to ostend, hardly much experience. i was wondering if anyone had any stories or helpful hints for undertaking this journey? do i need to make my last departure and arrival airport a customs airport when crossing countries boundaries? is it fairly straight forward to fly between countries? does anybody have any suggestions for airports/cities that they have visited and found helpful and accomodating (or any too avoid)? are the vfr requirements the same in europe as uk? how much notice should i give before departure? what do you do if nobody at a destination speaks english? in fact, any advice, however small will be appreciated.

yours,

confused of london....

[Aussie Andy]

Sounds like a fun trip!

In my very limited experience, you generally need to have filed a flight plan and report to ATC as required when crossing international FIR boundaries, at least this was necessary between UK <-> France and France <-> Spain when I did it as part of a group last year.

Language is generally English for major ATC services, but be aware that there are plenty of local airfields in France for example, and I would expect elsewhere, where knowledge of local language is necessary in the circuit and to have adequate situational awareness (the latter can also be true in bi-lingual enroute environments). I prepared a crib-sheet for my own use in France which you are welcome to look at for example here (http://web.onetel.net.uk/~andy_hardy/France/fr_circuit.pdf) (see also thread on this subject here (http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=50472))

Moreover though, with so little experience flying on the continent, my urge and what I'd recommend would be to either team up with someone who has a bit more experience of this sort of thing to come with you or, failing that, to at least take another PPL along with you to halve the workload and learn together. Even things like the maps being different and not being as familiar with where to look up information will add to your workload.

Hope this helps - and good luck!

Andy :)

[Fly Stimulator]

A little link (http://www.earthrounders.com/) in case you decide to get still more ambitious. ;)

[Final 3 Greens]

Pil

what do you do if nobody at a destination speaks english

Speak louder (works in Benidorm every time) :D

[atb1943]

You can get almost all your charts from Jeppesen (or an agent such as Transair). The Bottlang VFR airfield manual as a one-time trip kit is a good buy, and their VFR/GPS charts cover most of Europe with the exception of Sweden Norway and Finland. VFR Flitestar is a handy tool too.
Hope this helps.

[AC-DC]

PIL

some questions.
1. What is your exparience?
2. What is your bad weather expariance?
3. Have you got an IMC?
4. How long do you think to spend on rout?
5. What is your budget?
6. Where do you want to fly in these countries?