Hour Building Tour

[4015]

So, the time is fast approaching for me to start hour building.

I don't particularly want to just pootle around the South of England, I would much rather do something slightly more challenging and adventurous whilst working on skills like accuracy etc.

So, I am considering taking an aircraft and going on a small tour of Europe. A typical route could be mid-France, Northern Italy, Swiss Alps, South of France, South of Spain, then back.

My question to you all is this:
Who here has done something like this?
Are there any 'hidden' factors for me to consider? I am a proficient and confident pilot, but this will be VMC/VFR only.
Are there any opinions or tips on this?

Excuse the naivity, I have only just stared mulling the idea over properly and wanted some advice and input before I really started getting into the planning.

Thanks,

4015

[mad_jock]

Instead of going south....

Why don't you head north up Finland and go and have a moose burger in the artic circle. Finland is quite GA friendly and although the locals are humorless sods without a beer inside them they are actually very helpfull and quite amusing when pissed.

[troddenmasses]

As I got to that stage, I found that I could not afford either the time away from work, or simply the cash for one long tour away. Instead, we used to go for lots of 4 day trips. From Cardiff the first stop was always the Channel Islands to fill up with cheap fuel and breakfast. I don't know what the situation is at your club (if you are hiring), but they would always pay us back at the 'home fuel' rate, which meant that if the fuel at Cardiff cost £1 per litre (a while back), and the fuel in Alderney cost 25p per litre, we would gain 75p per litre towards the cost of flying. Don't forget that you can claim the tax back on any fuel that you export, as well - brings the cost down a little further.

We would then spread the map out along the wing, draw a circle at the 2-3 hour distance and then decide where to go for lunch. After lunch we would do the same to decide where to go that evening. Absolutely no forward planning (other than weather and Notams) meant that we had to get very good at map reading and accurate VFR flying. 2.5 days each way should give you a really good opportunity to see a lot of France, or hack off East - the decision can be made on the day when you see where the best weather is. Go for it - you will remember it for ever.

[SNS3Guppy]

Build experience, not hours. A gulf of difference exists between the two.

[Morrisman1]

Build experience, not hours.

Wise words, looking back Im annoyed that I didn't complete the required flights first then go have fun looking at new and exciting places, who knows If I hear back about my instructor rating soon the I may have another bunch of hours to build and I most definitely will use that opportunity to tour the country

[Radar]

4015,

How much time have you got? How many hours are you looking to build? You'll be amazed how much of Europe you can cover in a short time strapped to a Lycoming! Since 2004 I've had the pleasure of the following in an Arrow

Peenemunde - Gdansk - Palanga - Tallinn - Krakow - Budapest - Prague


Wilhelmshaven - Dubrovnik - Florence - La Rochelle -


Berlin - Salzburg - Vienna - Wroclaw


Aalborg - Trondheim - Svolvaer - Tromso - Alesund - Arhus


Typically, these trips take a week to ten days with sufficient downtime to enjoy the various destinations.

[4015]

Thanks for the messages guys, I'm already feeling a lot more confident about getting on and doing this.

troddenmasses - I like the spontaneity and skill building with that plan, sounds like a very good idea.

SNS3Guppy - I believe that is what I am trying to do? Get out of the comfort zone and challenge myself whilst learning? I thought that counted more as experience than flying the same routes in the same airspace over and over again.

To answer questions and add some information:
I'm looking at doing perhaps 20-30 hours flying on this trip. I need to do three times as much, but I want to use the rest of them working on professional skills over home soil.

I can dedicate as much time as needed, although ideally I would like to keep it to 7 days.

Thanks,

4015

[Radar]

20 hours in 7 days sounds pretty relaxed. What type do you plan to use?

I'd say head east ...... into Germany, Austria, swing round to Slovenia - northern Italy back via France.

Alternatively, locate the High pressure and head in that direction. Go with the flow.

Now you've got ME thinking !!

[BackPacker]

We would then spread the map out along the wing, draw a circle at the 2-3 hour distance and then decide where to go for lunch. After lunch we would do the same to decide where to go that evening.

If I were to do an hour building trip, this is how I would do it.

Get a Jeppesen VFR Trip Kit for the whole of Europe, plus the full set of VFR charts. Bring a laptop/iPod/whatever so that you can get proper synoptic charts to figure out where the good weather is, and don't plan too much in advance. (Or get a subscription to JeppView and bring a portable printer instead of the Trip Kit.)

At larger airports, don't go for the "official" handling agents, but phone up a few flying clubs before you set off, to see if they're willing to do your handing. That can save you a ton of money.

Pack light, and if necessary spend a morning or afternoon doing laundry (and sightseeing) instead of flying.

I wonder if a mountain flying course could also count towards your hour building time. I'm not sure if you fly the mountain flying training hours as PIC or PU/T. But that would be a great activity once you get to the Alps.

[Radar]

Excellent suggestion, BP. I spent an afternoon on the 2005 trip with an instructor in Switzerland. Departed Sion in a 180hp Cub for a couple of hours playing in the snow. Two hours later, after a few circuits and a landing on the snow at 10,000 ft. arrived back with the biggest grin imaginable. Superb way to spend an afternoon.

[BackPacker]

Come to think of it, another way of hour building is to get an FAA 61.75 "piggyback" PPL and do the grand tour of the US.

If you factor in the difference in fuel price, taxes and such you may find that a tour of 20+ hours may well be so much cheaper over there that your flight to the US plus the necessary paperwork is essentially free.

And the US is much better equipped to handle this kind of touring, with virtually no landing fees and FBOs at each field who will go out of their way to help you, to get the fuel sale.

Finally, something else. Once you've got your CPL/ATPL and are applying for the airlines, they'll probably be looking not just at the quantity of your flying experience, but also about the quality. If you just burned holes in the sky for hours, flying back and forth between A and B, you're not nearly going to be as interesting for them as someone who did the tour of Europe, then did the tour of the US, did a mountain flying and an aerobatics course, learned how to fly floatplanes and taildraggers, did some gliding, and did a whole bunch of other stuff to enhance flying skills in the same amount of hours. All other things being equal of course. At the very least, it gives you something to talk about, and be excited about, in the interview.

[Rod1]

I do a tour of Europe most years, always VFR. I normally do 18 hours in 7 days. That is very relaxed and allows you to cover a lot of ground. I would look at the long-term forecast, decide which direction, fly in to an airfield with a Transair or similar and pick up the charts etc and go. In summer, south of central France you are very likely to get good weather. If you want to take it a bit more seriously you could probably do 25 hours in 9 days but I would take some time to enjoy the trip. When asking for advice beware the “club expert” who has never been more than 1 hour from home base.

Rod1

[4015]

Gentlemen,

Thankyou for the advice. Every post gets me a little bit more excited. It would appear that the general consensus is that the tour is a good idea.

The stories you guys are telling is the kind of stuff I'd like to end up with afterwards

I would probably try to use a PA-28 of some description, but perhaps a 172 with long range tanks. The 28 I think might be more comfortable but the extra range and lifting capability of the 172 could come in useful.

So, financially, what should I expect cost wise over and above the cost of the actual flying? Charts, landing fees, handling fees etc.

4015

[BackPacker]

Charts,

As I said, get the Jeppesen Trip Kit and the full set of charts. You can get them from Jeppesen direct and have them shipped in a few days.

Expect to need about 10 charts, depending on your ambition. They're between 12 and 20 euros each. And the VFR Trip Kit for the whole of Europe (the "A" kit) is a little over 200 euros. But you can select smaller kits or make your own combination if you're less ambitious.

Start here:
Paper Charts, Electronic Charts, Avionics Data Solutions, Integrated Bundle Services - JeppDirect

However, I found it more helpful to simply phone Jeppesen and tell them what I needed. They then shipped that to me directly. Took about two-three days since I was not in a hurry.

landing fees, handling fees etc.

Anywhere between a few euro for the tea kittie to several hundreds of euros if you go to a controlled field with mandatory handling.

Once you're inside the Schengen area you can essentially fly from anywhere to anywhere without having to worry about customs/immigration formalities. (Just don't forget to file a flight plan if you cross an international FIR boundary.) This means that you can fly from any small field to another, and those are usually the cheapest. Do phone/fax in advance (a little knowledge of French, German and maybe some Spanish or Italian helps a lot here) so that you know what services you can expect, and what you'll need to pay for it.

The Jeppesen trip kit doesn't have this sort of information, so check out the website of the field. And in France there's a handy booklet describing these sorts of characteristics. I think called the "Guide VFR France" but I couldn't find it quickly.

[SNS3Guppy]

SNS3Guppy - I believe that is what I am trying to do? Get out of the comfort zone and challenge myself whilst learning? I thought that counted more as experience than flying the same routes in the same airspace over and over again.

That's fine. You did say you wanted to build hours.

One can fly the same hour a thousand times, or fly a thousand different hours. One can spend the hour tottering around the valley watching the leaves change colors on the mountainside, or one can spend the hour honing and perfecting slow flight, stalls, steep turns, timed turns, and engine-out procedures. At the end of the hour, one pilot has an hour of time to put in his book, but the other pilot has solid training and experience. Which one comes away more proficient and the better stick?

Two pilots can fly an hour of landings. One simply lands and takes off again. The other holds himself or herself to a tight tolerance on airspeed, and a narrow touchdown zone. One strives for accuracy and precision, the other simply to kill an hour in order to throw it in the logbook.

For those building hours, by all means falsify the time. Make it up. Building hours is worth no more.

For those building experience, log it, treasure it, and embrace it, because it becomes a part of you and your log a journal of a life opportunity.

Two people can go on a "tour" and play; one can do it with dedication to ensuring it's a full training experience with accurate times over waypoints, adherence to altitude, precise navigation, keeping a fuel log, and an ear toward better communications. The other simply flits from place to place, tossing it in a logbook to show hours. The former comes home with 18 hours of experience, while the latter lands with something to stick in a logbook. Falsify it in that case; it's much cheaper, and certainly no less beneficial than "hour building."

Going to a new airport (or a new country) for that matter does little to enhance airmanship, proficiency, or to expand one as an aviator and pilot. It's fun, perhaps (I've never thought so), even interesting to some. It's not the touring about that does anything to develop one over the course of whatever hours are expended and expensed. It's the experience one gains in the process, and that is never a function of hours.

Simply put, hours don't correlate to experience in any way, shape, or form. What you get from those hours, of course, has everything to do with the experience you gain, and that is entirely up to you.

Hence the admonition; build experience, not hours.

The hours will come. The experience takes effort and is hard fought. Hours are the easy way out, and a natural byproduct of seeking experience.

It doesn't worth the other way around.

[Radar]

4015,
One thing. When you do get up and out, be sure to let us know how you get on. Apparently interesting twist with regard to Austria at the mo.

[Katamarino]

Oh, and remember that Switzerland is not in Schengen or the EU, it is possible to get your hand slapped by customs and immigration for inadvertantly illegally importing Chinese women and DA40s...

[BackPacker]

Actually Switzerland is a subscriber to the Schengen treaty. They're just not in the EU. That means you should only get your hand slapped by customs, but not by immigration. (Whether that's less painful, I have no idea.)

Schengen Area - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[stiknruda]

SNS3Guppy - has it nailed!

Stik

[LH2]

Originally Posted by BackPacker

I wonder if a mountain flying course could also count towards your hour building time. I'm not sure if you fly the mountain flying training hours as PIC or PU/T.

The latter.