Le Touquet on a Sunday - first cross channel

[cessnapete]

Originally Posted by GBEBZ

Sorry to hear that, forums should encourage people not put them off.

Like I have said before though, there is a difference between Lydd to L2k and a longer crossing (say bournemouth to Jersey direct).



I honestly cannot remember the last time I hit 5000ft!

Try flying from Jersey ;-) Our standard departure clearance is "not above 1000ft" from Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney and towards french coast (Zone boundary).

You soon get use to looking for (tall) cruise ships to go around, and looking for the next rock or fishing boat to mentally log for which way to head should it all go quiet up front

There is a long running thread about flying over water on pprune which puts a lot of people off I think, a range of feelings from "hell no, not out of gliding range" to "whatever, if the fan stops I dont want thousands of feet to think about what might be" :-)

Clubs like the Jersey Aero Club fly all early PPL lessons 100% over the sea in the local training area, which is all sea, and well out of gliding range.

Thats the initial clearance, but on request when airborne with Jersey Approach., I have always got a safer (higher) level 5000-7000ft.

[scifi]

The only time I ever went overseas was when I submitted a GAR via a FAX machine. Upon landing, the customs officer asked if I had sent a GAR and got a reply. I said I had sent it, but not seen any reply. He said they might have been out of paper, so would never have seen my GAR. However as an ex GPO engineer I knew that you can only send a Fax if the receiving machine does have paper, so I tried to explain that to him.
I suppose the internet is used these days.
.

[GBEBZ]

Originally Posted by Jodelman

Please don't spread false news. The increased french customs presence has nothing whatsoever to do with Brexit.

I stand by my comment. This was the exact comment from the official Customs guy with the beard at L2k airport on 21/06/2018 at approx 13:30UTC who stated to me, when I commented that the office was new, that the reason that the newly built customs office was built, was due to Brexit. He could have been lying, but that is the words he said to me, therefore I stand by my comment. It was only a few years ago that customs were being removed, downgraded and the number of customs aerodromes in France reduced.

I submitted a GAR via a FAX machine

There is a fax machine in Alderney Operations for Faxing of flight plans to Guernsey. I was trying to use my iPhone to file it last year, and had no signal so had to manually write out a flight plan form and fax it. Was very strange.

Thats the initial clearance, but on request when airborne with Jersey Approach., I have always got a safer (higher) level 5000-7000ft.

Then you were lucky, and depends on where you are going and when. Most of the flight around here is not above 1000ft. Even the Flybe from Guernsey to Jersey only fly at 2000ft

[patowalker]

Originally Posted by GBEBZ

well there is no point in providing bullet pointed opinions without giving facts and evidence for those facts.

forums should be used for education as well as entertainment;-)

Too much opinion and not enough facts already on this site. These topics have already been discussed to death in other threads :-)

Fact: GAR not required Outbound to EU
Fact: CAEN requires 24HR PN for Customs
Opinion: New Customs booth at Calais has more to do with this decree and Macron's visits to his weekend house in Le Touquet than Brexit.

Opinion: Bearded customs officers are unreliable sources of information.

[GBEBZ]

Fact: CAEN requires 24HR PN for Customs

Interesting, it does seem to have changed yet again and there is no active NOTAM or AIP entry for the 72 hours notice any longer. Awesome. Until recently Cherbourg were also insisting on 24H notice for Customs (Luc and Edith were upset about this as they lost a LOT of traffic from the islands), but last week there was no NOTAM or AIP entry stating such, and recently Dinard also now need 24H notice. The situation around here has changed a lot, and continues to change.

If you cant trust a french man with a beard... who can you trust? :-)

As for the french decree. It doesn't use the word brexit, but it sure as hell reads like a brexit planning document to me Lots of mentioning of a "third country" and "non-schengen countries" :-)

Anyway, I'm now officially on holiday - Tokyo here I come... Out.

[patowalker]

Originally Posted by GBEBZ

As for the french decree. It doesn't use the word brexit, but it sure as hell reads like a brexit planning document to me Lots of mentioning of a "third country" and "non-schengen countries" :-)

Is the mention of "third country" and "non-schengen countries" surprising in a decree on border crossings?