Hour Building - Southern France
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Hour Building - Southern France
Evening all,
I'm currently plugging my way through my ATPL ground school (distance learning) and trying to get some hour building in. I will be moving to the south of France (Toulouse area) around June/July next year and am looking for a reasonably priced (in as much as GA can be), school for hour building. Ideally a C-172 but open to other AC.
Its also fair to point out my spoken/listening french is fairly dire at this point so ideally instructors would have at least some grasp of English. Also advice on dealing with other light air traffic, ATC etc in France would be much appreciated.
I'm currently plugging my way through my ATPL ground school (distance learning) and trying to get some hour building in. I will be moving to the south of France (Toulouse area) around June/July next year and am looking for a reasonably priced (in as much as GA can be), school for hour building. Ideally a C-172 but open to other AC.
Its also fair to point out my spoken/listening french is fairly dire at this point so ideally instructors would have at least some grasp of English. Also advice on dealing with other light air traffic, ATC etc in France would be much appreciated.
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In Toulouse there are mainly two airfields :
Lasborde and Muret.
Auto information is French only, yes.
But you could very well fly only on days with a controller. They're there 6 days per week or 7 days per week.
You don't join a school, actually, in spite of Toulouse being the European or even world capital for civil aviation, there is not one professional school there. The closest one is in Agen (1h30 by car). You join an airclub (aeroclub).
Most airclubs will have Robin Aircraft, some will have a C172 or two.
Start by having a look at the following clubs :
Lasbordes:
Aeroclub Toulouse Midi Pyrénées : the most expensive airclub in the area, with SR20 aircraft used for IR training.
Ailes toulousaines : cheapest airclub, with robin and tecnam AC
Muret:
Aéroclub Clément Ader : large airclub with 1 C172
Aéroclub Jean Mermoz, Aéroclub Jean Marie Bonafé : worth having a look as well, the latter being very inexpensive and has a C182 as well.
You should be able to find an FI with good english command at almost every club.
Many FIs here are wannabee professionals so they typically have a CPL IR ME, which required an ICAO lvl >4 in english.
ATC will not be very used to english, for VFR traffic at least.
I used to try to speak english on a few flights, most of the answers I got were half french half english..
Lasborde and Muret.
Auto information is French only, yes.
But you could very well fly only on days with a controller. They're there 6 days per week or 7 days per week.
You don't join a school, actually, in spite of Toulouse being the European or even world capital for civil aviation, there is not one professional school there. The closest one is in Agen (1h30 by car). You join an airclub (aeroclub).
Most airclubs will have Robin Aircraft, some will have a C172 or two.
Start by having a look at the following clubs :
Lasbordes:
Aeroclub Toulouse Midi Pyrénées : the most expensive airclub in the area, with SR20 aircraft used for IR training.
Ailes toulousaines : cheapest airclub, with robin and tecnam AC
Muret:
Aéroclub Clément Ader : large airclub with 1 C172
Aéroclub Jean Mermoz, Aéroclub Jean Marie Bonafé : worth having a look as well, the latter being very inexpensive and has a C182 as well.
You should be able to find an FI with good english command at almost every club.
Many FIs here are wannabee professionals so they typically have a CPL IR ME, which required an ICAO lvl >4 in english.
ATC will not be very used to english, for VFR traffic at least.
I used to try to speak english on a few flights, most of the answers I got were half french half english..
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Certainly look to be a couple of options you've pointed out. I’ll be honest the auto-information is what worries me the most, I sometimes struggle to understand folk in the USA making blind calls and they are purportedly speaking English!
First and foremost I should work on my French but I’m fairly flexible on flying days as I work ad-hoc so finding a day with controllers about shouldn’t be an issue.
I’ll drop a note to a couple of the clubs you mentioned and see what their thoughts are. Thanks for your help.
First and foremost I should work on my French but I’m fairly flexible on flying days as I work ad-hoc so finding a day with controllers about shouldn’t be an issue.
I’ll drop a note to a couple of the clubs you mentioned and see what their thoughts are. Thanks for your help.
Last edited by Fly4trade; 9th Dec 2017 at 11:39.
