Juliet Bravo went for her annual shortly after our return and the passenger door was carefully examined by RGV. It transpired that a couple of rivets in the mechanism had broken and this is what had caused it to jam.
We were advised to wear pilots’ uniform when outside Europe; clearly the handlers and various airport officials expected this and if we found ourselves in any queue with CAT passengers, we were immediately shunted to the top of this. No visas were required except for entry into Muscat where we were staying for longer than the period for which aircrew do not need visas. Miranda required a visa for Abu Dhabi; next time she will also be kitted out in appropriate uniform!
Mike Grey of White Rose Aviation efficiently arranged all our overflight clearances and fuel/handling at Riyadh. We made handling arrangements at the other airfields we visited and other than landing fees at Muscat for which we were billed on our return, paid cash in US $ on departure.
We spent the first part of the morning wandering around and buying the odd present for family/friends before setting off for the airport. Phil was flying back to his home base at Biggin Hill and we were going to Elstree to night stop in London and see our children before flying north to Carlisle the following day. Phil soon left us behind but in fair weather, we had a pleasant flight and arrived back in quite Spring like conditions after the inevitable dumping at Detling.
Au revoir at Avignon; back in winter clothes
Apart from the two glitches mentioned in this blog, it was a great outing and for me, the first serious long range tour – may there be more! It was also great doing it with a friend and fellow pilot particularly when the glitches happened!
After a rather leisurely breakfast, certainly compared to recent days, off to the airport to fly to Avignon, our route taking us across the Adriatic towards Brindisi, then across the heel of Italy to Naples and NW’wards towards Elba, then routing towards the French mainland leaving Corsica on our left. Good weather but with an inevitable headwind component so quite a long flight. Phil decided to have an enroute stop at Calvi so we arrived at Avignon before him – very satisfactory – and got the avgas bowser organised.
Late afternoon over the Med with Corsica in the distance
We stayed in the old city near the Palace des Papes and on our last night together, treated ourselves to a very good dinner.
We spent a wonderful morning wandering around the old Crusaders’ castle in warm spring sunshine; definitely somewhere to which we would like to return one day before leaving in the afternoon for Corfu. A pleasant flight on a sunny afternoon with lovely island views and a glimpse of Athens in the distance. Our nice Olympic handling lady was on hand to welcome us back and after refuelling took us to our hotel in the old town.
We were up early again because although today’s flying was much shorter than yesterdays, we were keen to see something of Rhodes so planned to stay overnight there with more sightseeing planned for the following morning. Of course as we moved westwards, we also gained an extra hour each day.
The flight Aqaba to Rhodes went smoothly; initially there was the dog leg to avoid Israeli airspace but this time shortened usefully by Cairo ATC, then a long track over the Sinai peninsular followed by an even longer track over the Mediterranean, talking first to Cairo, then Nicosia and finally Athenae ATC. Listening to the ‘Today” programme on Radio 4 shortly after my return, I learnt that at ground level, Sinai was largely lawless and any wandering Europeans there would be captured and held for ransom or even worse! Fortunately Juliet B’s engine did not miss a beat.
Over Sinai approaching the Med at FL120
As usual Phil beat us to it but unlike on the way out, Phil tended to cruise at our flight levels (usually FL120) as the headwinds increased the higher he went. We refuelled and took a taxi into town for a relaxed wander around and a search for a good restaurant for the evening – not so easy in the quiet season when nearly everything is shut.
This was our longest day’s flying with 9 hours 15 minutes in all. We started off with an Abu Dhabi departure at 0420Z for the flight to Riyadh which all went smoothly apart from the head wind we encountered as we flew westward. Fuel was waiting for us this time and we thought we would manage departure for Aqaba in less than an hour; ground checks complete, embarkation done and passenger door shut ….. except that the door would not shut. The locking mechanism had jammed. Screwdrivers out and the trim removed, we could see why the mechanism had jammed but not work out how to unjam it.
On arrival, we had briefly met up with a UK commercial pilot to whom we had chatted and he had given us his mobile number in case anything went wrong. We tried the mobile but no answer – it turned out he had gone off for the day flying his owner’s biz jet; another call to Stuart at RGV but it was difficult to explain to him exactly what was wrong and even more difficult for him to suggest a solution from three and a half thousand miles away. Eventually a local Cessna engineer turned up, looked at it and with a well aimed mallet blow freed the mechanism. Gingerly we replaced the trim, climbed in and …. yes, we could shut and lock the door.
Fortunately the air temperature at Riyadh airport is modest in February so we did not die of heat and finally we were off some two hours late to Aqaba making another night landing inevitable, especially we were now meeting stronger headwinds. However sunset over the desert was a marvellous sight and eventually descent clearance came, late to keep us clear of the mountain range delineating the border between Saudi Arabia and Jordan followed by a procedural ILS. Once again a customs check then a further taxi to the GA apron for refuelling and off to our hotel for the night.
After a week’s fascinating tour of much but by no means all of Oman, it was time to foregather for the return trip. Rendez vous time was determined by the time of Phil’s family’s return day flight to London and this would allow us a relaxed journey to Abu Dhabi with time to look around this city on arrival.
Air BP refuelling at Muscat
First we needed to refuel; special arrangements had been made to use our BP card to pay for fuel and this duly arrived in a small bowser drawn by a tractor. With the intervening mountains requiring a climb to FL160, I kept fuel uplift to a minimum. Embarkation for start up; fuel pump on high …… and no fuel pressure!! Phil shut down, we got out and started to look under the bonnet. I made a call to Stuart at RGV, picked up by him at fourth ring early on a Sunday morning which was very impressive. In the end all was fine; I think the problem was a vapour lock in the line between pump and gauge caused by a week sitting out in the tropical sun. However, it delayed us around three hours so on arrival at Abu Dhabi, there was no time to do anything other than refuel and go to our overnight hotel.
Muscat to Abu Dhabi: 230 nm in 2 hours 15 minutes.
Although today’s flight was quite short, Phil was anxious to meet up with his family who had arrived on the night flight from a cold and snowy London, so we made a prompt start and were airborne at 0530Z – 9:30 am local time.
Close mountain tops with Oman beyond
Essentially we were routed direct but with high intervening mountains to cross, FL150 was required, which was a bit of a struggle for Juliet Bravo in the heat.
Once over these, the Indian Ocean appeared with a let down and straight forward approach into the airport. We had had some difficulty in persuading the airport authorities to let stay there for a week; not quite sure why this was as there appeared to be acres of empty tarmac to park on.
Juliet Bravo parked for the week at Muscat
Entry formalities were quickly completed and then we were off in the limo to firstly drop off Phil to go and find his family before depositing us at the start of our Omani tour.
Another long day. We had originally planned two nights at Petra but because of bad weather, our visit there was condensed somewhat as we needed to be back at Aqaba by the evening of 13th February to allow an early start the next day.
Pilots with Echo Alpha at Aqaba
All went smoothly; we were collected by our handler from the hotel after a quick breakfast and formalities completed, were in the air at 0530Z for the flight to Riyadh at FL110. As with the last flight, a bit of a dog leg to start with but then essentially direct to OERD. Saudi ATC was efficient and always gave us the next frequency in advance in case comms were lost meanwhile. The desert comes in every hue from orange sand as you imagine it to be, to rocky outcrops to large cultivated and irrigated circles of crops with the very occasional road and even more occasional airfield spotted. To start with, there was a thick haze below us but visibility gradually improved as we neared Riyadh.
Cultivation circles in Saudi desert
As expected, Riyadh was a busy airfield but we were efficiently marshalled onto the GA apron. Avgas took a while to arrive; it needed to come from an airfield around 50 km away but for some reason, got stuck just outside the entrance gate to the apron. Very frustrating! It was also the most expensive avgas of the trip. Yes, said the refueller when we asked about this. It has to go to Europe for refining and then back here!
All this meant that we were running late on departure and with a less than optimal SID given, which added considerately to route miles flown, it was obvious that a night arrival at Abu Dhabi would be necessary.
Bahrain at sunset from G-PTEA
Miranda had covered herself with a long scarf during transit at Riyadh, which kept everyone happy, and was offered a limousine transit to the VIP area at Abu Dhabi but declined this for the crew bus.
It started to get dark as we crossed the Persian Gulf inbound to Abu Dhabi and it was good to hear Aussi air traffic controllers looking after this airspace and very busy it was too. We refuelled on arrival as usual and were more than ready for our steak and beers when deposited by our handler at the overnight hotel.
The day dawned fair with the remnants of the by now rather weak cold front out over the Aegean island.We had two sectors to complete today so it was an early 0610Z departure from Corfu. As expected we picked up a little icing as we traversed the front but this soon sublimated off once we reached clear air beyond. Phil was soon ahead of us and sent us weather updates as he was to do for the remainder of our trip.
An hour and a half on the ground for refuelling and a bite to eat and then off for the rather longer flight to Aqaba. The weather continued to clear as we flew south and east. We waited with baited breath as we made our first call to Cairo; would they hear us and let us in? Well yes, they did! Cairo control were efficient and clear in their instructions; the route did include a longish dogleg to avoid Israeli airspace but in due course Aqaba appeared and we completed an ILS approach to land shortly before sunset. A cursory inspection of our spare parts by the customs people and then refuelling before we were off in our pre-arranged car to Petra for the night.
