Category: 2014 – Kenya

It was a successful and very enjoyable adventure with no hairy moments. As with all such ventures, the secret to success comes in careful and detailed planning, ensuring the handlers knew in advance exactly what was required, particularly as regards avgas supplies. Within reason, the fewer stops the better and the bonanza is well endowed with a still air range of 1,350nm. Aircraft with lesser ranges can and do make the trip but the logistics become more complicated and expensive. Weather for the African part of the route at this time of year is not an issue. Except within Kenya where we flew VFR, all legs were on IFR plans although in practice, VMC prevailed albeit on occasions over thick dusty haze below us. Weather for the European part of the route at this time of year is necessarily more uncertain but on the whole was not bad, with occasional IMC and light icing.

We can certainly recommend G A S E who provided a much more comprehensive service than the traditional overflight agents; Ahmed’s ability to change our route approval in Egypt at very short notice was second to none. In a tourism context both Egypt and Kenya are very quiet at the moment and would certainly like to see more tourists around. Within Europe, we aimed for turnaround times of about an hour. In Africa, 75 to 90 minutes was more the norm but where refuelling was from barrel, two hours turnaround should be allowed for.

In all, the total distance covered was just under 9,900nm in a flight time of 68 hours 40 mins.

If any pilot reading this would like more detailed information to undertake a similar trip, they are welcome to email me for this – gajb@corsock.com

The last day of our adventure for Phil with him flying the leg to his home base at Biggin Hill, 530 nm in 3 hours 30 min. The weather forecast suggested that the best time to leave was around midday local; the overnight front had cleared to the east and the next trough was just making its way into France and so this turned out to be. After a wander round Avignon, we were out at the airport and airborne into initially a 20 kt headwind, which soon become a crosswind and eventually a tailwind with ground speed rising to 185kt. We started at FL100 but soon climbed to FL120 above SCT/BKN cu,sc with occasional higher buildups and climbed further in north France to FL140. By this time, there was significant CB activity but apart from a brief moment of heavy rain on the approach to Biggin, we managed to avoid any turbulence and icing.

Apart from the relatively short flight to Carlisle tomorrow, here the adventure ends and a great success it was. I will post a postscript setting out some overall reflections in a few day’s time and in due course, a write up will appear in PPL/IR Europe’s house magazine Instrument Pilot. I shall certainly go to Africa again in a year or three and there are other exotic destinations in mind as well. Meanwhile thanks to all who have read this blog and I hope it has been interesting and given you a flavour of what we have been up to over the past month.

Another long but this time very successful day’s flying. Overnight rain in Crete had given way to a bright morning and we started the day with a brisk walk out to the end of the harbour wall at Heraklion before leaving for the airport where Phil was going to fly the first leg of 625 nm to Salerno in Italy.

Departure was at 0900 UTC and after an initial climb to F120 to clear the Cretian central spine of mountains, cruise was at FL100 and we left the western coast of Crete for a 410nm leg over the Mediterranean to Carrafa in the toe of Italy before turning northwestwards up towards Sorrento and then Salerno. As forecast, there was a headwind of around 35-40kt which made progress slow but as the leg went on, this headwind slowly decreased. It would however mean another night landing for me and we rang Avignon on the sat phone to check their airfield closing time – no problems here as they were open until 9 pm local time. Considering we were flying towards the centre of the low over Italy, the weather was very good; we were over cu/sc but with increasing higher layers as we approached Italy. Flight time for this leg was 4 hours 50 minutes.

Salerno were very efficient and we managed refuelling and turnaround in an hour. Off again with me flying this time and there were now some large CB buildups but no problem circumventing these and as dusk approached over Corsica, they began to die anyway. The lights of France soon appeared and with a useful short cut from Provence radar, we landed at Avignon at 7:45 pm local having covered 535 nm in 3 hours 30 min making a total distance for the day of 1,150 nm, the highest daily mileage for this trip.

Into Avignon to our ‘usual’ hotel and then for a well earned and very good dinner. Tomorrow Phil does his final leg to Biggin Hill and then I return to Carlisle on Tuesday.

Following our arrival in Cairo on Thursday evening, we spent Friday morning looking round some of the Pyramids, including the Great Pyramid concluding our visit as the now normal Friday demonstrations after prayers got under way. Nothing dramatic, just a few groups of people marching with slogans and the army and police in side streets ready for any trouble. Eddie Gould of G A S E guided us round and we then had a very pleasant poolside lunch at our hotel before doing some serious flight planning for our return to Europe where the weather is not looking very springlike. Later in the evening, we met Ahmed, the other guiding light of G A S E who organised the clearances. We agreed to meet at 7am on Saturday when Eddie and Ahmed would take us back to October.

A good journey out there in just under an hour and then the problems began. First there was no promised fuel. Next we were told that we could not take our flight planned route to Port Said to clear customs/immigration outbound as the airway was shut because military drones were flying up and down the Suez Canal. The alternative route doubled our flight time. Ahmed then came up with a new plan; we would fly NW to Mersa Matruh, a military base to refuel and then continue on to Heraklion from there. The base commander’s permission for this was sought and gained and Ahmed then set about getting a revised permit from Egyptair to cover this new route, again obtained within an hour or so. Departure loomed, or so it seemed, but then we were held for 45 minutes at the 19 holding point because of ‘miscommunication with Cairo ATC’, tedious in the extreme! Finally we were off to Mersa Matruh.

Phil flew this leg, around 200nm culminating in a RNAV approach. Once on the ground, further problems accentuated by no one there speaking English. Apparently the fuel bowser was broken, and after further calls to Ahmed, he told us that the General commanding the base would let us some avgas from a barrel so out came the refuelling equipment again. The General himself, a charming chap who spoke some English, turned up to personally supervise the operation. Unfortunately no pics as photography here strictly forbidden.

Then it was off to Heraklion with me flying and helped along by a 25 kt tailwind, we covered the 295 miles in just over two hours. Both of us had tricky landings; Phil with a gusty crosswind and blowing sand and me with a 40º offset VOR procedural approach in the dark and then having difficulty finding the runway lights in the glare of surrounding town and industrial area lighting. Fortunately Phil spotted them at the last moment.

Into town and a more modest hotel than the one in Cairo but very adequate. Out for an excellent fish dinner in the town with the proprietor’s lethal grappa to end the meal; we felt we had earned it!!

Today turned out to be another long day with two legs; Khartoum to Aswan flown by Phil and Aswan to Cairo October (the Cairo GA field) flown by me. We left our hotel at around 7:15 am for the airport where our handler was waiting and the various formalities were completed quite quickly so that we were airborne by 0550 UTC for the 550nm flight to Aswan completed in 3hr 45 min. Apart from crossing the Nile on several occasions, our flight was over generally featureless desert in CAVOK conditions.

We crossed into Egyptian airspace just south of Abu Simbel.

Aswan picked us up on radar around 100nm out and we were vectored for an ILS approach on to runway 36. Efficient handling and refuelling enabled us to turn round for the next leg in around 75 minutes.

The second leg was around 400nm continuing north and often nearby the Nile and the fertile green strips of land on each side completed in 2hr 55min.

We were picked up by Cairo radar around 80nm out and vectored for a visual approach to 01 at October. There the faffing began. Despite having cleared inbound at Aswan, our passports were taken away and for a long time, nothing happened. Eventually Eddie Gould of G A S E who is looking after us here explained that officialdom could not understand why we should want to visit Cairo on a Friday. Eventually all was well and a retired Egyptian Air Force general kindly allowed us to put Juliet Bravo in his hangar. Then we had what can only be described as an interesting (with a capital ‘I’) two hour plus drive into Cairo – not for the faint hearted! Tomorrow we hope to see something of the Pyramids before continuing our journey back into Europe on Saturday.

A long day today.

Phil arrived as scheduled late on Monday evening and Juliet Bravo’s 50 hour check was completed yesterday morning. Miranda left directly to London on the BA overnight flight yesterday evening leaving Phil and I to start the return flight. The first leg of today was delayed by our handler apparently having a car accident on our way to collect us. We managed to negotiate our way through customs and out to the aircraft but until we had our GenDec which the handler was collecting, we could not depart and this cost us an hour. Then off to Lokichoggio in far NW Kenya to refuel which with a 20kt headwind made it a 2hr 55 minute flight covering 372nm. Somewhat to our surprise, there was a strong wind gusting to 33 knots from 20º off the runway which made for a testing approach for Phil’s maiden landing in a bonanza! It was also very hot doing the refuelling from a barrel and we were pleased to get away again in just under a couple of hours.

Loki to Khartoum was 750nm and we covered this in 4hr 45 min routing through South Sudan, then west Ethiopia before crossing again into South Sudan and finally Sudan. A Monarch charter flight was in our area and it was nice to talk to a Brit and ask him to relay our routine position reports to Addis as we were too low at FL120 to talk to them ourselves. Afternoon cu at our flight level made for a somewhat bumpy first half of the flight but these gradually disappeared as we went north and the weather was CAVOK for the landing at Khartoum in a temperature of 35ºC.

Again refuelling from a barrel for the last time this trip and off to our overnight hotel for much needed dinner and sleep. I heard that Miranda had a good flight home and is now safely back at Holmhead.

Today is a rest day while Juliet Bravo has a 50 hour check at DAC Aviation. Meanwhile I have been checking clearances, flight plans and fuel requirements for the journey home. Phil arrives this evening on the BA flight from London and we are hoping to spend a day on the way home in Cairo sightseeing – demonstrations permitting!

Sabuk Lodge was very different from Lewa camp. Game drives at Lewa were made in four wheel drive vehicles which were able to get very close to the animals and allow some marvellous close up pictures to be taken. In contrast, we spent most of our time at Sabuk on walking drives; we were not able to get so near to the animals as at Lewa but somehow it felt that we were able to see them in a more natural setting. Sabuk is perched high up on the side of a river gorge and is unfenced so there is a constant stream of elephants coming to drink; as well as elephants, we saw lions, giraffes, zebras – the more common kind in great profusion as well as the rarer grevy zebra, impala and warthog. However the leopard remained elusive.

At the end of our stay, our guide Robert and gun bearer Kumbak posed for this picture with Juliet Bravo at Loisaba airstrip. Note the thorn branches round the wheels to prevent the tyres from being eaten!

The flight back to Nairobi Wilson took an hour and we climbed to FL105 to get above the turbulent hot air. Once again Wilson was very busy with scheduled CAT and light trainers doing circuits. We are staying at the East Africa Aero Club, convenient as I can walk round to DAC Aviation tomorrow morning and discuss the 50 hour check to be done on Juliet Bravo.

The Delorme tracker is now working again and I have deleted our outbound route to make it easier to follow us on our homebound route when we set off on Wednesday.

148nm done in 1 hour.

After two splendid days at Lewa Downs with four exciting animal drives and many wonderful pictures of animals taken, it is time to move on to Sabuk Lodge near Loisaba airstrip. This was a short 25 minute flight hopping over some hills and leaving the predominately flat area around Lewa for more rolling countryside at Loisaba. This flight was not shown on the Delorme tracker as I had inadvertently left the unit on at Lewa and the batteries had run down. I have now installed new batteries and it should work on the next leg. We are at Sabuk Lodge for the next four days.

48nm in 25 minutes

It was hot and humid at Watumi where we were staying in a house right by the beach. Lots of swimming, snorkelling and general relaxing was available as well as deep sea fishing and water skiing. But after four days it was time to move on to the first of our safari lodges at Lewa Downs. More admin to be grappled with before departure as two flight plans had to be filed (and navigation charges for each paid); first for the flight to Lewa Downs and then for a short onward flight to Loisaba Airstrip on day 16. I was told we could file an airborne flight plan for the flight back to Nairobi Wilson from Loisaba and pay the navigation charge afterwards; time will tell on this!

We were airborne just before the daily commercial flight back to Nairobi arrived and climbed to FL85 for the 270 nm leg to Lewa; with a 20kt headwind, flight time was 2 hr 10 min. Soon we were above a sc undercast but this broke up as we reached higher ground with some large CB visible to the south over Mount Kenya. Lewa airstrip duly appeared and in accordance with the EAAC recommendation, we landed on the uphill runway 14. Nairobi Centre provide a flight information service but we were too low to pick this up. The aircraft soon had her cover on and we were off to our safari camp.

Note for David – no thorn bushes required to protect the wheels as there is a constantly manned guard hut just behind the aircraft.