Jabiru trip to Le Touquet 
by Mike Cowles

As with all flights the planning started some time before the day of the flight. In this case added to by the variety of, sometimes conflicting, information regarding permission to enter France. Happily the PFA appears to have come to an arrangement with the French DGAC. Permission simply requires the faxing of the aircraft’s ‘Permit Certificate’ to France, following which we are then given a permit to land in France. There then only remained the question of ‘Lifejackets’ and the ICAO Flight Planning form to contend with. Cloudbase supplied a couple of lifejackets, which I happily returned unused. The ICAO Flight Planning form was obtained from the tower at Redhill and Cloudbase now has copies available. Filling in the form is fairly straightforward for a VFR flight, which is, of course, the only way to fly!

I planned to land at Lydd for coffee and to don lifejackets, so I faxed off the flight plan an hour or so before I expected to depart Lydd. It is possible to fly directly from Redhill, but I wanted the break and it made customs easier. The friendly young lady who took my landing fee at Lydd helped me fill out the customs declaration and faxed it off while I had a coffee break.

My wife Lori is my test passenger and she did her life vest/emergency exits demonstration on the apron at Lydd before climbing aboard for our voyage overseas. It was unfortunately hazy over the channel, but thrilling to be out  over the water. I carefully noted the size and direction of the tankers below, ‘If we have to ditch’, I informed my wife, ‘They need a good few miles to stop, so I need to put down well in front of them.’ It was meant to be reassuring, I had after all carefully read the various magazine articles, but for future reference, I’m not sure I should dwell on such possible emergencies. Actually the flight over the water was very smooth and relaxing, except…

I’m still not always comfortable with telephone conversations, so using the radio is not my favourite flying activity. Just to add to my pre-flight nerves, this was to be my first controlled (formally flight-planned) flight and involve foreign accents. It could not have been a more pleasant experience. Lydd handed me over to Lille Approach after informing them of my passing mid-channel. I had to climb a little to 3,500ft to get Lille, but they were very relaxed and easy to understand. I crossed into France at Cape Gris Nez, which is a wonderfully easy landmark to spot from the air. Quite good planning on the part of the French, unfortunately it goes a bit flat and indistinct after that. Next time I shall ask for the scenic route along the coast. Happily Boulogne is easy to spot and Lille asked me to report entering Le Touquet’s control area.

Le Touquet gave me the QNH and told me come straight in, "You are number one for runway 24, report on Final". What could be easier? Le Touquet airfield is easy to spot, sitting just south of the estuary and standing out easily from the wooded surroundings.

If you (like me) do not enjoy paperwork and official fuss, fly over on a Sunday. I parked the aircraft, booked in, paid my landing fee and caught a taxi to the seaside. Within a short period, with less fuss than I have had at some U.K. airfields, my wife and I were strolling down to the beach to look for lunch. Le Touquet itself is a pleasant little seaside town, but it only seems to have one shopping street leading to the front. This appears to also be the only shopping street in the entire neighbourhood, judging by the crush of people wriggling like salmon spawning along its length. Lori and I had a pleasant lunch, strolled on the beach, watched a game of boules and hopped in a taxi back to the airfield. We had planned for just a short day trip for our first excursion and I had planned (with some eta guesstimates) my return trip and faxed that off at the same time as my outward plan. Note that the times on these forms are G.M.T., which meant they are 2 hours behind local French time. This at one point nearly caused me indigestion over lunch, before my wife helped me with the finer points of the earth’s spin.

Leaving was just as easy as arriving, we booked out and taxied off. The wind had shifted, so we climbed out towards the coast, passing south of the town. I asked and received clearance to fly back up the coast, which not only makes navigation much easier, but is very pleasant viewing. We departed from Cape Gris Nez and tracked back to Lydd. I confess I missed slightly to the North, but again the geography has been well planned to allow easy correction. Spotting Lydd is made easier by the power station just to the south and the slash of brown around it.

It had been a wonderful excursion, several good flights and friendly people all along, but I think I would rather stay over next time. The flight back from Lydd was into the setting sun and against a headwind. At the end of a tiring day, I may have happily handed control over to a co-pilot, but I would not really have missed any of the experience of the flight.

I am now busy saving my pocket money for a longer trip, I quite fancy bringing back pictures of St. Michael’s Mount from the air, unless that is one of you beats me to it…