With a great day ahead of us, Marc and Adrian agreed to meet at Little Gransden Airfield. Our original plan was to fly to and land at: Fenland, Breighton, Bagby, Blackpool and Taterhill before returning to Little Gransden. It didn’t work out quite like that because we realised into the journey we hadn’t left enough time.
The first leg was flown by Marc to Fenland. Whilst we have both been there several time why is it so difficult to find. Anyway Marc joined right base for 08. The main purpose of this visit was to acquire a 1:500 000 Northern England aeronautical chart. The last one they had, had been put aside for us. However, the very helpful chap in the shop couldn’t find it. Eventually he did so after paying, folding we quickly departed on 08.
Adrian flew the second leg to Breighton, an airfield neither of us had visited before. We were expecting that they would be using 10 but on hearing on the radio that 28 was being used we joined left base for 28 following another aircraft in the circuit. After parking up we used our Flyer free landing voucher. We both had coffees, with bacon roll for Adrian and sausage/egg roll for Marc. Very tasty. Breighton was very busy with almost continuous movements. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to wonder round. The regulars were very welcoming. We need to visit again.
LB on the ground at Breighton.
More pictures of out trip can be found by clicking here.
At this point we thought that if we went to Bagby we would run out of time, so decided to cut out Bagby and route direct to Blackpool. Marc would now fly this leg. We headed initially in a north northwest direction avoiding the Leeds zone and then when we could turn west southwest towards Blackpool. This would be the highest ground part of the trip so we flew at an altitude of about 4000ft. We listened to Blackpool ATIS then contacted Blackpool. We were routed to join right base for 28. Warton is very close and we were aware that some pilots and miss identified Blackpool and had mistakenly landed at Warton. No problem for us on this excellent visibility day. After landing, refueling and parking we once again use a free landing voucher saving us nearly £20.
We would have liked to made a trip into Blackpool as neither of us had been to the centre, but unfortunately again we would run out of time. We had a quick soft drink and snack in a bar just outside the airfield before returning and booking out with ATC via a phone. At this point we also decided to give Taterhill a miss again because of time constraints.
Adrian flew the final leg back to Little Gransden. This involved navigating the Manchester Low Level Route (LLR), which is in Class D airspace. Within the LLR aircraft may fly without ATC clearance, subject to the following:
- They remain clear of cloud and in sight of the ground.
- Maximum altitude 1300ft on Manchester QNH (available on ATIS 128.175MHz or on the MCT VOR 113.55MHz).
- Minimum flight visibility 4km
Although carriage of radio is not mandatory for transit it is recommended that you have and you Squawk 7366 and listen out on 118.575. A good document to view is:
http://flyontrack.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/mcr-llr.pdf
We kept a good lookout as there is expected to be a number of other aircraft using the LLR and we would also flying low over Warrington. We were overtaken by two other aircraft also heading south in the LLR but essentially uneventful. The rest of the journey back was very pleasant in the late afternoon sun. On the approach to Little Gransden runway 10 18:25 it was a little turbulent.
The only downside really was returning the Techlog to LB after completing it in LG pilot’s cabin. By this time it was dark. After closing the door of LB, I mis-judged where the step was as I climbed down from the wing and fell pulling a muscle in my side. This didn’t distract from fantastic day even though we didn’t do everything we had intended. We should arrange to leave earlier next time we do a long trip.