Flying in Europe for the first time!

johnh wrote:

Am I really going to cross my fingers and hope that say Austrian ATC, who I’ve never dealt with in my life, are going to let me fly VFR through their Class Whatever?

@Peter has experience with Austrian ATC – can’t remember if that was VFR or IFR though

This area is one of the scariest in France. Nice to know that it can reasonably be done (although it seems easier with a bit of experience)

hazek wrote:

LFBO EB (LFBO) EA (LFBO) EN (LFBO) OCWOF FJR MTG MRM LUC CNM AZR USANO ABN SAVONA (MJW2) (LIMJ) COGOLETO (MJW1) (LIMJ) LIMJ

This is the flight plan filed route ? (And, I would assume, you’re trying to stick to it as much as possible)

If doing cross-border, you would file a similar route VFR via Eurocontrol ?

I expect to get through CAS. No where in the regs does it say that if I plan to cross CAS I should carry 30min extra fuel to be able to go around it. Small deviations sure, like that time we wanted to just cut the corner of the Munich TMA to save a few minutes.. that’s fine to be denied. But if I planned a flight straight through them not giving me that seriously messes up my plan for fuel. I also filled that as my flight plan and no one notified me it wouldn’t be possible. Using the right points the flight plan should be delivered to them which matches my experience.

But yes they can say no. They can do that for exactly two reasons, if they’re at capacity or if your routing conflicts with other traffic. So really only for one reason because the routing part is solvable with a different routing. But if they’re at capacity and you now don’t have enough fuel then this is like a CB in your way and you have to divert. But that’s always a possibility when flying VFR.

But yes, my default is I will get through. My whole flight is planned around it. But I do keep in mind that my routing can’t conflict with other terminal traffic. Meaning I will either go high enough or low enough so I don’t mess with any instrument approach sectors. And I will also use points that they know so they know exactly where I intend to go.

Again.. it matters how one goes about this. Results will be very different if you don’t do it right.

@maxbc I never flew that but I was asked how I would do it if I did. And that route is probably how.

The route is from Foreflight, if it were filled it might look a bit different. It’s not an IFR route.

I have to say it’s pretty cool to fly in Class C and have airliners land directly below you. Happened to be a few times already.

I too am with @hazek here.
I have flown for over 40 years both IFR and VFR in France.
IFR as has already been said is easier. I usually file an “I” flight plan for all IFR flights ie no Z or Ys and no STARs or SIDs.
Then pretty much at 800ft it’s on autopilot if I’ve got one to destination just changing headings if instructed to do so by ATC.
ATC will tell me to change a heading every now and again when I am leaving CAS and am I happy with that or they can offer me a short cut or whatever. All pretty simple. Less tiring and some might ask “am I really flying or just a passenger in charge of my own plane.?”
For VFR in France, which I am now doing a lot more of, I still do what I did 40 years ago. That is I draw a straight line on the map from departure airfield to destination airfield. I expect to get through all CAS, although as in IFR I also know that I may be asked to change heading. The only big difference is that I cannot fly through cloud. So if I am given a transit of a CAS and a huge cloud appears in front of me I will need to get permission for a change of heading or altitude to avoid the cloud.
“P” airspace I avoid
“D” airspace I can fly through but it is prudent to talk to someone to.find out what is going on and if it would be safer to reroute slightly.
“R” airspace for the most part I know before I take off whether or not it is active. If inactive I can just fly through.
Otherwise SIV (FIS) will also inform me if I am heading for an active military area.
Or 10 minutes before I arrive at the “R” zone I will call the ATC of the “R” zone and ask for clearance to transit. Usually they are very helpful, sometimes suggesting a transit by different points or a different altitude. Very rare, unless very active, an outright refusal. But of course I do 7ualso have a plan B for these zones just like I would have a plan B for icing in IFR if I want to fly through those clouds that I am avoiding in VFR.
I could make life simpler but add to the mileage in VFR by flying airways through France. It was rare in IFR for me to fly above FL100 if I could help it as I just couldn’t be bothered with all the palava of oxygen.
So in VFR (although.I could) I do not tend to fly the airways above FL100 at least for more than I need to do so.
The route hazek demonstrated for the south coast of France was a route we took, apart we were going to a different destination in the Super Guépard. It was no problem and Nice were very helpful as were Marseille. We didn’t need to talk to the military.
So it depends whether you want to sit back and let A/P and ATC take you to your destination or whether you are happy to be a bit more involved in the flight.

Allright gallois please fly that route and post the track.

If I get round to flying that route again I will try to.. As you know I am not very good at IT.🙂But if you go onto You Tube on the French site you will see many Super Guépard journeys flown along that route including ATC. One guy is based near St. Tropez.

europaxs wrote:

I seem to remember, that @Emir flew through that area VFR in the flightlevels on a return flight from Spain to Croatia and it worked quite well.

You remember well and it worked quite well but I wouldn’t repeat it. It was 4.5 hours of explaining to different ATCs why I was there and where I want to go further. I have to admit all were very accommodating and helpful but I was lowered to FL120 and mainly routed around busy airspaces. In the end the route was similar to what I’d fly IFR but due to low altitude the flight lasted 40 min longer.

I have also flown both VFR and IFR all over Europe, mostly below FL100. The truth is they are both useful tools in the toolbox, if one’s objective is the most efficient way to get from A to B. As has been mentioned it also depends greatly on where one wants to go. There are many places where you can fly basically US-style VFR—straight line (or not), mostly in open airspace, and talking to no one for hours. Actually much of Europe is like this, and there are many many long-distance trips one can take under VFR where your radio contact is limited to periodic handoffs and an occasional traffic advisory. Frankly I wouldn’t fly any trip in the US without flight following either.

However there are exceptions to this, and depending on where you often fly it may indeed be much easier to fly IFR. I live in one of those places (the Netherlands), where VFR means being trapped in narrow altitude corridors dodging class A everywhere. I often cross Belgium, which is just as bad. So I usually file IFR for my trips even when VFR would be possible. To be fair this is also true where I come from in the US, where I was based at KPDK north of Atlanta. Going anywhere to the south means either circumnavigating a huge class B, filing IFR (where you were pretty certain to get an “over the top” clearance), or doing your best to negotiate a VFR crossing.

ATC is also the same story everywhere in my experience, in that each area has its own local conventions and even individual controllers provide different levels of service. What will get you busted in one area will result in a friendly reminder elsewhere, but being prepared, professional, and proficient usually keeps you out of trouble.

So while I agree that VFR can be challenging on certain routes/areas, and there are definitely some aspects of European GA that are less convenient (airport closing times, PPR, avgas availability), it’s not really that big of a deal in most places. And it’s worlds better than most of the rest of the planet!