It generates and maintains a lot of 5-10hrs/year pilots. One could argue this is better than nothing, of course. But I can absolutely guarantee that if you told every would-be PPL student that this is what they will be doing, they would spend their money elsewhere.
But that is the individual pilot’s decision, not something that is forceful on them by the club.
In fact sometimes the opposite is true.
Eg Albi is a 2 hour flight in a DA40. In talking on Saturday with another member of the club we decided to fly there, sometime next week, have lunch, visit the Toulouse Lautrec museum and the magnificent cathedral and return in the evening. We have a nice day out and each do 2hrs flying. Without the club and chatting with other pilots, I question whether or not I would bother or whether I would just wait until the wife suggests we go somewhere. I think clubs tend to bring social flyers into GA because most club members prefer to share rather than go alone.
When I used to fly in Lognes Aeroclub, I was asked to do 4h-5h in C172 if I am taking it away one day: I don’t think that would work unless flying Toulouse-Dakar with other pilots and 200 other aircraft or be part of the annual ‘fly-in’, AFAIK, these are the only way of ‘Touring in Aeroclub’ and it’s a brilliant way to socialize and fly further !
I looked at that aircraft logbook, it averages 3h in sunny busy days and 0.5h in marginal days and 0h in SVFR days, I managed to get away with 1h/day if flying it away when Lognes weather is crap on weekend but you gotta make sure to bring it back when it’s sunny, if it gets stuck in weather elsewhere while it’s sunny in Lognes, you will get a heavy settlement and public trial…
I am not sure if the above describe the mechanics involved for ‘aeroclub touring’? I would be very worried if you put too much of those constraints on a non-weather pilot, I personally, would prefer he cancels the trip (without financial penalty) or stay in the circuit
In France, Aeroclub s change with president s… Pre-Covid over the last 10 years I used to try for one flying holiday a year, and would book one of the two club Robins for a couple of weeks in the summer, often writing [subject to change-weather dependant] in the diary. I would do around 20hrs on a trip, and the average use of the other aeroplane for the time I was away was about the same as I flew while away – I flew more hrs than most a year, no worries. A change of president and a complaint that someone couldn’t fly on a local jolly as one aeroplane was away for 2 weeks, introduced an electronic booking system and a 6 day limit with 3hrs/day… As I’m the only club member that ever flies anywhere further than 2hrs away I know who the rule was aimed at… When I pointed out that the local favorite of “a day out in La Rochelle” wouldn’t meet the new rules they were quickly modified to 2hrs/day and “exceptions at the agreement of the board”. I have a trip planned this Summer, we’ll see what happens… 
I agree with skydriller that rules depend on the President to some degree. But any changes to the "reglementation interior " of which, this would be one, must be agreed at the AGM and cannot be decided solely by the club president or committee.
Things must have changed at Lognes. I fly regularly with someone who was a member there for many years and we also have another member who was an instructor there and both said if they took the aircraft away, they were expected to do a minimum of 2hrs a day. This is the same at LFFK and in 2 other clubs of which I am a member. But in my experience it isn’t enforced unless someone else also wants to book the aircraft for that time and a compromise cannot be reached.
Aeroclubs are the sum of their members! When the members want the ability of longer trips with less flight time, the club will allow it.
In my opinion, Peters statement that the clubs “generate and maintain a lot of 5-10h/yr pilots” is not correct. The opposite is true! Many aeroclubs act this way because there are so many pilots who just want to fly 5-10h/yr.
If a critical mass of pilots in a club wants to do touring – and are willing to pay the price for that – the club will offer the option. In many clubs there are just not many of those pilots.
Based on my aéroclub experience, essentially all flights stayed in France. The annual club fly-out is to:
Longer flights by individual pilots are largely the same:
There is basically zero interest in flying abroad. Maybe 1 or 2 flights a year to Switzerland, which has decreased drastically from 10-15 years ago. I’m not sure why, whether it’s something only the older pilots did, or customs is now an issue, or Geneva isn’t GA-friendly anymore. Every 5-10 years someone goes to Morocco, usually organised by Latécoère.
Flying to e.g. Dakar has been done before, but would require an extra step of convincing the club management. Once on board, they would provide a lot of help, but could very easily veto the trip.
On club trips ELP legality shouldn’t an issue, as they can organise one English-speaking pilot per aircraft. Obviously this isn’t the case for pilots flying on their own. Of course, aviation ELP (e.g. passing an exam) might not correlate to real world ELP (e.g. arguing with an airport or hotel).
There’s nothing on the subject in the current règlement intérieur. I once had trouble with a rule that x hours had to be flown in the club in the last 12 months to take a plane away overnight (I had the hours). This was to limit the problem of holidaying Parisians booking up the planes to the detriment of permanent members. In fairness, this was pretty much what I was doing.
I think in NL it’s mostly an issue of aircraft availability that drives the policies. Considering it’s very difficult to find even a 3-4 hour slot on the schedule during daylight hours, booking a long trip on a nice day in advance likely means big money loss for the club. One of the reasons I am comfortable flying night and IFR is because I would often make an agreement with the scheduler to let me have the plane longer on days forecast to be IFR conditions. Or I would fly somewhere for dinner in the winter. This is the only way I was able to make “longer” trips in club aircraft. No chance it would happen on VFR days. But only when I bought my TB did I start making “real” trips to further destinations.
Most aeroclubs do some serious touring but usually it’s ‘between pilots’ maybe twice a year in the usual ‘fly-in’…then once every 3 years in ‘raids’, ‘ralleys’ where people bizarrely fly as far as Greece, Senegal, Egypt
Also one needs to arrange for extra things (e.g. PLB, jackets, life raft) and may have to extend the insurance to cover foreign trips, also long touring depends on machines but typically, one can’t take the precious wood & fabric a long way without a ridge of high pressure and arranging hangar, plus washing airborne is not appreciated even if the TC and equipment says it’s an IFR machine
dutch_flyer wrote:
No chance it would happen on VFR days.
You will get lot of enemies when you take 4-seat machine one week middle of August for yourself 
Malibuflyer wrote:
Aeroclubs are the sum of their members! When the members want the ability of longer trips with less flight time, the club will allow it.
That depends on local custom. In Scandinavia and, as I understand, Germany and France, aeroclubs are normally democratic associations while in the UK they are normally commercial enterprises where members are really customers.
