Since we have fixed the fly-in dates, someone would need to look at the notams at the start of July and decide which airport it will be.
That pretty well rules out booking a hotel well in advance which is somewhere between the airport and wherever we will meet up in Paris. So one would be looking at a centrally located hotel.
As with Carcassonne, I will leave it to a French speaking person to organise this 
@Nestor and I are well aware of all this. I expect the closing days to be published, as usual, towards the end of June, but I also expect that there are some people in the know that will be able to provide us with the schedule somewhat earlier. The June schedule for Toussus was published by NOTAM today and although there are quite a few days without ATC, I note that there is not a single closure on FRI, SAT, SUN. In May Pontoise is closed every THU (a lot less than Toussus). It looks like Melun does not have any days of closure. Toussus also has a curfew on Sundays and holidays between 12:00 and 15:00 LT
Wrt booking accomodations, it depends whether we opt for accomodations in the vicinity of the airport chosen, or in some district of Paris. In the latter case people could fly in to whichever airfield they wish. Meanwhile we are looking into what airport would be the most convenient from all perspectives; accessibility, parking, immigration, IAP, transportation.
But I would like to ask a few questions to all:
Kirsty and I would like to come though I can only confirm on the 15th June when I find out what work I have on in July.
Just looked at the entry for Toussus in the AIP – it reads to me that Customs/Immigration is available of 24 hours notification either by fax or e-mail.
pg wrote:
Just looked at the entry for Toussus in the AIP – it reads to me that Customs/Immigration is available of 24 hours notification either by fax or e-mail.
You need to look at NOTAMs too. There has been a NOTAM around about customs/immigration for the last 4 years. For Pontoise they finally integrated the information into the AIP, but not so for Toussus.
Of course… Silly me expecting the AIP to be authoritative. Unless of course you’re flying to Pontoise, where it is. Perhaps they could consider issuing a NOTAM stating which airports’ AIP entries are reliable and which aren’t. (That was tongue in cheek by the way, in case anyone thought I was being serious).
But thank you for the steer to the NOTAM – not something I usually check until a day or two before departure.
But thank you for the steer to the NOTAM – not something I usually check until a day or two before departure.
One thing I learned years ago… as soon as I have a vague plan for a flight – check NOTAMs. Sounds a bit wrong, as NOTAMs should really be for the very short term information, but in practice it is sometimes not so. Italy has airports in their AIP which have been NOTAMed closed for over ten years..
Silly me expecting the AIP to be authoritative. Unless of course you’re flying to Pontoise, where it is. Perhaps they could consider issuing a NOTAM stating which airports’ AIP entries are reliable and which aren’t. (That was tongue in cheek by the way, in case anyone thought I was being serious).
Unfortunately PG you did not have to have your tongue in your cheek, because this is the actual situation around Europe… some AIPs are accurate, some are full of crap, some are in between.
Speaking of France (whose AIP is normally fairly good), they had bogus info on Customs and Immigration for e.g. Pontoise and Toussus for something like a year, after France shut down Immigration there early 2012. The airports were withdrawn from the official EU list of ports of entry but the AIP was not updated. So, loads of Brits flew straight in there, while the staff were telling people “Yes we know about the new regs but nobody cares so just fly as normal”.
This is why one needs to do some enquiries “on the ground” just to be sure, especially for a fly-in. And, dare I say it, especially in France where there is a lot of “show of force” going on right now. It’s not a good idea to mess with it.
Italy has airports in their AIP which have been NOTAMed closed for over ten years..
Are the airports actually operating? (what I really I mean is whether staff are turning up and getting salaries paid 
)
No, they are indeed totally closed.
Peter wrote:
Speaking of France (whose AIP is normally fairly good), they had bogus info on Customs and Immigration for e.g. Pontoise and Toussus for something like a year, after France shut down Immigration there early 2012. The airports were withdrawn from the official EU list of ports of entry but the AIP was not updated. So, loads of Brits flew straight in there, while the staff were telling people “Yes we know about the new regs but nobody cares so just fly as normal”.
It is exactly because the AIP is authoritative that also I continued to fly to the UK from LFPT after Toussus and Pontoise were withdrawn from the EU list of ports, until they put out a NOTAM. When it comes to customs/immigration procedures I pay attention to nothing but AIP and NOTAM. There is too much hearsay about PPR/PNR at French airports which emanates even from ignorant Customs officers whose paygrade should not allow them to utter anything else than “Passport please. Anything to declare? Thanks you. Good bye.”
In Carcassonne I drew the attention of Customs to a discrepancy between the operations hours they gave me by phone and what was published in the AIP. The lady told me she would take action, and sure enough, next time I checked, a month or two later, the entry had been updated.
It seems like there are regulatory changes that do not always trickle down into the AIP. The rate of update appears to depend on the airport. For Toussus the Customs information has still not been updated. For Pontoise it was updated, I believe 6 months ago or so.
