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The outcome

We finally agreed that I handed over our Cessna 172 to Guido Peterzelka and his wife as he needs to be back in Luxembourg on Tuesday morning at latest.

We have some spare tickets left for a regulair airline flight to Luxembourg, so the decision is taken that Guido and his family fly the Cessna back on Eastern Sunday towards Luxembourg. The weather was a bith rough in Avignon ( 2!5 kts of headwind with gusts to 40 kts) , but Guido managed to land the Cessna safely in Luxembourg at sunset. 
Next weekend, he returns to Fayence with a regular airline together with a technician in order to fix his plane and fly it back to Luxembourg. Let’s cross fingers it all works out for Guido. 
My Eastern 2017 journey ends somewhat different than what we planned, but it was a memorable vacation which I’ll never forget.

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Changing plans !

It is no option that Guido Peterzelka continues his flight to Luxembourg in his Beech Bonanza. If the engines heats up again without the oil pump seal issue being properly adressed, he could eventually in the worst case get fire on board as oil can ignite because of the heat. He made several calls with his co-owners and technical support. His plane stays grounded in Fayence till next weekend, that’s for sure.

So our stay in Fayence takes a different turn, the Eastern bells nevertheless passed on Sunday bringing eggs ro the kids. In the mean time, we enjoyed some good moments together visiting the Saturday morning fresh market in Fayence. Wonderful place, I like it a lot.

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Problem in Fayence

We’ve landed yesterday in Fayence coming from Sabadell and our friends travelling with us on this journey through France and Spain, the Peterzelka family, planned to fly this afternoon from Fayence to Leverkusento celebrate Eastern with their family..

However whilst preparing to take off with their plane, something happened. Whilst they were lining up, smoke came into their canopy and they had to evacuate the plane. Very bad ! They’re making some calls now to see how this is gonna to be fixed. Seems a problem seal with the oil pump at first glance. It will change the rest of our journey
They already had some kind of higher oil consumption as usual throughout our journey because of a small leak nearby a seal at the oil pump, maybe this is linked to what happened today. Very bad, likely no big thing, but it needs to be reviewed and fixed by a technician.

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Flight from Sabadell to Fayence along the coastline. Stunning views

Our next stop is Fayence in the Var nearby Cannes. I don’t dare to fly on a direct course over the sea. We have swimming vests, but no dinghy’s in case the motot of our plane stops working. Of course, the plane does not know it is flying over the sea, but I’m not taking the risk and that’s why I planned a road along the costline to Fayence. There are many restrcited zones in France, but if one flies high enough, I’m often above these zones. Plenty of wind today, but that’s not of a concern. We refuel our plane in Sabadell and take off at 2pm sharp for a flight of a couple of hours in our Cessna 172

Even before crossing the French border, I’m already in touch with a very friendly air traffic controller of Montpeller. He’s very helpfull and guides us whilst overflying many airports allowing the need in me to take many pictures.

The weather worsened when we approached Fayence, Cannes was already fully covered with clouds. I know this area quite well, so we flew under the cloud base and landed with a long final appraoch in Fayence. Our friends, the Peterzelka’s landed just behind us.

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Barcelona and Gaudi

Never tried this before, but it proves to be a convenient way to explore the city of Barcelona…and different from a Cessna

We stayed in the Catalonia Ramblas hotel, which proved to be an excellent choice. Perfect location in the center of Barcelona and excellent beds. We strolled the whole day through the town
Our son does not miss any opportunity to eat the Pimientos del Padron, hoping he will get a spicy one. I fear that one he got his spicy one, his quest for Piementos will be over for a longtime..’

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Safely landed in Sabadell

We  just safely landed in Sabadell nearby Barcelona and are now enjoying a beer on a sunny terrace with a pilot friend of Guido Peterzelka, named JördI Osterloh.

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Next route : from San Sebastian towards Sabadell nearby Barcelona

This Wednesday morning, the weather looks good and I have prepared a flight all over Spain from the Atlantic shores to the Meditarrean nearby Barcelona, where we schedule to land at the Sabadell airfield. We’ve booked a hotel at the city center of Barcelona for 2 nights. On the left sight, we’ll have the Pyrenees mountains. Sounds like a good plan.
In advance of this trip, I read and heard that Spanish airports are sometimes troublesome. Not for us. All the experiences we had were good, but I must say we were well prepared and I contacted all the airports in advance. A simple call can do miracles. Communication is the key.
The flight as such was absolutely wonderfull. Stunning views of northern Spain which looked remarkabely green at this time of the year. Big ( BIG ) fun and a highlight of this private pilot vacation with my family. Enjoy the pictures below.

My son likes to be the co-pilot, asking all the time questions ….:)
And than, suddenly out of nowhere, a mountain ridge in front of us with a famous construction on it. The monastery of Montserrat. A tourist spot by excellence , but the best views you get from the Cessna LX-AIO passing nearby.

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San Sebastian : Europe’s food capital

This Tuesday is another non flying day with only tourist activities in San Sebastian. The climate here is a rather humid one. The place is known to be a European food capital and hosts some of the best restaurants one can find. We are truly tapas lovers howver and always keen on trying the Piementos del Padron. Today, we simply have been strolling into town at a relaxed pace and enjoying the particulary beautiful town of San Sebastian with plenty of characteristic places. How nice !

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From Ile d’Yeu to San Sebastian

This Monday was another flying day. Skies were rather clear but I did not have much fuel left. I therefore took off with lots of crosswind and flew to la Roche sur Yon, an airfield some 42 nautical miles inland where I could refuel our plane. We added some oil as well and enjoyed lunch at te restaurant airfield. Seems everyone here were union members as all the discussions we heard whilst being on the tower of the airfield and nearby the fire brigade were union related. Funny place.

Now we were fully loaded again and ready for take off, we noted on the weather maps that the weather south of Bordeaux was deteriorating and some low clouds came in from the Atlantic sea. A overcast cloud base at some 1500 feet was to be expected. We called with the Peterzelka family who were ready to take off with their Beech Bonanza at Ile d’Yeu and they planned to fly under the cloud base south of Bordeaux. We planned the same. The first part of our flight happened at flight levels 55 and 95, where the air was very calm. I checked a couple of times the latest weather bulletins for San Sebastian. Seemed to be effectively having some low clouds. So we descended to some 700 feet and followed the coastline passing Biarritz. The visibility was below 8km, so called Special VFR, but always within the limits. No need to return and so we proceeded safely with landing in San Sebastian directly from over the sea on a long final. In preparation of this fly out, I have been in touch with San Sebastian airport and we booked a parking slot. This is mandatory as there’s not so much space over there. And again, people were very friendly and helpfull. From the airport, we took a bus into town and checked in at our hotel. San Sebastian, here we are ! We had an enjoyable evening in a local Tapas bar with good wine and hierbas. Fiesta !

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No flying on Sunday but biking at Ile d’Yeu

No flying on Sunday. We planned this journey by alternating days between flying and tourist activities. This makes it more comfortable for everyone. Toda.y, we discovered the island of Yeu by biking around it. Google maps proved to be very inventive as it guided us on biker trails inside the country where not many bikes did pass yet to say the least. Very sportive and healthy day. 


We enjoyed lunch on the road in a bar with inhabitants of the island, where the only thing one could eat was “saucise”. It proved to be tasty. My son is a big fan of ” mente à l’eau” , which he enjoys whenever he is in France.

We continued our beach journey through the island of Yeu. What a neat place to discover with our friends. We enjoyed lunch in a small harbor with only one open air restaurant

By the end of the afternoon, it got really warm and we took a nap at the beach, where we suddenly saw the fog arrive from the sea. It took only a couple of minutes, it felt like some kind of horror movie. 


We quickly biked back to town after a very enjoyable day together with the Peterzelka family enjoying excellent food. This time, no one got ill. All the places we enjoyed lunch or dinner in France have been very nice. Tripadvisor proved to be a good travel compagnon.

Everyone was exhausted at the end of this day and we got rather early to bed as the day of tomorrow with a scheduled flight to Spain will be beautiful again.