May 22nd was a nice sunny day. The weather forecast was announcing a foggy morning in the north of France, this was not really the case, and we left Chavenay around 11. Pas très tôt.

The trip was initially scheduled for two planes, we ended-up with Miriam, Olivier and myself on the F-GBIT. Olivier is used to participating in my trips, but for Miriam, being a young student, this was a day with quite a few first experiences. A new plane she never flew before, a long flight, and even more flying abroad, over the ocean, with flight plans… Well, all of this within a day was certainly lots of new learnings for a student! No doubt Miriam was eager to experience it, she wants to be a pro!

For the first leg to Deauville, the DVL VOR was out of service, but this didn’t matter, the controller gave us a clearance to fly over it for a long final runway 30. Nice landing, the 2500m is long enough for our small DR400.

The flight plan was filed in Chavenay in order to avoid the one hour wait for an international flight. In Deauville, we found nice custom officers, process was quick and smooth.

A direct flight to Alderney, making sure to avoid all the various “P” zones, like la Hague, and Olivier is landing on the small 850m paved runway. This is lunch time, the local custom est en train de déjeuner, we just fill in the GAR form, file the next flight plan and we are ready to go for lunch as well. Nous avons faim. The Braye Beach restaurant is the right spot for us and for you if you go there. Very nice place, just in front of the beach, jolie terrasse, good food.

The island is very small, and so nice! People are nice too, the first time I’ve experienced a taxi offering the ride when their visa machine does not work! And AVGAS is 1.7€, our President will love that!

Alderney mega terminal!

On our way back, we stopped by Caen where we found a rare Stinson Vultee.

Customs did not come but we have a fun chat with the ground office. We left them with a nice gilet jaune gift, to avoid de se faire engueuler par le contrôleur très tatillon ce jour là, car ça a l’air désormais obligatoire à LFBK.

All three Channel Islands are beautiful, but Alderney is certainly the most charming. We’ll come back soon!

Thanks to Miriam and Olivier for this very nice day.

Laurent