Towerguys World Tour

[Alex]

Awesome stuff, and really interesting encounters as well.

Alex

[Charl]

Man, I like your story.
Hey TG, between shuffling jumbos down the lanes, have you ever thought about scripting something aeronautical?
I hear Peter Jackson is a plane nutter...

[towerguy]

yeah a couple of times I thought about it but I usually wake up or sober up _ once I even did both! really scared myself.

now I am working on the storyline for further out and trying to source resources like charts and maps, and fitting in heaps of reading about places actually on my route that may be useful. It actually takes up quite a lot of time but it's fun and I'm starting to learn heaps especially about just how much I really do NOT know.
hopefully more in a couple of days.

cheers
B)

[Jimmy]

Juat had my first good look threw here,very impresive, great story twrguy!

Those sreenshots are wounderful, your envirmoent and textures and stuff look really great. So does of the airport scenery, can you post a list of the addons you use in these pictures?

James

[towerguy]

Leg 8 SCIR (Robinson Crusoe) to SCEL (Santiago) 460nm

If you like to get away from things and have a quiet relaxing holiday then this place is a must! A total population of just 500 situated 460nm out into the South Pacific, Isla Juan Fernandez or "Robinson Crusoe" is a relatively little known tourist destination that richly rewards those that make the discovery and the effort to get there.
Arriving as I did by air, I was able to catch a lift to the ferry by 4wd, and what a ride! nearly vertical in places. The ferry,little more than a fishing boat, dropped myself and another 2 couples that had just flown in from Santiago at the pier in the small settlement of San Juan Bautista.
We all checked into the "Hosteria Villa Green" situated on the small central 'plaza' and then wandered along the foreshore for dinner at the La Bahia restaurant.
The next few days were spent doing the tourist thing swimming, seal watching and tramping to the top of the hill - the 'Mirador de Selkirk', it takes most of the day and goes up to nearly 3000ft. This is the Island that Alexander Selkirk of Robinson Crusoe fame was marooned on in 1704 for 4 1/2 yrs - althought I believe the book changes the location to the Caribbean.
As much as I enjoyed my stay here, it was time to move on again.
"Golf Yankee" was fuelled, a long and laborious undertaking done by handpump from 40 gallon drums. Oil checked and topped, weather checked and plan faxed through, I was off!
I have had to carry reduced fuel this leg as the accelerate-stop distance for this weight is 2200ft and the strip is only 2822ft long - not a lot extra but it's only a short leg so no worries.



Weather predicted Southerly to South easterly along the way with scattered to overcast middle layers and so it proved to be.



I was in and out of it all the way.



At least reading up on the ILS at Santiago helped pass the time. That and the 'unusual' vectoring I started to receive half way to the coast. About 30 miles off the coast things thinned out some and I was able to get a sight of land at last - real land!



Santiago Approach provided vectors for the 17L ILS but due to the surrounding terrain I had to maintain 8600ft till right base and then a sharp descent down to 5000ft until established on the localiser!



Fortunately I had already started slowing well before TOD in order to slow the engine cooling , but I still had pretty steep rates of descent to try to catch up with the glideslope. Eventually visual I asked for and received clearance for an orbit to get down.



Taxiing in I could see that this is definitely home to Lan Chile.



Once safely closed up for the night security gave me a lift over to customs where I picked up my 90 day 'Tourist card' and stamp.


The imposing Andes in the background.

Then it was join the crowds out front for a mini bus to San Pablo and change to the Metro ( very modern clean and efficient, and cheap!) into the city. I am booked at the 'Hotel Galerias' right in the center of town so its lunch, pool and then out and about to see the sights.

Trip so far : 5894nm 37.0hrs

[ardypilot]

Wow, another continent already!

That really is rather green, is that accurate or just the VOZ North landclass still?

[towerguy]

It should be just FS9 as I unvozed before my last flight. I will double check at next startup. The area around Santiago in central Chile is the most fertile area and is extensive farmland so that would tend to tie in. I have also loaded in the new mesh for South America - it is about 20m resolution - and it is loaded through for FS9 and FSX.

[Charl]

Mmmm map, map, he hasn't loaded the map!
How's he know where to fly then?

EDIT: Bet it's just a straight line going off to the right

[towerguy]

here you go this is just for you Charl


Leg 8 Juan Fernandez to Santiago

cheers

[JonARNZ]

Wow, I love these screenshots, the visuals are amazing. I also really like the frame you have put around them, great job!!

[towerguy]

thanks

the frames are from "the gimp" graphics program - free download or available on most magazine disks like NZ PCWorld.

Screenshots are just Ctrl+Printscreen captures then pasted into MS Paint and cut or cropped to shape and size and saved as JPEG. Then I load the jpeg into Gimp for any processing etc and save again as jpeg. Then its just the usual upload to photobucket.

Terrain and addons are what I can find at Avsim or Flightsim.com etc - thank goodness for broadband at work! From what I have been able to find I think most of this flight will be in FS9 with only a few local side trips on FSX as the landclass is frankly a huge disappointment for something that cost so much here in NZ. ( or maybe MS is just pre-empting Global warming!)

[towerguy]

Sorry it's been a few days but Santiago is such a fascinating place that I took some extra time out for sight seeing. I also managed a day in the tower talking shop with the controllers and sussing out some of the route ahead.

I was planning on crossing the Andes from here over to Argentina but one of the tower contollers is off on leave and has invited me down to Temuco for a days gliding. He will show me about and his parents own one of the many wineries in the area so thats an added bonus! Also the passes over the Andes get progressively lower the further south you go so it really does fit in nicely.

After preflighting and meeting Arturo at the Tower we decided to plan a low level run down to Temuco so he could show me the sights along the way. The weather forecast was for light and variable winds on the ground but strong headwinds upstairs and scattered to overcast SC at about 3000ft.(Activesky real weather!)



Taxiing out for a 35R departure we had a short delay at the holding point for ariving traffic.



Then we were away with a right turn out over the suburbs of Santiago. Levelling at 2500ft we seemed to be rocketing along above the rooftops. Having Arturo along was a huge help, navigating us clear of the restricted areas south of Santiago we were soon on track and enjoying the scenery.



This area is basically the breadbasket of Chile and is very similar to flying over the Waikato. Passing the cities of Curico and onwards to Talca we flew over what seemed like endless miles of farms and vineyards. We got a REAL close look as the terrain here is between 500ft and 1000ft and the cloud base is 2500-3000ft and fairly solid.



After some scud running things gradually improved with the cloud burning off but the vis now dropped in heavy haze as we neared Temuco.



Arturo explained that Temuco is the fastest growing City in Chile and is the center of the region, supporting many industries such as Timber, Steel, Textiles and of course Food and Wine.



Sliding between a couple of low hills we were quickly busy, entering the downwind, trying to slow up and get set for landing.



Typical - got a passenger so it's Too high Too fast and land long brake hard! Oh well they say if you can walk away from it then it's a good landing and if you can reuse the aircraft then thats a bonus!



Refueling having been completed, we secured the Aircraft and headed off to meet Arturos family who have offered a place to stay and dinner. Tomorrow we go gliding so thats something else to look forward to.

Todays map and details.



Today SCEL to SCTC 338nm 2.5hrs
Total 6242nm 39.5 hrs

[G-HEVN]

I'll bet it was nice having something other than water to look at! B)

[towerguy]

Wow what a day! It started really last night with dinner - a home cooked Lamb roast that must have been half the flock. This was followed up by helado (ice cream) and raspberry kuchen (pastries) with continuous top ups of the vineyards finest till the early hours.

This morning was a relaxed and leisurely breakfast of eggs and toast out on the veranda overlooking the city below. We left for the Airport midmorning after the heat had a chance to start the thermals and there was a reasonable breeze so Arturo said there should be some decent ridge work as well.

After being introduced around the gliding club as the crazy kiwi that flew in from over the ocean we got down to the serious business - drinking - (oops thats later!) - getting the gliders out and rigged for flight.

Arturo has lent me his personal glider and will use one of the club ones himself - pretty decent of him. Check out the rego! CC-TGY.





We towed out to the south and I released about 3500ft and turned towards the hills to the east of town for some ridge work.


Guess I better pull the gear up!
Its so different from flying the Baron - its quiet!

After gaining some altitude along the ridge I made for the fields north of the city where I picked up a great thermal and shot up so quickly that the vario was screaming its nut off and the VSI was pegged solid!



I actually had to fly out of it as I shot through 12500ft, with no oxygen on board I guess it's not time to try for an altitude record today.

After a couple of hours it was time to rejoin so I headed out to the south again just to see more scenery while losing height.



Advising the tower I was returning I was given a downwind lefthand rejoin over the city for the grass vector and touched down after 2hrs 50mins of really enjoyable flight time.







We are sitting in the gliding club bar now telling each other ever more improbable flying stories and I hope like heck that Arturo has someone coming to pick us up as neither of us are in PIC state!

[ardypilot]

Nice to see some updates TG- the scenery for Temuco looks real realistic!

Also, what AI package are you using for all those LAN Chilie aircrfat, and is that photoreal scenery you are gliding above in FSX?

[towerguy]

This is all stock standard FSX except for the actual mesh which is about 20m res I downloaded from Flightsim.com. Asyou can see it pretty well matches in with what I had in FS9 so I will be experimenting more - and I managed about 14-16 FPS for the whole flight which was quite okay , only gripe was that track-ir dropped out partway through!?

also am using PAI and some other packages from avsim (freeware)

[ZK-Brock]

Hey Towerguy, are the updrafts used for gliding created in realtime in FSX (e.g. with certain conditions, thermals occur in certain places), or are they set in stone (e.g. only a few places worldwise have thermals, which are fixed in place)?

[towerguy]

I really don't know, think I read that it depends on landclass of area and time of day etc but not sure.

[towerguy]

Bidding farewell to my Chilean friends it was once again into the blue, or blue with scattered stratocumulus anyway.



Heading east I climbed through increasing cloud and decided to go 'on top'as the terrain gets a bit rugged down there and the forecast over Argentina way was for Cavok conditions.



It turned out to be a good choice as the layers would have made valley running pretty fraught but they were scattered enough to get a great view of all the lakes and National parks below.



Passing the volcanic Mt Liama to my left I was presented with a stunning vista of mist shrowded valleys running off to the horizon with the occasional glimpse of unspoiled lakes ranging in hue from deepest blues through emerald green to almost white.



This continues all the way down to Tierra del Fuego at the southern tip of south America and well over into Argentina. It is some of the best tramping, fishing and camping in the world, I just wish I had the time to take advantage of it.



Closer to Neuquen is the town of El Chocon which is renowned for its Dinosaur fossils and ancient footprints.



Once east of the Andes the cloud burn't off and its a pleasant if hazy cruise towards Neuquen, our refuelling and lunch stop for today.



It is the provincial Capital and suports the oilfields to the west and all the surrounding fruit growing industries - and some good wineries!



The wineries must be doing a good trade today as I had to wait for a couple of hours for customs to arrive and start processing the paperwork. My lunch stopover is now an overnighter.



Luckily there was room at the 'Del Comahue' which is given a good write up in the travel guide. Oh well - it's Argentina so that means steak for dinner!



This leg 211nm 1.7 Start up to shutdown
So far 6453nm 44.0

[ardypilot]

That first screenie is amazing, your weather looks really detailed there TG!

I must take a flight around that part of the world sometime, it looks stunning!