The Silk Road was an important over land trade route connecting the Western and Eastern worlds. At its peak, it stretched approximately 7,000 kilometers between Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia, India, and China. Not only were goods traded along this route, but it also facilitated the exchange of knowledge, arts, and culture. In 2014, the United Nations decreed a nearly 5,000 km section of the Silk Road between China, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan to be a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
FactualGull and I will be flying the entire length of the Silk Road (Istanbul to Beijing) in MSFS in 11 stages, one leg per week over the next three months. We welcome other pilots to join us on this journey, and we will be sharing lots of facts and trivia about the history, culture, people, food, and drink as we traverse nearly the entire length of the Asian continent. We have planned the following itinerary, with each leg estimated to have a flying time of approximately 3-4 hours based on a cruising speed of ~120 knots. Please note that this schedule is tentative and could change:
Date
Flight
Saturday, January 9, 2021
Istanbul, Turkey (LTBA) to Aleppo, Syria (OSAP)
Saturday, January 16, 2021
Aleppo, Syria (OSAP) to Baghdad, Iraq (ORBI)
Saturday, January 23, 2021
Baghdad, Iraq (ORBI) to Tehran, Iran (OIII)
Saturday, January 30, 2021
Tehran, Iran (OIII) to Mashhad, Iran (OIMM)
Saturday, February 6, 2021
Mashhad, Iran (OIMM) to Samarkand, Uzbekistan (UTSS)
Saturday, February 13, 2021
Samarkand, Uzbekistan (UTSS) to Kashgar, China (ZWSH)
Saturday, February 20, 2021
Kashgar, China (ZWSH) to Korla, China (ZWKL)
Saturday, February 27, 2021
Korla, China (ZWKL) to Dunhuang, China (ZLDH)
Saturday, March 6, 2021
Dunhuang, China (ZLDH) to Lanzhou, China (ZLLL)
Saturday, March 13, 2021
Lanzhou, China (ZLLL) to Luoyang, China (ZHLY)
Saturday, March 20, 2021
Luoyang, China (ZHLY) to Beijing, China (ZBAA)
All flights start at 8pm ET / 5pm PT (0100Z) and will be livestreamed on my Twitch channel at https://twitch.tv/SeedyL. We will have multiplayer mode enabled (West USA server) and encourage any interested MSFS pilots to join us on this very unique and historic journey to the East!Jamnuamr2021 16, 2021 6:00 P1 → Jamnuamr2021 16, 2021 6:00 P1
We’ll be flying on the West USA server starting at 8pm ET / 5pm PT (0100Z) on each of the next 11 Saturday evenings taking off from the airports listed in the table above. If you’d like to follow along with the livestream for commentary/historical information/trivia/etc., we’ll be casting from https://twitch.tv/SeedyL. I’ll also share a .pln file for each leg of the journey in Twitch chat.
oh, i didnt even know this was the plan for saturday streams for the next few months. up until i checked the events calandar i just found out existed on the forums
What skill level is required to join? I’m totally new to flight sims, can take off and manage some semblance of landing. But definitely know nuts about comms and navigation.
this will probably be similar to previous live streams SeedyL has done, where anyone can join as long as you can fly somewhat in a strait line. you should usually know which direction to go by watching the live stream, or even just seeing where everyone else is flying
As @stw222 mentions, you don’t need advanced flying knowledge to participate in these flights. As long as you can take off, fly in a straight line, and perform some gentle to medium turns, you’ll be fine. You don’t even need to know how to navigate over long distances – just follow the group. Feel free to set your own difficulty options in the sim, for example if you want to turn crashes off or reduce the realism of the flight model to make the plane easier to fly. The Silk Road tour is more about exploring the world in MSFS and discussing history, culture, people, trivia, etc., then it is about serious simulated flying. Hope to see you join us on January 9th!
Speaking of which it would be a good idea to do advanced flying tours with certain altitude restrictions for each phase of the trip
Or only inverted flights during certain parts
Stage 1 of our journey across the Silk Road is tonight, January 9! Our flight plan is Istanbul (LTBA) > Ankara (LTAC) > Kayseri (LTAU) > Adana (LTAF) > Antakya (LTDA) > Aleppo (OSAP). Come join me and FactualGull at https://twitch.tv/SeedyL for some casual and relaxing flying as we share plenty of facts and trivia about this historic trade route and the people and culture along its path. We will be starting at 8pm ET / 5pm PT / 0100Z. Multiplayer mode (West USA server) will be enabled for anyone who wishes to fly with us in MSFS.
Stage 2 of the Silk Road journey (Aleppo, Syria to Baghdad, Iraq) is tonight, Saturday, January 16. I’m super excited about this flight, as we’ll be traversing the Fertile Crescent, one of the most historically-significant regions in the world. FactualGull and I will once again be joined on audio comms by our friend and history expert, AnimeBirder.
