Leg 4 from Inverness EGPE to Oban EGEO, this time with working live weather!
This Cessna 152 is my plane of choice for this leg.
This is Inverness
It is the largest town in the Scottish Highlands and the administrative center for the Highland Council.
It was one of the main strongholds of the Picts and have existed for at least 1500 years, so it is rich in history.
That is Loch Ness, I don’t think much further introduction is needed really.
Fog incomming!
Better get nice and low, so I can find my way through the fog, but also keep a better eye out for Nessie!
The visibility isn’t to great, but still manageable though.
The fog didn’t last for long and we’re already almost past Loch Ness… Didn’t manage to spot Nessie, so I’ll leave that for somebody else!
It is pretty straight forward flying this leg, even without fancy glass cockpit instruments. You just have to follow the valley all the way to the Scottish west coast basically.
The lake in front of the plane is Loch Oich.
Next up it’s Loch Lochy, and yes that is its actual name!
Right under where the plane is a battle called The Battle of the Shirts were fought in 1544 between Clan Donald and Clan Fraser, the battle got its name because it apparently was so hot they had to take of their chainmail and only fight in their shirts.
Flying just below the cloud layer, pretty cool flying along this long valley or glen as they are called in Scotland, this one is called the Great Glen and is the result of a fault running from south west to north east.
Done with the lochs (For now), heading over some relative flat farm land.
Looking east, the river is called Spean and has its origin in Loch Laggan.
Out there Ben Nevis the highest point in the UK should be, but sadly there isn’t much to see because of the low clouds. Ben Nevis is the remains of a volcano that collapsed around 350 million years ago. Today it’s a popular climbing destination with about 100,000 people ascending each year.
Flying over Fort William, the second most populous town in the Highlands. Because of its proximity to Ben Nevis its a popular tourists center for climbers and other visitors. This is also the start of Loch Eil, which is actually not a lake, but more like a fjord.
Nearing Oban airport, can you spot it?`
Flying over the airport to get an idea of the layout. It seems that landing on runway 19 has quite the interesting approach as there is a mountain a mere 1.5 km from the runway requiring you to either come in very step or turning around the mountain on final.
Turning around to line up with the runway.
Coming in a bit low, barely clearing the treetops
Aaaand touchdown! Probably the best landing on my tour so far. The Cessna 152 is amazing to fly, very stable and almost just fly itself. Dont know if that is true to life, but it was pretty nice and made the flight a lot easier considering it doesn’t have any fancy autopilot, at least not one I know how to use
Parked up, and ready to drive to the nearest hotel!
That was it for this leg! Next time we are going to Ireland (the island) and the City of Derry airport EGAE.