Day 1 - flight from Langebaan Cape Town to PE

The flights from Cape Town to Durban fetching our Flight School plane Sling FYA were broken down to 2 legs of 4 1/2 hours each - the first from Cape Town (Langebaan where we flew in the seaplane) to Hitgeheim inland of Port Elizabeth where we spent the first night.. these pics follow. Tomorrow I will post the second leg. Durban Skyye Flight School

Follow the blue line from the Cape in the West to the East coast following a route over the Ceres mountains, Oudtshoorn, the Klein Karoo and Hitgeheim, our first stop-over. then onwards on day 2 to the coast at Port Alfred and then through East London and continuing along the Wild Coast to Durban.

Leaving Langebaan our first set of mountains were the Paarl mountains climbing to 7500ft  and once over them we reached the valley of Ceres with more mountains to climb to get along our route.

The vertical navigation plan shows peaks ranging up to 7500 ft with the top peak along my chosen path at 6000 ft, with our proposed altitude selected at 7500 ft to clear them and avoid down and updrafts that are often found around the mountains. In the middle is Oudtshoorn we had to descend to for refuelling en route so that we could make the second day without stopping. The range of the 2 x 75 l fuel tanks is 7 hours.

Louis (left) and myself on day 1 on route to Oudshoorn. The weather was fresh at 12 - 15c deg and a bit of cold air was coming in through the closed vents.

There were a number of small dams quite high in the mountains

The Ceres valley, famed for citrus growing in the Cape, viewed from 7500ft  surrounded by high mountain peaks we were flying over.

At times the clouds were gathering but there were plenty of gaps so that we could maintain visual contact with the ground at all times according to the VFR (Visual Flight Rules) we were following

More mountains and clouds - a lot of the time the route I picked followed between mountain ranges so that the peaks on either side of the valley we were following were higher than our plane. You can see the winding river below in this photo.

FYA on the ground in Oudtshoorn where I put in R1800 AVGAS to refill the tanks and take a full 25l container with to our next stop. Avgas is able to be used instead of car petrol (Mogas) where there is none available but at R17 a litre is more expensive. Usually I fill the tanks using a 25 l container at the local petrol station.

Feeling good after our fuel and piss-stop in Oudtshoorn

The mountain ridge seen here was one of a number of long ridges running parallel to each other and don't look so high seen from the right side of the plane as we were flying quite close to the slopes, but to our left they drop away down to the valley 5500ft below. If you look over this ridge in the Klein Karoo you also can see another valley and ridge in the distance.

After Oudtshoorn I followed the ridges of the Klein Karoo which line the route through to the coast leading down after Port Elizabeth to Port Alfred. 

There is a bit of reflection in the windscreen here, but the clouds were gathering and we were needing to drop below the cloud base and fly under the clouds and had to check our vertical navigation carefully to ensure no mountain peaks would be ahead so we wouldn't get trapped with a cloud covering over and mountains in our path. It is critical to check the weather en route ahead of each flight and to continually assess the weather en route to ensure we remain VFR and able to reach your destination safely. Only last year 3 planes got caught up in cloud in this vicinity and only two made it home, the other plane getting lost in the clouds and ended up crashing into the terrain.

We experienced a strong headwind along the whole journey with winds up to 50 kts (90 kmh) which slowed us down and increased our fuel consumption. This took my landing at Hitgeheim to 5.30pm which was sunset and with only 15 minutes to spare to a legal landing time. This is due to our planned airfield not having landing lights, as I am rated to fly at night, and had it been later we might have had to divert to Port Elizabeth... one of the reasons why fuel management is important to ensure one has adequate fuel for a possible diversion such as that.

We landed safely at 5.30pm on a private airstrip called Hitgeheim on a platteaux and which serves the Addo Elephant Park lodges in the area. We overnighted at a fabulous little guesthouse called Fish Eagles Lodge along the banks of the Sundays River which runs through this area.

Wonderful little guesthouse right on the banks of the Sundays River in an area called Sunland, close to the Addo Elephant Park where we could hear the eagles cry along the river. Thanks Sue for an exquisite Kudu steak dinner followed by the best malva pudding and custard.. a real treat and by far the best meal I had that week. Highly recommended stop-over or base to explore the Addo region. Great hospitality from both of our hosts.

See my Aviation blog for more great Africa aviation stories and how I got my licence.