World Tour Leg 23 - Abu Simbel to Yanbu

I woke up in a hotel next to the airport and I could see part of the Nasser Lake that I planned to visit today. Few days before I had accepted a cargo transportation from Abu Simbel towards Yanbu, in Saudi Arabia, so this would me the leg that would make me leave the country.

The take-off was splendid. After the Aswan Dam was built, one of the temples that was moved was Abu Simbel, and it is located right after leaving runway 15, in a sort of a small island.

The flooding of the water caused the accumulation of limo and sediments, generating nice colors in the surroundings. One doesn't really realise about the magnitude of the Nasser lake, which is the name given to the lake before the dam, until seen from the air.

After about 130 nm I was flying over Aswan, as the day before. At this point I turned right, heading east, towards the coast at the Red Sea.

The landscape started to show few small mountains, something I miss since the Morocco Atlas. I cannot wait to cross the Middle East and head towards the Himalaya. But, for now, I reached Berenice, the ruins of a port founded on 275 BC. The contrast between the brown mountains, the yellow wide beach and the light blue water made of this place an interesting landmark on my trip.

But now, a small challenge. I had to cross the Red Sea and, for the first time, spend a significan amount of time over the water. Crossing from Gibraltar towards Morocco was not as challenging, since the distance is shorter and, in case of emergency, I could glide towards near one of the coasts. But now I have to cross about 130 nm of water, without any visual reference.

I kept 8500 ft. of altitude for the whole time. Maybe I should have risen higher, to secure a longer glide in case of emergency, but I realised too late and I didn't want to push the engines in the middle of the sea to do the climb.

But problems arrived in a different manner. After some time following the VOR of Yanbu, my destination, the NAV1 indicator failed. Fortunately, I started to see the coast of Saudi Arabia, so I could use it as a reference, and the wind was calm, hence I was not too deviated from my route. Since the conditions were favorable, I didn't even think about testing NAV2. But, overall, this leap over the Red Sea has been a good training for the much longer legs I'll have to do over the oceans.

In any case, I arrived to the coast of Saudi Arabia and the Middle East, if we consider Egypt as North-African. I could recognize Yanbu easily due to it's interesting geometrical network of roads and streets.

For the approach I decided to surround Yanbu in a sort of wide left downwind patter for runway 28, avoiding flying over the core of the city. And another soft landing.

So far, the weather has been great, and the winds calm. I hope to fly in similar conditions at least for several more legs. Now it's time to repair the NAV1, rest and discover the history and culture of this new country.

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Technical details:

HEBL - OEYN

NASSER ASWAN RAS_BANAS

Distance: 420 nm

Average GS: 200 kt

Average alt.: 9500 ft.

METAR:

HEBL 271700Z 12004KT CAVOK 33/06 Q1009 NOSIG
OEYN 272000Z 26008KT CAVOK 25/18 Q1008 NOSIG