World Tour Leg 33 - Gwadar to Karachi

This flight will be a bit more complex, for two reasons. The first one, the heat. I'll fly high later in the day, even with cowl flaps open, to cool down the engines a bit. The second reason, Karachi airport is IFR only, so I plan a zulu flight (VFR on departure, IFR on arrival). Karachi is the largest city in Pakistan, 12th in the world, former capital of Pakistan till it was moved to Islamabad. Definitely will be a busy airport to land on.

So, after my new 5 passenger embark, we take off. We had clear skies for the whole flight, allowing to see the amazing landscape that this area of Pakistan has to show.

 

 

As I expected, the heat is too much for the engines, so I climb to FL155, where the temperature is lower. After Ormara, things get even more interesting. I would like to travel north, following the mountains, but that would deviate me too much from my main objective. Maybe in future.

 

 

While approaching Karachi, the first green fields in a long time show up. The IFR approach ended up being very useful, due to the fog that surrounded the airport and that would have prevented me to land in visual conditions.

 

 

Next leg is not decided yet, but definitely I want to cross India as fast as I can. The idea of reaching the Himalaya is pushing me forward constantly.

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Technical details:

OPGD - OPKC

06 N10 PASNI N10 ORMARA N10 HINGOL IFR KAJAL DOSTI2B 25R

Distance: 280 nm

Average GS: 170 kt

Average alt.: FL155

METAR:

N/A

 

 

World Tour Leg 32 - Chah Bahar to Gwadar

I want to continue my trip towards the East, although I cannot find any decent job that will take me along the coast from Chah Bahar. For this reason, I decide to fly alone, no cargo, no passangers, towards Gwadar, my first stop in Pakistan. Gwadar is not a big city in Pakistan, but an important strategic harbor. It is located between two long beaches divided by a kind of small mountain, making an interesting landscape.

I take off at sunrise, trying to make good use of cold temperatures, till a cruise altitude of 7500 ft, allowing me to enjoy the landscape features along the coast. There was a bit of mist, that faded away once the sun was higher in the sky.

  

After half an hour or so, I cross the border, that divides a nice bay with few rivers arriving to it.

 

Another half an hour later, I see the iconic landscape of Gwadar and manage to land after an easy visual approach.

Luckily, some passangers are waiting for somebody to take them to Karachi, so I won't miss this opportunity.

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Technical details:

OICZ - OPGD

09L CHABAHAR JIWANI 24

Distance: 110 nm

Average GS: 190 kt

Average alt.: 7500 ft.

METAR:

N/A

World Tour - Middle East summary

DISCLAIMER (written on May 2023):

The World Tour I was logging here has been obviously cancelled long time ago. I'll give an explanation of this. However, I'm planning to start a new one very soon. Before doing that, I want to post those pending entries I had from 3 years ago, as well as the last legs I did before cancelling. Therefore, there will be a few more entries these days, to complete the old Tour (8 more legs till Paro) and then I'll start the new World Tour again. 

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It has been a great experience so far to discover the Middle East in this Tour. Crossing Arabia was something I wanted to do for a long time, and the last leg along the iranian south coast has been amazing. All this was done in 8 legs, covering about 1500 nm of stunning desert and coastal landscapes.

But now, some kind of news. It has been a great experience to visit these countries with X-Plane 11 and orthos made with ortho4xp. I had already flown some of these legs, in FSX, years ago, on my beloved Mooney Bravo. So many great memories came out during this stage and I could recognize many of the natural landmarks such as mountains, bays and so.

And now we have MSFS 2020. I have been inactive for a long time. After testing MSFS for a month after its release, I decided that it was still not ready to be used as a serious simulation engine. But it was so beautiful that, for a while, I decided to wait and see what happened with its development.

Currently (8 months after the release), MSFS is not a serious alternative for study level simulation yet. However, they have fixed many bugs and improved some features that, at least, leave some of the default propellers at the level of those default in X-Plane.

So, will I continue the World Tour on MSFS? To be honest, I don't know yet. The Baron has been more or less fixed in the last patch (what they call Sim update 3), so at least the mixture is finally modeled and the ceiling is a bit more realistic (FL230 instead of FL+300 as before). Cowl flaps do "something" in the sense that move the EGT indicators. But, of course, no damage is modelled. And having a glass cockpit is not something I like, but not a limiting factor in terms on continuing the Tour. IVAO and FSEconomy work perfectly fine.

As "pros" for MSFS, weather is simply amazing and landscapes in flat regions and cities are usually superb. However, the mesh is so poor that hills and mountains are hard to see. Asobo claims to fix this along 2021, but I'm not hopeful on getting a mesh of the quality I got until now. And the resolution of the orthos is not as great as those made by ortho4xp. A positive point though is that I have to visit Japan and USA, 2 of the theoretically best countries in MSFS.

Finally, the main "con", together with the poor mesh, is the lack of a failure system or something similar to the REP package I'm using with the Baron right now. If I go on with MSFS, there won't be failures, locked gears, emergency landings or maintenance to do.

So, in conclusion, either I wait till the mesh is fixed and a study level Baron shows up in the market, or I switch to a brand new glass cockpit Baron and continue with the awesome weather system and a landscape that, although not great in mountains, is far better in flats and cities.

The third option is to return to the X-plane installation and continue as until now. But, to be honest, all the work of preparing orthos for half of the world, while I have MSFS sitting there with similar landscapes ready to use, is something that bothers me.

I'll take a decision one of these days. Anyway, nobody read this, so... :D

World Tour Leg 31 - Sharjah to Chah Bahar

My 5 new passengers were waiting for me to fly towards Chah Bahar. Dating from 2500 BC and destroyed by the Mongols many centuries ago, this city is currently an important maritime international trade center due to its status of Free Trade Zone. More importantly, this trip would make me fly over a small portion of Oman and cross most of the Iranian coast in a single leg.

Due to the busy airspace of Dubai and its surroundings, I decided to file a Y flight, departing by VEBUL and cancelling IFR from there. Weather, as usual in this area, was great to enjoy a stable take off and nice views from the large metropolitan area of Dubai-Sherjah.

The spiky hills reveal that we are entering Oman airspace. At least, the Musandam exclave. Oman is the oldest independent state in the Arab world and has a rich and long history dating from prehistorical eras. Musandam Peninsula is formed mainly by the mountains created by tectonics. In addition to this, since the Arabian plate is sinking under the Eurasian plate, water is starting to flood the coast and create beautiful shapes.

After flying over Limah, extremely nice city on a beautiful location, we head towards the Iranian coast. Although I can see the coast across the Strait of Hormuz, an emergency over the water would not be pleasant. But in few minutes we enter Iranian airspace, following the coast till our destination. The shape of the mountais here is again really interesting, creating a contrast with the flatness of the sandy shores.

Finally I reach Chabahar Bay and Chabahar airport, in which I land on visual despite a slight low visibility.

Lovely trip that I expect to repeat at some time. This part of the world has some unique landscapes that I will miss once Pakistan is left behind. Speaking of which... next trip might lead me across Iran eastern neighbour.

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Technical details:

OMSJ - OICZ

SID: DAVMO4Q

VEBUL VFR RAS-AL-JAIMA JEBEL-AL-HARIM KOOH-MOBARAK COAST CHABAHAR-BAY

Distance: 300 nm

Average GS: 190 kt

Average alt.: 9500 ft.

METAR:

OMSJ 152200Z 15007KT CAVOK 31/26 Q0997 NOSIG

OIZC 151600Z 19006KT 6000 NSC 31/28 Q0997 A2945

World Tour Leg 30 - Dubai Int. to Sharjah

While in Dubai, I looked for some jobs towards the East, as I had somehow to compensate the maintenance of my Baron. In addition to that, after Dubai I expect to have challenging flights till maybe India. And some passengers were waiting at Sharjah, the 3rd most populous city of UAE, to be taken to Iran. So I decided to fly my Baron from Dubai Int. to Sharjah Airport.

Sharjah, although a different city, is in practice fused with Dubai, and this flight was maybe the shortest I will do in the whole world tour. Less than 1000 ft AGL, low speed, following the VFR charts to avoid problems with authorities... nothing special.

Next destination, Iran.

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Technical details:

OMDB - OMSJ

FB MK SU ML

Distance: 40 nm

Average GS: 150 kt

Average alt.: 500 ft.

METAR:

OMDB 152200Z 20007KT CAVOK 31/28 Q0997 NOSIG

OMSJ 152200Z 15007KT CAVOK 31/26 Q0997 NOSIG