World Tour Leg 35 - Jaipur to Nepalgunj

The weather is not great, but I decide to take off anyway by using VOR navigation, since the clouds are supposed to disappear after very few miles. I'm quite excited not only for approeaching Himalaya, but also because I plan to fly over Agra, where the Taj Mahal is. Let's hope we can spot it.

Taking off was challenging but soon there were clear skies. Visual navigation is India is hard, due to the lack of noticeable features, so VOR assistance was crucial to cross this country.

 

Finally, over Agra, we are able to see the Taj Mahal, the stunning marble mausoleum dating from 1653.

And we finally arrive to Nepal! Landing on fog, of course.

 

The following legs will be planned purely based on landscape, not caring at all about jobs. My idea is to cross the Himalaya and spot the most iconic peaks. It will be tough, due to weather, altitudes and lack of emergency landing spots, but we came for that.

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Technical details:

VIJP - VNNG

270 AGG JAL 08

Distance: 330 nm

Average GS: 200 kt

Average alt.: 9500 ft

METAR:

 

VIJP 221500Z 20006KT 3000 TS SCT030 FEW035CB 33/21 Q1001 NOSIG

N/A

 

 

 

World Tour Leg 34 - Karachi to Jaipur

Once arrived to Karachi, I don't find any passenger or cargo to be taken towards the Himalaya, but I hear that some work is available from Jaipur to Nepal, so I don't doubt a second and decide to fly towards Jaipur. The weather was not expected to be good in a while, so I decided to make a full IFR long flight. It is actually the longest leg I have flown until now, covering 560 nm. The previous longest one was from Misrata to El Beida (500 nm), in VFR. Let's see how the Baron behaves now.

 

There is not much to say about this trip, besides the fact that we crossed the border towards India, finding a combination of stunning desert formations in Pakistan and huge green fields in India. Many mouths to feed.

 

The Baron did a great job, technically a great flight, without any incidence. And finally I meet the passengers that I will take to Nepal. Things might get more interesting from now on.

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Technical details:

OPKC - VIJP

25L PUNA3A PUNAM R462 (DCT) UUD A347 UKBAB W124 JJP ILS-Z 27

Distance: 560 nm

Average GS: 190 kt

Average alt.: FL130

METAR:

 

OPKC 211300Z 24010KT 6000 BKN020 34/23 Q0998 NOSIG

 

VIJP 211530Z 18007KT 2000 HZ SCT030 FEW035CB BKN100 29/22 Q1001 NOSIG 

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