As usual, the trip was preceded by a day at Gatwick as thanks to Peter and Angela, my night stop was at the ‘Horsham Hilton’ meaning a short trip to catch the Easy Swiss flight in the morning. Unfortunately, the weather on Monday was a bit grim and was threatening rain if not actually raining most of the time. As 08 was in use, I parked near the Flight Tavern and walked round to the crash gate. In position by 07:20 and the numbers began to fall in to the book. The plan was to stay here until the lunchtime Emirates arrived before adjourning for food. Lunch was early though due to the rain getting too heavy. Back an hour later until packing up at 17:05.
Am not a regular visitor here so lots of catching up was done. Made 6 Easyjets and 2 Ryanairs. 3 XLs including the one in BA colours and the British Jet MD-90. Other highlights were the Gabon Airlines 767 EC-JOZ and Qatar 330 A7-AFL which we think was on a first visit.Nice early start on Tuesday and a quick spurt up the M23. Parking was easy and the transfer bus appeared right on cue. The Easyjet check-in was working well where we met up with Michael to make up the group of 3. Even security was easy producing a comment of “could have had an extra hour in bed” which is just what you want to hear.
Our flight to Geneva was to be on A-319 HB-JZM which we boarded nice and early which boded well for an on time departure but in the end we pushed back 10 minutes late. Our hour and a quarter flight was uneventful which is what you need really. The weather was much better today but then it had to be.
An hours time difference means we arrived at 11am to find the longest queue for immigration I’d ever seen here. We only had hand luggage so once past here we were soon on the viewing area above the terminal. Many familiar faces here and the shop was doing a booming trade. A baguette and drink were had before we set off for the EBACE registration hall where we picked up our passes that had been pre-booked.
The hall that was empty last year now had display stands showing that EBACE is getting more and more popular. The static park (accessed through security checks) seemed to be as full as usual and getting pictures was as difficult as ever due to all the people wandering about. The end of the park still gives good views of the airport action although I’m sure there were more vehicles going up and down the service road than previous years. Only fluffed one shot over the 3 days because of this so manageable.
Several new models on view including the Eclipse 500 and the Citation Mustang which is a sign of things to come with the VLJ (Very Light Jet) becoming a popular concept. Dassault have added winglets to their Falcon 2000 and branded it as the 2000LX. Canadair’s new Challenger 605 was on view as were several smaller types that honestly didn’t hold the attention.
On the last day of the show I managed to get on board the Honeywell G450, Global Express (see pic left), CL-605 and Challenger 300. This was a good way to get out of the sun and enjoy some AC as it was getting really hot. Also went on the BBJ (N4AS) and had a very quick look in the Legacy 600 on the way out of the show.Nothing really exotic this year (other than a Korean Global) but plenty of new biz to keep the interest going. A reasonable number of airliners with some of the smaller types operating the routes. The evening Finnair flight was a different EMB-170 (Womble) each day and the LOT flight at the same time was am EMB-170, 737-500 and EMB-175. Flybaboo now have a Dash 8-400 as well as the smaller –300s. Aeroflot have a daily minibus at lunchtime but only A-320 VP-BQV was good for me. Air France use 318s with N, P and Q being seen. Etihad now fly here with A6-EYG and J being seen.
Easyjet are one of the biggest (if not the biggest) operator here with the Swiss registered A-319s being based here but occasional visits by G- ones. Flights from Berlin provided a few elusive ones and brand new G-EZBV operated from Bristol.
We were luckier than some with our flight home. The morning 319 to Gatwick went tech so a LGW based aircraft was used for the lunchtime flight but this was still at Geneva when the evening flight should have gone. Another LGW 319 was used (G-EZBU) for our flight and although was 50 minutes late departing was only about 5 minutes behind the earlier flight. We landed at Gatwick at 20:10 local and after dropping Peter off, got home about 2 hours later.
Like most trips, it was tiring although no early mornings while in Switzerland was a nice change. Same again next year? I think so.
Pics at http://bob-holland.fotopic.net/c1286774.html
