North Cape Trip
By Peter Schneider, EAA# 298 629
Schneider_P@klinik.uni-wuerzburg.de

After two years of trouble free flying with my Vixen, I thought the time is ready for a longer trip and, since my bird loves cool air and I love northern countries, I planned to set out for the North Cape. I called around in the scene to listen who was also interested in some adventure. Eventually I contacted Kitfox fellow Reinhold Schinagl because I heard he and a bunch of people of his flying club had the same plans to start around the same date during the time of midnight sun. So, eight people with four planes met Sunday noon, 22nd of June at Bayreuth airfield to join there. I came in with my Vixen from my home base at Wurzburg, one hour west. The seven Austrian guys arrived from Kapfenberg airfield in the Alps not far from Graz with three birds. One bird was a Kitfox Speedster built and owned by Reinhold Schinagl and piloted by himself and his friend Martin. Reinhold and his wife Hilde realized their dream in a French homebuilt MCR01, a real carbon fiber speedster. Three fellows from their flying club Georg, Helmut and Thomas arrived with a Skyhawk. After a good lunch, the first day took us to Rugen island where we fueled up and stayed over night.
In the morning everyone put a lifevest on. Then, we crossed 50 nm of Baltic Sea into Malmo TMA, Southern Sweden in rainy weather. 6500 feet above the sea we tried to figure out where the horizon was. There was none until we hit the shoreline inbound ALM VOR. However, the GPS map guided me straight and reliably to the reporting points. At the same time 100 miles to the west a tornado touched down at Flensburg, which is considered an extremely rare event. Three hours later we touched down at Karlskoga, a 24 hours PPR airport, where initially nobody was awaiting us because we had missed to call them prior to our takeoff. Accidently a friendly guy volunteering at the airport had pulled out our flightplans of the fax machine at the airport and run up the tower to give us a friendly welcome and close our flightplans. After refueling and a pizza in the town we submitted new flightplans and a pizza to the friendly guy. Soon we were airborne again for our second leg of the day ending at Lycksele airfield in the "mountainous area" of middle Sweden. There, nice guys brought us into the town to Hotel Lappland to stay overnight. Up here in the north, the night remained day, so we first took a walk downtown until midnight.
Next day our plan was to cross the Finland border into Norway. Underway, it was interesting to see different headings on the magnetic compass and the VOR receiver compared to the GPS map due to a deviation of 6-7 degrees. After 1 hour 50 minutes we crossed the arctic circle. After crossing two borders in the middle of nowhere I flew over Kautokaino, a town with a famous silver jewelry and a museum with its architecture beautifully integrated in a river bend. There, I had stopped by with my family two years ago. Unfortunately, all photos I took from the air were screwed up due to wrong setting of my camera. After 4 hours 7 minutes I descented into Alta fjord along a tossing river which I knew from two years ago, was full of salmon. At Alta I still had one hour thirty fuel remaining plus reserve. Refueled and catered, we took off in formation to set out to the North Cape. Whereas the Kitfoxes climbed like homesick angels, the Skyhawk had a pain to gain significant altiude in the same time and the MCR01 had to drive with flaps to maintain a 40 knots slower as usual speed. Thus, we met 5 minutes after takeoff within a range of 200 yards with me as "wing leader". After one hour in formation over snow covered tundra and still partially frozen lakes below us we crossed a fjord, knowing that 700 feet below sea level there was a road also crossing this fjord, and we arrived over the North Cape island. Now a thrilling photo session began which envolved several circles around the cape and interceptions of the other planes, while a cloud blanket went in from the Barents Sea and covered almost the whole island and Honningsvag airfield, our harbour for the "night". After an exciting approach, using the map information of my Garmin 195, I spiraled down to sea level to hit runway 25 of Valan airport counting a total of 1433 nautical miles since Wurzburg. Aside of the runway (!) I saw the ILS antennas set off by 60 degrees to the runway heading, pointing northerly into the bay to ensure approaches free of interference with the cliffs and mountainous obstructions close to Europe´s northmost runway. After everybody was safely in and tied down, we found a place to stay and jumped into a bus which took us up to the cape again where we enjoyed the midnight sun at the visitors center with a polar beer in the hands. From here, the next stop could have been Spitsbergen, only 500 miles across the Sea and only a little bit beyond my endurance without an aux tank (or a couple of Coke bottles with extra fuel). What a challenge to resist that idea (and survive that way without whale watching...).
Next day it was a short two hours hop to Tromso over snow covered tundra, mountains and deep fjords passing Hammerfest, a dream of water and landscape. There, we met Torgeir Mortensen, a Kitfox Model 2 owner, who found out the only one hotel with the last four available rooms to rent. He shared a hangar with a Kitfox 4 owned by the local flying club. Before getting there, the friendly guy who refueled our birds, took me to the terminal building in order to get some money from the cash machine to pay for the fuel. On the way back to the fuel station he got calls and I found myself in a 40 tons tank truck to participate in refueling a 737 and two turboprops of Braathens Air and Skyways which were on a tighter schedule than we were. Next, we pulled the two Norwegian Kitfoxes out of the hangar for a foto session. On this occasion, I took a thorough look underneath my cowling to ensure a safe continuation of the trip. As the chief electronic guy for the SAR fleet of the largest Skandinavian air ambulance company, Torgeir also showed us the Norwegian air rescue system. For the next day we planned to move on to Bodo, where a nice air museum was waiting for us. The forecast showed blue skys along the coastline. Supplied with a good buffet dinner we took a footwalk to the famous ice cathedral which is located just at the other end of the long bridge over the fjord.
In the morning of the 25th however the whole coastal range was overcast all of a sudden. Some tiny spots in some corners of the fjords still allowed to climb on top and I picked one. Guess who was climbing faster: the slope or the Vixen. The Vixen won the race. Thanks to the moving map, I could see where fjord waters were and where solid rock was to be expected, just in case...On flight plan again, we headed for Arvidsjaur, northern Sweden, hosting a big airliner flight training school with a fleet of 50 Cessna´s, all painted with the mountain safety pattern, stripes in orange colour. This leg took me 3 hours, again with tailwind. On the way over a large uninhabitated area I passed over Kiruna, the famous iron ore mine. We shared lunch and took off for the next 350 nm leg to Borlange where we stayed over night on a nice campground after having delicious steak and fish with local beer in a "western steakhouse".
Next morning the first leg took us south around a series of Cb´s, thunderstorms and showers which had built up earlier than we appreciated. The second leg led us over the Baltic Sea again back to Germany after 4 hours of flying that day. We tied down at Peenemunde airfield on Usedom island, where Werner von Braun took the first steps into space age and developed the first rockets during world war two. From here, my friends were heading back to Austria next day and I visited friends in Hamburg.
The total trip was 3075 nm, total flight time with the Vixen from Wurzburg to the cape and back was 34 hours. On our way we met a lot of friendly and helpful people. The Vixen behaved excellently as also did the Speedster, both have Rotax 912 engines. Only under certain conditions both planes have developed carburetor icing (below 10 degrees Celsius, humid air or rain), noticible by a rough running engine and occasional coughs, causing little adrenaline pushes. With the heat box frequently on in such conditions relief was achieved. Fuel consumption was 17.0 liters per hour. Average cruising altitude was 5500 feet, my average groundspeed was 90.4 knots with some tailwind during the whole trip. The MCR01 has a Rotax 912S engine and that plane was one third faster than mine.
It was my longest trip so far. Equipped with ELT, mountain survival stuff (compass, food, insect repellent etc.), life vest and the watching eyes of many friendly controllers on their radar screens I increasingly had the feeling of being on a well prepared and safe trip with a reliable and properly equipped airplane. In some very remote areas, friendly Swedish and Norwegian airliners gave me relays to centers when my radio was out of reach.
Trip schedule:
22.6.: Bayreuth (EDQD), Guttin (EDCG)
23.6.: Karlskoga (ESKK), Lycksele (ESNL)
24.6.: Alta (ENAT), Honningsvag (ENHV) 1433 nm
25.6.: Tromso (ENTC)
26.6.: Arvidsjaur (ESNX), Borlange (ESSD)
27.6.: Vaxjo (ESMX), Peenemunde (EDCP)
28.6.: Hamburg (EDDH)
29.6.: Braunschweig (EDVE)
30.6.: Würzburg (EDFW) total trip: 3075 nm