We were so happy that we had made it to Oshkosh, but in reality we were underprepared and overwhelmed of the actual EAA Airventure show. As we had lost already one day of our original planning as we got stuck in Reykjavik, and judging the stress we had endured in the whole trip so far, we decided that we nevertheless would stay here a full 4 days and not 3 by sticking to our original schedule. It turned out to be a sound decision. So from here onwards three days at the Oshkosh show were left. This means that we planned to leave the airshow on Friday morning. But we had a restriction: we could ..read more

Flight 10 : Appleton to Oshkosh We woke up very excitedly: today we will fly into Oshkosh via the notorious Fisk arrival. We had charged all our gear and cameras, and we were charged up ourselves after our big steak. After a typical mediocre plastic cutlery breakfast, we returned to the FBO in Appleton and I took a sneak peak at the actual Fisk arrival situation: This year in Oshkosh, more than 10’000 aircraft arrived and departed in about two weeks time. On top, every afternoon during the EAA Airventure show, there is an airshow so the arriving and departing from the Oshkosh airport (KOSH) i ..read more

Dit is de video over ons vliegavontuur naar en van Oshkosh in de zomer van 2023. Gemaakt door RateOne magazine, waarvoor dank ..read more

Flight 7 : Kuujjuaq – Shefferville After a good night of rest after yesterday’s long day, we woke up pretty early in a calmed down Auberge Kuujjuaq. Downstairs we topped up of jug of coffee and paid the hotel. The hotel manager was a friendly guy with Moroccan roots who knew Belgium. He brought us in his battered car to the airport down the road. The plan of today was almost equally ambitious as the one of yesterday: three flights ! First from Kuujjuaq (CYVP) to Shefferville (CYKL) to load another barrel of Avgas. Than we continue onwards to Val d’Or (CYVO) in Quebec, followed by the last leg ..read more

Flight 4 : Reykjavik – Kangerlussuaq As planned the day before when we were stuck in Reykjavik, we knew that today would be the longest day. In fact, it was a gift of nature! Reykjavik sits in the timezone of UTC, and our final destination for today is Kuujjuaq which sits in UTC -4hrs. This means that we had a day of 28hrs. And even better: as it s summer on the northern hemisphere, the sun is hardly setting in this part of the world. Boy … would this be a long day … longer than desired even. Read along: We got up early and we were in our airplane at 08:00L, which is the official opening time ..read more

After having arrived in Reykjavik, on the second day of our trip to Oshkosh, we checked the weather and we quickly saw that our original plan of flying the second day to Greenland and onwards to Canada, would be impossible. The GRAMET showed in green a persistent icelayer above the Greenland icecap blocking access to the eastern airports of Kangerlussuaq (BGSF), Nuuk (BGGH) and Ilulissat (BGJN). Also Kulusuk (BGKK) in the east and Narsarsuaq (BGBW) in the south did not show pretty forecasts. We did not have the range to skip Greenland entirely and fly all the way to Canada. So we were blocked ..read more

The previous blogpost discussed the preparation of the trip. Now we depart ! Flight 1 : Kortrijk – Wick After a nervous night, we got up very early so we could take off to the west as soon as our home airport Kortrijk (EBKT) opened (at 06:00L). I had arranged with the airport police that we could pass by there from 05:30L onwards (after having done the GenDec), and we had prepared most of the airplane upfront, including fuel. Also the evening before we had done an interview for the local aviation publication RateOne. The plan was to fly Kortrijk (EBKT) – Wick, Schotland (EGPC) – Reykjavik, Ice ..read more

Introduction I have done a couple of long trips before, like returning from Dakar, Senegal in our Piper Arrow with my friends. This time, I decided to do this trip to Oshkosh somewhere around New Year 2023 and I realised I did not have a lot of time left to prepare it. Also I decided to not to communicate too broadly around us because the probability that it would work out was not very high: anything could block: aircraft not OK, insurance too expensive, trip not feasible etc. So the first thing I did was making a list of things to do: I ended up with 87 action items and things to arrange or b ..read more

I am happy to let you know that my son and me will be heading eastbound this week along the Blue Spruce Routes from Europe to Oshkosh, USA ! We will undertake a fantastic trip in our vintage Piper Seneca twin-engine airplane. We plan to fly from Europe to the world-famous EAA Airventure fly-in in Oshkosh, USA via Scotland, Iceland, Greenland, North Canada, and back in 10-12 days. In Oshkosh, where thousands of airplane lovers gather every year they will soak in the atmosphere, watch the airshow, visit vendors and camp under the wing of their own airplane. We will encounter the adventure of fl ..read more

Freedom sometimes just means a takeoff with Piper Seneca III from runway 24 at Kortrijk, Belgium airport (EBKT) on my way south into France ..read more