The best golf courses, hotels, pubs and restaurants for pilots

More military humour

I’ve been to Fifteen Cornwall twice now. Jamie Oliver’s restaurant is right on the beach. The tables are shallow terraces so that everybody has a clear view through the long picture window onto the beach. It’s like being on an ocean liner. The ambience is relaxed with lots of exposed wood and 70s style light light fittings and artwork.

The restaurant is about 5-10 minutes cab ride from Newquay Airport (aka St. Mawgan) making it more convenient than getting a cab into Padstow for a meal at Rick Stein’s (See GHW reivew).

The design is inspired by surfing but the menu is all Italian. It isn’t cheap. Aileen’s sea bass main course was £21 and the total bill for three (excluding service) ran to £112. Is it worth it? Yes, I think so. The antipasti platter was generous and tasty. The main courses: taglierini, risotto and fish were delicious and well-cooked.  It’s a great restaurant for pilots and worth the trip.

Contact information

Fifteen Cornwall
On The Beach
Watergate Bay
Cornwall TR8 4AA
+44 (0)1637 861000

www.fifteencornwall.co.uk

Nearest Airport

Newquay Airport (RAF St. Mawgan) (5m)

Nearby Towns

• Padstow
• Newquay

Pilots love checklists. I use this one to plan my flights. I fly an N-reg aircraft on an FAA CPL/IR so it’s geared to IFR trips in airways but other pilots may find it useful for different kinds of flight (e.g. VFR channel crossings). Anyway, no guarantees, no support, use at your own risk but enjoy!

Stibbair Pre-flight Planning Checklist

Currency

• JAA PPL Medical
• FAA CPL Medical
• JAR PPL
• RT licence valid
• JAR SEP Land
• UK IMC
• BFR CPL Checkride
• IR currency (6 IAP, VOR, hold)
• PLB registration
• 90 Day Rule (Day / Night)

Route planning

• Update charts in Flightstar
• Plan route in Flightstar
• Crosscheck Standard Route Document (Available from Jeppesen)
• Review route on VFR charts
• Identify alternates
• Check NOTAMs in AVBRIEF and/or NOTAMPLOT
• Check official night and night currency
• Complete weight and balance form
• Check fuel requirements (30m day VFR, 45m night VFR, 45 IFR at alternate, 123 rule for alternate)
• Check flight plan with CFMU validator. Check route availability if required.
• File flight plans with HOMEBRIEFING (or fax and call to check it arrived. Heathrow: Tel: +44-(0)20-8750 2615 / 2616, Fax: +44-(0)20-8750 2617 / 2618, Manchester: Tel: 0161 499 5502 / 5500, Fax: 0161 499 5504, Scottish: Tel: 01292 692 679 / 692 663, Fax: 01292 671 048)

Paperwork

• Book plane!
• Check timezones and prepare schedule
• Check customs PPR, handling and customs at destination.
• Fax handling request if required
• Complete GAR in plenty of time (EU: 4 hours before inbound, Channel Isles, IOM, Eire and Northern Ireland 12 working hours inbound and return) and fax to Denham 01895 833486 or to GAR central on 0870 240 3738 or by email to ncu@hmce.gsi.gov.uk or call on 0870 785 3600
• Print plates, plogs, W&B, GAR, flight plans, schedule
• Confirm details with passengers
• Pack in plastic folder trip kit

Day of flight

• Print SIGMET, wind, synoptic, TAFs METARs, radar picture, satellite cloud (Note that Homebriefing has a SIGMET with cloud tops on it unlike the Met Office version)
• Check freezing level
• Complete risk assessment and print
• Check passports
• Call destination for customs, handling, PPR as required
• Call Red Arrows and Royal Flights 0500 354802 if VFR or check www.raf.mod.uk/reds
• Call French ATC to close flightplan if arriving at a non-IFR French airport +33 810 437 837
• Arrive one hour before flight
• Don’t forget: passport, Euros, phone, flight plan docs

I recently set up a site with information for passengers at a new address, www.stibbair.com.

On Saturday, on a trip to Rotterdam, my passengers had their first boarding card.

What I particularly like is the the carrier: “UFO”.

Now all I need is an AOC and I can start my own airline!

The only way to visit Europe’s finest restaurants is by air.  The mission: fly to three of Europe’s best restaurants in 24 hours. The gastronauts: me, a 37-year old victim of compulsive flying disorder and pro-am restaurant critic; my wife and a couple of my long-time chums and co-pilots. The plane: a Cirrus SR-22 light aircraft belonging to Freeflight Aviation, fractional ownership club based at Denham, England. Our inspiration: the Michelin Hotel and Restaurant Guide.

The original Michelin Guide was published in 1900 by the tire company as handbook for a handful of intrepid car owners and their chauffeurs. It has evolved into the bible for foodies. The company publishes the famous Red Guide for most countries in Europe and, recently, New York City.

Michelin’s ultimate restaurant accolade, three stars, implies “exceptional cuisine, worth a special journey.” For the top restaurants, the rating may be the result of up to twelve anonymous inspection visits over the course of a year. To put three stars into context, in the UK there are just three restaurants in the top tier, three in Holland and just over two dozen in France.

To eat three super-gourmet meals in short order requires serious training. We decided to get match fit by starting with visits to ‘mere’ one and two-star restaurants. This spring training ran over the course of several months before the big day.

First, we flew to Exeter in Southwest England to visit the New Angel. Overlooking the beautiful Dart Estuary, it uses locally-caught fish to special effect. The small dining room is separated from the kitchen by a sort of bar, making every table a ‘chef’s table.’ Delightful. We wanted to sample some Dutch cuisine so we flew to Amsterdam a couple of times. First to visit La Rive, which overlooks the Amstel river. The view, service, food and décor were excellent. The second visit, to Christophe, was also good but cosier and more informal.

We were nearly at our gastronomic peak so it was time to turn the training up a notch. It was time to visit the French. We spotted two restaurants, both two-stars, which were close to small airfields. The first, Jean Bardet, is in Tours, in the Loire Valley. A five-minute cab ride from the local airport, it was exquisitely French. The dining room looked like a set from Dangerous Liaisons. The soup of langoustine and brill with truffles was astonishing. The most perfectly savory thing I have ever eaten.

The second restaurant, Richard Coustanceau, is found on the beach in La Rochelle, a pretty town on the French Atlantic coast. The fixed-price lunch menu was extraordinary value at €45 each. My tuna tartare starter followed by sea bass and then raspberry desert were all done to perfection. My passengers shared a bottle of Condrieu but I was the designated pilot for the journey home. Tant pis.

Finally after a lot of hard work, we were ready for the big game. Our palates had been intensively trained. My license and instrument rating were current. We selected our targets: Parkheuvel in Rotterdam, Holland for lunch, Guy Savoy in Paris for dinner and after an overnight stay at the George V, back to England for lunch at The Fat Duck in Bray, England. I planned the route and booked the plane.

Then disaster struck. One of Freeflight’s aircraft had a prop strike during a botched takeoff and another had a damaged nose wheel. The other three planes were booked solid. No aircraft! The upside of sharing aircraft in a syndicate is that you share the cost. The downside is that you share the risk. Luckily, I was able to reschedule the trips and rebook the restaurants but the dream of doing it in 24 hours was shattered. In the end, it took three days and three round trips instead.

I fly from a small airfield, Denham, in Northwest London. Because it is sandwiched between Luton and Heathrow airspace, it is always a challenge to gain altitude and join airways quickly. On the day of our trip to Parkheuvel, I was lucky. A friendly controller let me begin the climb within minutes of take off and we quickly reached 8,000 feet over North London. The view over the city was crystal clear. The flight to Rotterdam was over quickly and we taxied up to KLM’s smart private aviation terminal. A taxi was already waiting and we went from the plane to the car in under five minutes.

Unfortunately, the restaurant didn’t live up to the occasion. The food – lobster salad and sea bass for me - was well cooked. The location was charming: a modern building on the strand between a park and the river Maas. But Parkheuvel was badly let down by the service, which was slow and absent-minded. For example, the pre-starters were delivered without the cutlery to eat them and the coffees we ordered never appeared. We may have caught them on an off-day as the place had changed hands a few weeks before our visit. However, if it wants to keep the three stars of a world-class restaurant, the new owner, Erik van Loo, will have to get a grip.

Our second destination, The Fat Duck, was much more successful. The chef, Heston Blumenthal, is famous for his scientific approach to food. The first course of our 15-course tasting menu was a palate cleanser of green tea, vodka and lime meringue ‘cooked’ in liquid nitrogen at the table. Half-meal, half mad-science; the result was like nothing I’ve eaten before. More importantly, it really did clean my palate. The Tattinger vintage champagne suddenly tasted twice as good. His other signature dishes, snail porridge and bacon and egg ice cream, confused and delighted the taste buds in equal measure. We giggled and squealed like children all the way through the four-hour meal. The Fat Duck is a genuinely unique and delightful experience and all for the price of a few hundred Big Macs.

My home base, Denham isn’t the best airfield for visitors to The Fat Duck. The runway is just 2,100 feet long and there is a very steep approach. It’s a heroic, short field performance in a Cirrus but too small for a jet. I would recommend Farnborough instead. It’s got a long runway and a world class FBO.

For our Paris trip, we landed at Le Bourget and the approach took us over Paris within shouting distance of the Eiffel Tour and the Arc de Triomphe. This was as memorable as the Bay Tour I flew in San Francisco in 2002 and the visual approach into Cannes last year. Definitely the way to arrive in Paris. A limousine whisked us from the airport to the restaurant in about twenty minutes

I wasn’t sure that our last destination, Guy Savoy, in Paris could live up to the standard set by The Fat Duck. I couldn’t have been more wrong. It wasn’t better but it was equally good in a different way. Take, for example, the artichoke and black truffle soup with layered brioche with mushrooms and truffles. The joy of it was the best possible ingredients in the best possible combination. It was not the scientific product of molecular gastronomy but the loving result of years of experience. Similarly, desert was a tapas-like succession of sweet things. They kept coming until we could eat no more. The most memorable was a single grape, marinated in coffee and wrapped in chocolate. The size of a Tic Tac, it came on its own teaspoon.

Guy Savoy is opening a new restaurant bearing his name in at Caesar’s Palace Las Vegas. It will be run his by son Franck and with “the same spirit,” as its Parisian cousin. What is this spirit? What is its inspiration? He explains: “The smile is the simplest thing and the most important in our restaurants.” So it is at Guy Savoy and so it is whenever flying and fine dining come together.

Every couple of years I make the pilot’s pilgrimage to Florida to do some flight training: PPL, instrument rating, CPL. This year I had planned to go do my multi-engine rating.

However, I’ve decided not to go. Why?

• Poor standard of flying schools. I’ve trained with different schools in Florida and none of them have been great. The last one was absolutely awful - enough to put a newcomer off flying for good, in my opinion. Picking a flying school is an act of blind faith. While I did get two good references for Fly EAA in Naples (my first choice this time) it was difficult to get detailed answers to my questions over the phone and I got no reply by email. 
  
• I don’t want to fly a Diamond anymore. EAA train on DA42s and I had planned to fly that rather than fly a 30-year old Aztec or Seneca somewhere else. I’ve had demo flights in the DA40 and DA42 and liked the handling (but not the performance - especially compared to the Cirrus). However, the recent engine problems with Thielert make me nervous about plane availability and, frankly, I’m not sure I want to train for an aircraft I am now unlikely to buy or rent. As I write this, I note that EAA have stopped doing ME training on the DA42 so even if I wanted to go do the course there, I couldn’t.  Just as well I didn’t buy my tickets.
  
• My wife doesn’t want to go to Florida. We’ve done all the tourist stuff and, frankly, visiting Florida again holds little appeal.
  
• The whole bloody visa business. I just don’t fancy spending a couple of days of my life filling out forms and waiting in line and being treated like a suspect at the airport just to get permission to spend my dollars in the USA. On its own this isn’t the deciding factor but it tips the balance.

So, I’ve done a checkout on the SR22 Turbo and I’m going to fly some more Cirrus hours this summer. The travel money will go towards holidays in San Francisco and the Maldives. If Diamond sort themselves out, I may look again at the twin rating. But I’ll probably do it in the UK on my JAR licence.

Freeflight has a nice gallery of pictures from the rollout of the TheJet.  (Full disclosure: I’m a member pilot in the group.) They have an order for the sixth TheJet to be produced. We can’t wait.

Airport information

Nearest town: St. Peter Port, Guernsey

Website: www.guernsey-airport.gov.gg

Landing fees: £4.10 - £8.10

Longest runway: 1463m, Asphalt

Fuel: AVGAS, Jet A1

Admin 01481 237766, ATC 01481 238957

Opening times: Winter 0630 - 2100, Summer 0530 - 2000

AIP plates and airport diagram

Airport map

Airport services

• Handling: Aiglle: (up to Gulfstream V): 01481 239544. Aurigny Air Services: 01481 237426. Flybe: 01481 237574. Rock Aviation: 01481 268281
• Taxis: Delta Taxis (01481 244444), Island Taxis (01481 700500). Pre-booking recommended.
• Car Hire: Europcar (01481 237638), Value (01481 243547), both located on concourse.
• Le Goffre food village, Ritazza café/bar, newsagent, flower shop, cash point, duty free shop.

Pubs

• The Mermaid Tavern, Herm Island, 01481 710170. Welcoming pub on idyllic island, a ferry ride from Guernsey.
• Laska, St Peter Port, 01481 727444. Fashionable cocktail bar with lush interiors.
• The Queen’s Hotel, St Martin’s, 01481 238398. Good pub grub menu.

Restaurants

• L’Escalier, St Peter Port, 01481 710088. Classy menu in romantic setting.
• Saltwater, St Peter Port, 01481 720823. Good seafood, fine harbour views.
• Le Nautique, St Peter Port, 01481 721714.

Hotels

• The Clubhouse, St Peter Port (01481 710331). Choice of town accommodation from three star hotel to luxury self catering apartments and quiet family cottages.
• La Trelade, St Martins (01481 235454, www.latrelade.guernsey.net). Indoor pool and health spa.

Golf courses

• La Grand Mare, Castel (01481 256576, www.lgm.guernsey.net). Full 18-hole course and golf shop at this hotel complex. Unverified listing -

Activities

• Hauteville House (www.victorhugo.gg). The island home of exiled French writer Victor Hugo.
• Castle Cornet (www.museum.guernsey.net/castle.htm). Ancient harbour fortress.
• New Strawberry Farm (www.newstrawberryfarm.com). Undercover mall with wide variety of shops and entertainment.

Useful information

• Tourist office: 01481 237267
• www.visitguernsey.com
• www.thisisguernsey.com

When I was studying for my instrument rating in Orlando, I flew an SR-22 that had the ability to receive weather information in the air. It displayed a radar picture on the multi-function display and TAFs/METARs for airports. It was very cool and a valuable safety system for longer flights. Unfortunately, this option is not available in Europe.

Timm Preusser rigged up a system using a pocket computer and a Globalstar satellite phone to do the same thing. However, Globalstar has some problems with their satellites and his approach - though effective - seemed a bit Heath Robinson (that’s Rube Goldberg for my American readers.)

Avidyne recently announced the MLX-770 Two-way Datalink Receiver. Instead of using satellite radio broadcasts, it uses the Iridium satellite phone system and integrates into the Cirrus’s avionics.

It downloads a radar mosaic for most of western Europe (the same display you get from Meteox, from the looks of things) and METARs/TAFs. You can also send and receive text messages in the air, which might be useful.

In short, I want it.  Actually, I think I’d rather have this than the new Garmin avionics from Cirrus.

Project Propeller is a great organisation that matches WWII RAF aircrew with pilots for fly-in reunions.

This year, I flew two old boys – a Spitfire pilot and a tail gunner – to Shuttleworth / Old Warden. There was a band, a lecture by Tony Blackman (Vulcan test pilot), tea and cakes. It was a real privilege and a pleasure to sit with these veterans and listen to their stories.

The Spitfire pilot was not too impressed with the Cirrus sidestick but complimented me on my landing (high praise!).

The airfield is lovely too, with a great collection of flyable old aircraft. See notes for visiting pilots.