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Tallard and ALPINE VOL - A User's Perspective.

Jim & Sophie Houston

The adverts abound, and it can be quite difficult to extract fact from fiction, especially as you have already spent good money on your training so far, just never seem to be making any meaningful progress, and such a trip will involve real expense. Sadly the rather amusing articles about the difficulties we all face in getting that precious licence are all too true. Weather problems, instructor availability, aircraft serviceability and so on all contribute to delay and frustration in a very real and persistent manner. As if you didn't have enough difficulty getting the aircraft in the correct part of the planet to attempt a good approach and landing. "It's all part of the rich tapestry of microlighting" quotes your instructor - "you'll be a better pilot because of all the time you've had to think about it". "Take a broom handle and pretend it's a control bar" Familiar?? mmm! What about all the rearward progression due to lack of continuity and practice? What about the quite enormous consumption of time and cash attending failed trips? To say little about the feedback you get from a broom handle. That licence just seems to be getting further and further away, and to make matters worse you surely won't have it before the winter sets in and conditions get really poor.

So you're considering an overseas trip to get a bunch of continuous training and move things on a bit, but just can't decide where. Not surprising really, adverts are there to sell services, and you can't really be expected to know exactly which questions to ask at this stage to get the correct answers. So read on, we had a truly excellent experience, and if we can help others enjoy anything similar, then the effort of writing this article will be more than adequately repaid.

Tallard Airfield is situated immediately south of Gap, just 200km. up the motorway from Marseilles, and SNCF runs a very frequent service from Marseilles to Gap (pick-up available). Or you can go in via Grenoble, just 100km. away. Indeed, the end of the motorway is immediately under you on a 21 departure. So much for ease of access. If you fancy a longer drive, perhaps to make it more part of the holiday, or because flights are easier for you, then it's about 4 hours drive over the Alps from Turin in Italy via Briançon. Truly beautiful.

Tallard is all about airsports, with nothing else save the odd charter aircraft, with microlights and gyroplanes, light GA and helicopters all over the place. Ground time can be particularly interesting watching the French national freefall team practising. So big is this activity that the area to the west of the field is banned save for 2 Twin Otters, a Pilatus Porter and a giant Beech which continuously lift the parachutists. Interesting though, they do tend to leave via 21 and return on 03, pick up more guys and depart again on 21. Don't worry - your instructor will explain it all to you, and it'll sure sharpen up your observational and look-out skills! But don't go west young man - there could well be a problem with unwanted guests in the cockpit!

The flying is amazing, the scenery superb and the weather reliable. Tallard claims 330 flyable days per year, and by that they appear to mean 330 trainable days per year. A fine distinction? It doesn't seem so fine when you, the early trainee can't fly in the wind, but other more hardened pilots can. It's a major point really, as each lesson is precious, miss just a few for any reason and that licence seems to disappear well into the future. If memory serves me well, a total of 3 individual flights were lost due a mixture of high wind and thermal activity, but that was over a period of 8 days for three trainees, never was there a whole day blown out. The wind was noted by others more familiar with the local weather situation, the Mistral was roaring down the Rhone valley with uncommon ferocity, and it was "interfering badly" with the normally benign micro-climate protected by Pic de Bure just to the North. "Interfering badly" appears to generate a weather induced failure rate of only about 10% of training flights. I wonder how many other locations could make that claim?
So, take 1 ab initio trainee, one about 10 hours into the thing, and an ageing ex-GA pilot wanting to fly trikes. Add Tallard, one Quantum-912, a well seasoned instructor and a clutch of excellent and modestly priced restaurants, including Maison de l'Air on the airfield. Then go flying every day when you're not out sightseeing or having barbeques. Result - vast improvements in flying skills and some enormously good fun. The ab initio could actually control the aeroplane, the 10 hour guy could fly a good approach, and the GA guy was ready for his GFT. Sound good?

But as usual a snag arrived. A detailed check of the Quantum revealed the tiniest of hairline cracks in the exhaust, and the exhaust once removed revealed a 4 inch split in the back. Worst fears to the fore, just how long would it take to get a replacement from the UK? How much flying would be lost? GFT just round the corner as well! 50 minutes later it was back on the aircraft and successfully tested. Turned out that the young lady some of us had been admiring was an expert welder of aviation materials. When not building paramotors she fixes broken trikes! So much for the engineering backup questions that might reasonably be asked. In any case I think they make Pilatus Porters in the hangar at the end of the taxiway - so I guess help might have been available from there as well.

A wee bit more polish on the flying and it's GFT time with Marcus Dalgetty as Examiner. 105 minutes of proving you really can do it, all the way, end-to-end and all hooked up. Culminates in the fabulous words "I think we've probed far enough - that's a pass". It felt a bit more of a pasting than a pass, but it probably had something to do with the potentially atavistic nature of older GA pilots. So thanks Marcus, for being so thorough and persistent. Then of course it's off for a celebratory dinner in le Domain de Grands Chenes. Give them a call as they get booked up, but any wait is worth it, and a good deal less expensive than you might expect for that level of service and quality. Their poster is in the entranceway to the accommodation (Residenciel), (which is itself less than a minute's walk from the hangar). There's plenty of good eating options in the village just 5 minutes by car (la Cigalle, le Chateau, le Marseillese), but le Domain de Grands Chenes was by far the best all round, and surely the best value we experienced.

And the next day dawned in true Tallard fashion, sun shining, fluffy fair weather cumulus and still air. Time for the shiny new trike pilot to enjoy a solo flight over Ceuse at 8,600ft., clad not in thermal gear with bar mitts, but a pair of shorts and short sleeved shirt. Amazing experience, quite a contrast. Smooth touchdown to hand the aircraft to the newly arrived Instructor, Colin Gordon. And the rest of the period was conducted on a hot-seat basis between instructors, with a very great deal of flying being done and solid progress made by all.

To bring it all together - the advanced trainee was now qualified, the 10 hour guy was conducting flights end-to-end with some tolerable landings and the (as was) ab initio was getting ready to enter the circuit. Not bad I think in a total of 8 days.

So glad we did this, progress was swift and solid with no loss of continuity, the instruction was great and the socialising a great compliment to the flying. There was a clearly palpable sense of the licence getting closer on a daily basis, every day! Minor problems did arise, but were swiftly resolved. Weather was never more than a minor irritant, despite determined attempts by the Mistral.

Will we do it again? Yes. Advanced training on high and difficult mountain strips, summer or winter flying in the high Alps, convenient transport and accommodation, to say nothing of great French food, and most of all - solid and reliable weather.

With all of this, plus back in the UK, a 3 runway layout, 5 Instructors plus 2 resident Examiners (including Radio), 2 Quantums, 2 Quiks and the new GT-450, AlpineVol has got it right!!