All Is Well In Paris

The opportunity came along recently to trade one of my Caribbean trips for a Paris trip. Not having been there in almost a year and thoroughly enjoying my previous visits to the city, I made the trade.

Departure from DFW is in the late afternoon with an arrival in Paris the following morning.


All loaded up and ready to taxi...get that MD80 out of the way!! We had a mission to accomplish! (they probably did too)

Takeoff weight this day was close to 400,000 lbs. Every seat had an occupant. Our liftoff speed was close to 170 knots with a climb speed of 330 knots above 10,000 ft.
Not a problem for the Boeing and it's General Electric powerplants.

Before long we were pointed Northeast and cruising at 33,000 ft under clear skies as the sun was setting in the West. In just a few hours we would be staring a sunrise in the face and putting up our sun visors.

Paris in the summer seems to bring out the crowds. I don't know if I have ever seen the city quite so busy.

The French have an excellent idea at work in Paris. Bikes for rent. You can rent a bike from a multitude of locations throughout the city. All you need is a credit card and off you go. Then you can drop off your bike at any of those locations....you don't have to go back to where you rented it. What a great concept. And they are relatively inexpensive also. I intend to try it someday.

Naturally I had to visit the cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris. Always an impressive sight.Then a walk through the Latin Quarter.



Kind of busy today.

Is that lady picking her nose?





So then back to the hotel for some rest. The next morning our crew of 13 was up early for the leg back to DFW. Departure from Paris is before Noon with a mid-afternoon arrival time in Texas.

Charles de Gaulle airport is a very busy place. But there's always something interesting to see. Look at this Air France A320 in retro colors.

Next up was this Air France B-747-400 and then it was our turn.

The headwinds were brutal this day. The leg took just over 11 hours. Our individual rest breaks were extra long and allowed for a nap and a movie!

All is well in Paris.

Next up, a trip to the 49th state.



For a look at some more of my photos, please aviate over to Plane & Simple.

Caracas Re-Visited

It's been a while since my last post. A multitude of issues have kept me busy of late.

Recurrent training came and went uneventfully and the summertime line flying is just as busy as ever.

It has been almost one year since I moved over to 767 / 757 international flying and the change has been well worth it. I should have done it sooner. The MD-80 is a worthy machine but I sure don't miss it.

A recent trip took me back to Caracas, Venezuela. As you may recall, the ATC service there is rather slow and the local workers have an affinity for sitting around and doing the minimum required of them. Sometimes they seem to do even less.

The inbound leg went without a hitch. Maybe it was because our arrival time was at 11:00 PM at night. After leaving Curacao's airspace we contacted Maiquetia Control and were promptly cleared directly to the outer marker for runway 10. A maximum gross weight landing with autobrakes and full reverse had us stopped with plenty of room leftover. A smooth trip through Customs and Immigration and off to the hotel
we went.

The smoothness continued the next morning. We sailed right through the three (yes three!) security checkpoints and arrived at our gate to find our inbound flight from Miami had arrived early.

No maintenance issues today so we were all set to launch for Miami.

Our call for clearance from ATC was almost immediately answered with "cleared as filed". That was amazing....what has happened here? Has Caracas ATC joined the rest of the world with their efficiency? Hope so.

Next up was to get all our passengers and their luggage on board, and the door shut for an on time departure. Would it be possible? Amazingly, yes. In fact we pushed back a few minutes early and we given a prompt clearance to taxi to runway 28.

Along the way we spotted a Cubana Ilyushin Il 62. We don't see these Russian planes very often. Very interesting! Click on the photo to get a larger view and you can see that this airliner has a tailwheel.


A takeoff from runway 28 and a turn to the north and we were on our way.

I could soon smell our crew meals cooking in the galley. Or was that the smell from the lavatory?



Not long after takeoff we passed over the Dutch island of Bonaire in the Lesser Antilles. Supposed to be some great diving there I hear.


Two hours later the gear was down with full flaps on final approach to runway 9 at Miami. An approaching thunderstorm was threatening but we made it just in time.

This visit to Caracas went quite well. No issues and no complaints. Let's hope it continues this way in the future.