Jacquie had purchased GJACS new in 1997 and wanted to fly to Tenerife. It was a trip I had done before albeit in a faster Bellanca Super Viking and to Gran Canaria not Tenerife. We departed Fowlmere and arrived in Biarritz later that day. The weather deteriorated and the next day we hopped across to San Sebastian to get away from the low cloud and drizzle in Biarritz.
It was a restless night in San Sebastian due to a pneumatic drill which started around midnight and continued until around 0500hrs! Departing San Sebastian, climbing to FL100 we began to accumulate very ‘light’ Rime ice as we passed FL090 and we decided to continue to FL120 which resulted in just being ‘on top’ and after a short while the ice melted and we continued to Seville.
After refuelling we departed Seville for Casablanca again filing FL100 but now in the sunshine and blue sky. Casablanca was hot and hazy and after refuelling (which included draining a significant amount of water from the tank drains!) we jumped in a taxi. This was a taxi with a serious ‘knocking’ sound coming from the front nearside driveshaft and it made me think it was far more dangerous than flying!
We chose The Swiss Hotel for our overnight stay and I remember Jacquie calling out after entering her room as a member of staff was asleep in the bed! Subsequently she called out again after having turned on the bath and some very brown water was pouring out of the tap!
Next day we left for Lanzarote, despite climbing to FL100 we lost radio contact after about 50nm out from the coast and relayed our position and ETA through a Thompson Flight. Lanzarote ATC parked us some distance from the Tower but were kind enough to send a van to transport us for flight planning, customs etc and we were airborne again after about an hour, bound for Tenerife(North).
Tenerife was windy but sunny and it was great to have the use of Jacquie’s mother in law’s house which was spacious and had a pool. It had been about 14hrs flying over 4 days and I completed the visitors book with a diagram of our route and some comments. Jacquie introduced me to The Shack. This establishment was about the size of a telephone kiosk and did not have a ‘menu’ you just specified ‘fish’ or ‘meat’ off the bar b q. It was excellent. There was also a fridge full of empty coke bottles and a vat of red wine on the counter. You simply filled the coke bottle and a ‘first’ for me was to drink cold red wine.
We gave ourselves a day off and then prepared for the return leg which was a reversal to Casablanca but then to Malaga, overnight stay and then northwards. The trip back to Casablanca was uneventful and we refuelled and were airborne within an hour.
As we passed Tangiers it was obvious there was some weather ahead and since this included CBs and it was a hot afternoon we descended to 3000QNH and then 1500QNH for the approach into Malaga. It was during the last 20nm that I saw something I have only since seen a couple of times, lightning streaking down and appearing to hit the sea! It made us both ‘jump’ and we were relieved when ATC said we could fly any heading to join the circuit for a visual approach. It was quite ‘bumpy’ and the subsequent thunderstorm continued well into the night.
Next day the weather around Madrid comprised of thunderstorms so we routed to Valencia and ended up staying the night. I remember Jacquie demanding a hotel with a swimming pool and we ended up several miles out of town finding one!
In the morning, we routed east of the Pyrenees to keep out of the weather and got home a day later than planned.
The Archer performed faultlessly and our total flying time was approx 30hrs. 10hrs of this was IFR and usually at FL100. At that time GJACS had a KLN89B GPS which was so useful compared to my previous visit whereby we had no GPS, and the STEC55 proved invaluable and I recall it only disengaged once in quite unpleasant turbulence but otherwise was a great asset.