lsed

+1 for Santos Dumont

Took a video on take off and it was just stunning.

Why didn't I take a window seat when flying into Nice, seems like I have to make another trip to Monaco!

San Gottardo

I agree in principle. And I cannot get distracted by any pleasure (IFE or other) or work on a day with clear sky overflying the Alps, the Grand Canyon, Indonesian volcanoes or a city like Istanbul or Venice. I can even remember long-haul flights where I was watching outside during the entire flight, for instance a routing of Paris-Alps-Torino-along the Italian West Coast-Sicily-Crete-Alexandria-Cairo with the pyramids-Nile valley-Red Sea-Riyadh-Doha.

But when you are on a 12 hour trip from Europe to California and all you have for hours are clouds below the plane and below the clouds there would only be the grey Atlantic Ocean to see then you suddenly care less about lowering that window shade and watching a good movie, doing some reading or just sleeping.

Let's see how many true "out of the window spotters" we have: who has ever seen a cargo ship in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean (>1 hour away from the continental shorelines) during a TATL flight? I have seen one, once. Of course by pure coincidence, because I just don't stare at the Atlantic for hours. If you can say that you have seen a ship in the middle of the Atlantic on more than 20% of your TATL flights then you are a true "window spotter", because you need to look out a lot during a very long time to happen to see one.

orbitmic

I have a few times, but as you rightly point out, sadly, the Atlantic ocean on North Atlantic routes (the ones I take most often on transatlantic) is very often too cloudy to see anything below. Still, I do try, and only begrudgingly accept to lower that blind when it is too cloudy to see anything out because i can feel the angry eyes of my fellow travellers! That said, I'm not sure that being a "window spotter" means that you need to be looking out of the window all the time, just like you can love food without necessarily eating anything any time! I typically keep an eye on the flight map and strategically choose when to look out. I will always do so when flying over big or scenic cities be they London, Nice, Paris, Venice, Geneva, Istanbul, Tbilisi, Marseille, or Chicago, always when flying over beautiful stretches of coast (eg the whole Mediterranean cost from Nice to Barcelona, the whole Adriatic coast, across the channel, or whenever flying over islands of all types), and then a bit of the rest (lakes, mountains, desert, ocean, places I don't remember having flown above, etc). I do also enjoy a good film and I do try and sleep whenever I can for a few hours, I think on planes too and of course whenever I'm not travelling alone, spending time with a loved one is a crucial treat too. Some landscapes are more beautiful than others and I guess we all have our 'soft spots' - mine are predominantly cities and islands but I get a bit bored by agricultural fields! So love aerial views but a fanatical approach would not be for me any more about that than about anything else!

NickB

Indeed although, imo, it is not so much the approach to the airport per se but generally the views of the region in general. Something slightly similar is the view over Capetown when you are lucky enough to have a flight that goes over the Atlantic to turn and come back to land on the Southern runway: the final approach to CPT itself is nothing special but the views over the bay of Capetown, the city with the mountains behind is superb.

In the broad KTM area, two airports which I have not personally experienced but which I am surprised not to find in there are Lukla and Paro.

Indeed. While more straightforward, the mountains around UIO make for a beautiful approach there too, at any rate among the relatively larger airports serving populous urban areas.

In a totally different genre, the endless approach to GRU (depending on the approach followed) where you wonder whether there will ever be a gap in the urban tissue is quite interesting in its own way.

San Gottardo

All those were on my list as well ;-) Plus some others: Medellin (but the old downtown airport, not the new Rio Negro one), La Paz, Cochabamba, Sucre, Tegucigalpa, San Francisco, Vancouver, Juneau, Anchorage, Dutch Harbor in the Americas. Lugano, Samedan and Bolzano in the Alps (I seriously think about taking this flight), Geneva when flying the approach from the South-East which lets you hug the Mont Blanc, some of the Greek Islands (Skiathos, Kastelorizo), Istanbul after some holding patterns over the Black Sea to then fly back over the Bosphurus and the city, Beirut approaching from the North, Leh in the Himalayas, Tioman in Malaysia. And one of the most dramatic both from a scenery and piloting skills point of view: Linzhi in Tibet. Never been, but I'd go just for the landing.

Interesting to note that Paris CDG has departures that are much more scenic than arrivals. Many departures on runway 26R make a sharp right turn and overfly downtown Paris. Planes are still low, and for instance I find it easy to spot the building where I live (it's close to an easily recognizable spot anyway).

bodory

Right turn? I would have said left.

I can also spot my building with such a path.

NickB

uhh, yes you are right! It is the 08s and 09s where Paris would be on the right.

jsfr

DCA, IST, SYD, NCE and PAR definitely! Kai Tak beat them all (before it closed). What about SIN - flying in over the bay with all of those ships is impressive. The best of all (less common southern hemisphere airports) has to be Hamilton Island (HTI), Queenstown (ZQN) and Denpasar if you're sitting on the right side pf the plane. GVA in Summer is nice as well diving down over the Jura, turning right and flying along the lake with a great view of the fountain and the alps.

Best view ever was half way from Frankfurt to Washington on a northerly route, opened the window to discover Greenland in all its beauty. I just had to take a photo, next thing I knew the enire Business class cabin was taking photos out of both sides of the plane, it was really amazing....

(BTW - Great thread!)

San Gottardo

Err, yes... you are of course right. I mean left. Well, I mean left is right. (Monty Python "Clockwise" anyone?)

bodory

All right then

nicolas75

It is true that take-off and airport approach of Santos Dumont is very nice.

I am not a big fan of London City (actually do prefer LHR as most of the time there is a lot of traffic and we need to fly around London : superb panorama of London when the weather is clear). Same story some years ago when GVA airport had heavy traffic (view over the Alps was really great).

I like also very much take off at Lisbon airport (beautiful view over the bay and bridge). Not so nice when landing.

I am also very impressed when landing in massive metropole like Bogota with long approach over the city before actually landing.

Well, I must say also that landing at CDG is always a pleasure for me when the sun sets and the Eiffel tower is illuminated: simply superb.
The only downside of the story is: oh, this is where I live. Why not landing on Champ de Mars rather than flying to CDG and having to come back after .

CharAp

SBH is beautiful and often heart stopping on finl approach. LCY if you come in over London is incredible, but maybe that's because I'm a Londoner.


Last 12 months - LHR, LGW, LCY, FAO, STR, PMI, AGP, LIS, DEL, ANU, SBH, AXA

HasteFlier

I agree that NCE has a very beautiful approach, though I far prefer the one from the east !

I have great memories of a few other similarly situated airports - Entebbe and the approach over lake Victoria comes to mind, though I was less impressed the last time I landed there.
Some mountain airports can be pretty impressive as well ! I like Cusco a lot, and I have half-scared, half-impressed memories of Piás, a small mine airfield in the northern andes of Peru, at the bottom of a valley with very strong winds !

Cupart

My top 5 list...

SXM - Love the view of the tiny islands surroundings Saint Martin (from above) scattered in the turquoise waters after a good 8 hours flight from CDG.

SBH - As getting/landing here really makes you feel like you're flying, and nothing beats the landing "view" of Eden Rock at St Jean through the cockpit window.

SPB - Charlotte Amalie Harbor Seaplane Base in the USVI. Spectacular views of the city of Charlotte Amalie upon approch from SSB (it also helps that it's a seaplane )

GVA - Lac Leman and the mountains what else can I say...

FBU - Now closed and replaced by the horrible OSL, but used to be one of my all time favorites. Spectacular approach and almost felt like landing on water.

UStravelfan

Very vivid memory of a JFK approach on a BA Concorde in May 2003, flying over Verrazano Bridge and the straight, thNew York bay with downtown Manhattan. Will never forget that.