Scenic places to fly tubeliners in P3D

[IAhawkeyeDDS 158]

Kai Tak is great….  Does anyone know is there a way to get AI traffic to use Kai Tak?

[Ikarus280 93]

WOW! 

Thanks for the suggestions guys, definitely a lot of interesting places mentioned. Will check them out in the weekend.

Feels great to get out of the same boring commuter routes and finally enjoy other parts that the world has to offer as in the sim we're not confined to just one airline like in real life. 

[SimeonWilbury 220]

11 hours ago, IAhawkeyeDDS said:

Kai Tak is great….  Does anyone know is there a way to get AI traffic to use Kai Tak?

Back when I used AI Traffic in FSX I used a utility called AI Flight Planner to edit all the flight plans that came with my Traffic Addon to replace VHHH with VHHX, it was able to do them all at once which helped. It's been a good few years since I did it so I can't quite remember the process, but it should be possible assuming said utility is compatible with v5.

[Ikarus280 93]

i'm currently in the air, flying an Avianca MD-83 flight from Bogota to St. Martin with a stopover in Cartagena. The part from Cartagena to St Martin is a "virtual" charter of course.

Me being ready to fly loads of flights in both South America and North, I bought ORBX openLC for both continents. And to my surprise the scenery was much better looking than MSFS. There was absolutely no blurries at all and all ground textures loaded super crisp throughout the flight. With AS3PD, envtex and envshade, everything just looked so much better than what I had with MSFS! (In MSFS, it was very blurry until approach at lower altitudes). The approach to Cartagena was an interesting one, and now I am in the air on the way to TNCM. 

Not to mention the detail of the Maddog X, with functioning ACARS and EFB making multi-legs a breeze. No need to open any loading/fuel managers as you can do all your flight planning for legs in advance and just load them from the EFB, letting GSX do the refuelling for you. 

Looking forward to my flights in the US after having explored South America. And then back to Europe for some time. 

 

[Tim_Capps 474]

A lot of great suggestions. But South American scenery is the best-kept secret in P3D. There are tons of very atmospheric, adventurous airports to be had at bargain prices, from Ushuaia in the southern tip (best experienced in driving snow on FD with CS 737-200 with Total Overhaul Mod from avsim.su) to Cartegena in the north. Columbia is covered like a blanket. Then there's Central America and the whole Caribbean basin, too. Some of those jungle airports won't support a heavy, but they're a lot of fun. The airports are not always quite up to bigger dev standards, but not shabby, either.

Kai Tak remains unsurpassed.

The Med offers very dramatic cliffs at Palermo, and there's Catania on the east coast of Sicily overshadowed by Mt. Etna. I was really impressed by FSG's Alicante--lots of surrounding countryside in detail. LEPA has always been a favorite. Really, most of the traditional "spade and bucket brigade" holiday spots are scenic.

Corfu and Samos are Aegean standouts and provide interesting challenges.

I really like UK2000's Luton EGGW for English countryside with ORBX... beautiful little airport in a lovely setting avoiding monster EGLL. Not dramatic, but always very pretty. Great for 737 or Airbus flights, but also home to one of the more colorful (literally) British airlines: Court. I have a rainbow of fresh fruit Court colors for BAC One Elevens and L1011s that they operated. Quite an operation detailed in a rare insider's non-whitewashed, non culturally-sanitized look called "Colours in the Sky," which is one of my favorite aviation books. But (as usual) I digress.

You can get some cool approaches from Lake Michigan into Chicago airports (I prefer KMDW to KORD) if you have the city scenery. Same with River Visual 19 at KDCA with city scenery. Burbank doesn't usually come to mind as a tubeliner airport, but there's some great scenery around Bob Hope that takes you right into Hollywood with a wide area and an excellent little airport that is still fine for a 737. (I've used it with bigger.) That's a real gem. Monterey, CA is another scenic area, with landmarks like the Pebble Beach golf course and Lone Cyprus included. Yes, these are all tubeliner airports, too, just smaller.

A long time ago someone came up with a PDF called World's 100 Busiest Airports. You fly from one to the next until you have them all covered. The routes might be dated by now, and the "busy-ness" has undoubtedly changed, but I recommend it as a fun cure for "where do I fly today?"

[Patco Lch 1,480]

I love to google the places I fly to and read up on the local culture and look at some photos and videos. Back to Quinto the city was built by the Spaniards in the 1500 s and much of the architecture is Middle Ages European. Around 10000’ MSL seems you would have to have lungs the size of basketballs to function at those elevations. 

For those of us who don’t get out of the hood much physically can go anywhere with the internet and P3DV5:)

[SimeonWilbury 220]

2 hours ago, Tim_Capps said:

A lot of great suggestions. But South American scenery is the best-kept secret in P3D. There are tons of very atmospheric, adventurous airports to be had at bargain prices, from Ushuaia in the southern tip (best experienced in driving snow on FD with CS 737-200 with Total Overhaul Mod from avsim.su) to Cartegena in the north. Columbia is covered like a blanket. Then there's Central America and the whole Caribbean basin, too. Some of those jungle airports won't support a heavy, but they're a lot of fun. The airports are not always quite up to bigger dev standards, but not shabby, either.

Do you have any Cargo-specific recommendations for South America? Quito is definitely on my list but wondering if there are any other airports that'll take 747s you'd recommend.

[Patco Lch 1,480]

39 minutes ago, SimeonWilbury said:

Do you have any Cargo-specific recommendations for South America? Quito is definitely on my list but wondering if there are any other airports that'll take 747s you'd recommend.

Pull up FlightAware and follow Atlas Air. Constant 747-400F and -8F flights from KMIA to places such as Santiago (SCEL), Bogota, (SKBO), Sao Paulo and Buenos Aires as well as flights across SA between these cities.  I love the Andes:)

[Tim_Capps 474]

1 hour ago, SimeonWilbury said:

Do you have any Cargo-specific recommendations for South America?

Viracopos SBKP by Paulo Ricardo. Anything he does for Brazil is great--real labors of love with tons of area around the airport. Bargains, too. And Paulo is a good guy. Viracopos has been eclipsed as Sao Paolo's main airport, but has been largely repurposed for cargo. Guarulhos is also a big freight airport near Sao Paulo, and both El Dorado in Bogata and Quito handle a lot of freight. All have nice third-party airports. Not sure Jorge Newberry SABE in Buenos Aires handles 747s. Might be a tight squeeze 🙂 But it's a major capital, so you'd think.

[F737MAX 5,738]

53 minutes ago, Tim_Capps said:

Not sure Jorge Newberry SABE in Buenos Aires handles 747s

However, SAEZ - B.A. Ezeiza does. (TropicalSim)

Other South American, big city airports with cargo ops:

SBGL - Rio-Galeao (TropicalSim)
SBGR - Sao Paulo-Guarulhos (Paulo Ricardo or TropicalSim)
SCEL - Santiago de Chile (LatinVFR)
SEQM - Quito-Mariscal Sucre (Flightbeam)
SKBO - Bogota (PKSim)
SPIM - Lima (PKSim)

[him225 51]

Recent VGHS in pbr is pretty good looking and detail, it sees fair amount of cargo movements.