In my exploration of the St Marten area, I came to a tiny desert island which has a delicious French name , île Tintamarre, which means Hullabaloo island.  It is located a few miles East of TFFG Grande Case. Looking at the ground I saw what would be a very decent strip. Kind of a clearing in the bushes.

What a Porter is made for ? I went for it ! 

There is also some remnants of human activities. So I went to do a little search and bingo!, between 1946 and 1950, it was the home base for a now defunct airline, Compagnie Aérienne Antillaise 😁. Also, the islet is uninhabited now but long ago there was a Dutch guy raising sheep here and exploiting rocks to make quicklime. What we see are long forgotten rail tracks.

 Nice isn't it. 

 

These are the kind of unexpected adventures that make MSFS so good!

Just now, regis9 said:

These are the kind of unexpected adventures that make MSFS so good!

Absolutely. There are a lot of islets which really deserve a look if you are in the low & slow flying. The mesh is lovely.   I always been a sucker for a good mesh. This is an islet north of Anguilla.Nice modelling !

 

One of my flight sim 'projects' is a tour round the Solomons and Philippines to see how many old disused wartime airstrips are still visible on Bing. You can often see these old runways, such as the ones at Pitu, on Morotai. They are still evident, running parallel with the modern concrete runway in the lower right corner.

 

Edited February 6, 20242 yr by Paul K

More on Tintamarre island and the Cie Aérienne Antillaise. A bit of history which is delightful and funny. It is in French but any browser will translate it in English in a snap

DES AVIONS AUX ANTILLES AVANT AIR FRANCE | Montray Kréyol (montraykreyol.org) (Airplanes in the Antilles before Air France)

I am sure there is plenty of stories like this in the Antilles. Maybe our friend @Krakin knows some ?

This sort of reminds me of the early flight simulator adventure books written by Charles Gulick for the  sublogic sims in the late 80’s early 90’s.

Gulick directs the reader to an anomalous scenery feature produced in error in the middle of nowhere in that early basic scenery which he had discovered.

He speculated that as it was possible to fly all around the world in that old sim, although it didn’t actually have any scenery apart from a few select and small areas, that if you just kept flying and kept your eyes peeled you never know what  you might find out there that had been inserted by error. 

Compared to now when we literally do have almost complete world scenery , you never know just what you might find.

Edited February 6, 20242 yr by jon b

This is what the sim is all about IMO, thx for sharing Dominique.

Have a look at Lundy Island in the Bristol channel (there is free scenery for it in .to, cant remember if it even shows in stock msfs), I've landed there irl.

5 hours ago, Dominique_K said:

Nice isn't it.

Yes it is.

Treated myself to the A2A Comanche today and for its first spin, went around Lago Argentino and Perito Moreno Glacier.

Despite usually being a heavy metal driver in the sim, my next set of flights is going to be around the Caribbean. The SLH Designs airport bundle and your screenshots here have convinced me!

I just wish creating even a basic airstrip was easier for those of us with little or no experience. I discovered there was a private airstrip, south east of West Calder near Edinburgh, which was not in the sim. An internet search was inconclusive as to whether it was still in use but I decided to activate it and add runway numbers and a windsock (no buildings or anything else) so I could locate and choose it in future. Took me ages!🤯

 

This is it: Broomhill Farm Airstrip

The pink planes are Latch Farm (left) and RAF Kirknewton, with Edinburgh Airport top right.

 

And my very basic version:

The 'taxiway' below is as it appears in the sim. It leads to the farmhouse (in reality and in-sim). Not sure the dip in the middle is so pronounced!!!

If the trees at the end are at all realistic, I doubt Rwy 23 is actually practical in real life for take offs and landings on 05 are downright risky!

Tried landing on the Tintamarre clearing in a 152.  Caught a wing tip and skidded into some bushes.  Great fun.  Thanks for the location heads up.

Edited February 6, 20242 yr by jjn47

9 hours ago, F737MAX said:

Yes it is.

Treated myself to the A2A Comanche today and for its first spin, went around Lago Argentino and Perito Moreno Glacier.

Despite usually being a heavy metal driver in the sim, my next set of flights is going to be around the Caribbean. The SLH Designs airport bundle and your screenshots here have convinced me!

Even if there are imperfections, overall it is a lovely scenery worth the time . I see a lot a sail and motor boats which are a nice touch but I am not sure they come with WU16.  I have the Mamudesign freeware adding marinas that I would recommend

https://flightsim.to/file/38499/mamudesign-marinas

 

I use FStarter to find small airports to check out. It is so easy to find those small airfields that you though didn't exist.