European Contest Calendars

I am planning on an extended stay in Europe after the World Championships in Spain this July. I hope to attend a few contest scattered about Europe culminating with Julio Isidro's contest in Portugal in September.

I am looking for any information or schedule of contests I might attend. I plan on flying F2A Speed as well as Stunt. The Stunter will be an Original Nobler so as to be eligible for Old Time Stunt, Classic, or F2b whichever is flown. I have visited the FAI website and have their calendar but this does not cover all Local or National events. Catching a Free Flight Contest or so would be good too.

Also any help on cheap accomodations, camping facilities and places to see will be greatly appreciated. Social Security is not very generous so I am trying to make the trip as much on the "Cheap" as possible. I am leasing a car for transportation and will have two months to travel and visit in as much of Europe as my money and time will allow.

Any help from my European friends and Forum visitors will be greatly appreciated.

See Jim Snelson's site: http://www.controllinecentral.com/Calendar.asp

I intended to put all the world's stunt contests in Stunt News, but it was too much to cope with.

Howard, Dave S. & others,

Thanks, the CLC calendar appears to be just what I am looking for. I would like to have some sort of a loose itenerary planned before I go but that will be open to modification after talking with the contestants at the World Champs. It should be fun.

Jim,
What a trip! It should be great fun...Wish I could do it!!!
Best of luck and best wishes. Think of us poor working slobs TRAPPED here...
I haven't been to Spain for nearly 30 years...but, it used to be pretty dangerous to just drive around there. Same with Sicily. Lots of banditos. Maybe it has changed.
Be careful and keep in touch.
Your friend,

Jim, the European Control Line Championships are in late July. Scott Dinger

>.. the European Control Line Championships are in late
>July.

But not this year! Eurochamps alternate with w/champs. Eurochamps (C/L) in odd years, w/champs in even years.

LAST EDITED ON May-04-06 AT 07:55 PM (CST)
 
Jim, you may have to research this one a bit.... The events shown on the FAI calendar are world cup events. Some suggestions for other sources:

UK events: check the CLAPA site, Barton club site and 3 Kings site. I can thoroughly recommend the British Nats, held in late August - FF held there too...

French events: check the FFAM site and the CMBL site.

Links to these and other sites that will have the information you are looking for can be found on Goran Olssons site. Asking around at the w/champs will be useful, I'm sure that you will be invited to many contests.

Hope we get a chance to meet in Spain.

Edit: Howards suggestion above pretty much covers it...

hello Jim,
good to hear from you. Especially since you plan to visit that old fashioned Europe.
I can give you ( almost )all the information you need. Depending on how much time you want to spend in Europe, how much you want to travel around, and what places you want to see. If you want to visit several contests that might require quite some driving. But I think Americans are used to bigger dimensions than what we Europeans call "big".
Let me tell you first: I'll not be at the WCs in Spain, and at this moment I don't know the date of Julio Isidro's contest. So I don't know what your basic plans are. For a rough planning I'll give you some contest dates here, and you can decide what looks interesting for you. Also it depends on what kind of landscape you want to see.
Some dates:
August 5-6 in Southern Germany, F2B
August 12-13 in Belgium, F2A, F2B
August 19-20 in Switzerland, F2B
September 2-3 in Italy, F2A, F2B
September 9-10 in France, F2A, F2B
The longest distance for you from Valladolid would be Belgium, probably two days driving. The most interesting contests would be Switzerland ( F2B only ) and Italy ( F2A and F2B ).
Just contact me at [email protected] and I can give you all information about the contests, the area ( landscape ), accomodation, and place ( map, route ). I can also give you information about free flight contests if you like ( I'll have to find out, but I have some very good friends in this area ).
Also I can give you addresses of modellers if you like to meet some. Anyway, contact the German team manager at the WCs, Uwe Kehnen. I'll inform him about your plans, and he'll give you any possible help.
Good luck with your European trip, claus

Claus,

Thank you for the information. I will contact you by E-mail for further information. The Portugal contest is Sept. 8,9, & 10, the same time as the contest in France. As you can see I will be in Europe for 2 full months. This covers the time of all of the contests you mentioned. This will be a once in a lifetime trip so I wish to see as much of Europe as possible within my rather limited finances. It all comes out of my savings which are far from unlimited. I look forward to our paths crossing again during my trip. I am used to driving almost 60,000 km per year so I look forward to the prospect of driving all over Europe.

Jim,
I have just been trying to finalise my travel arrangements to Valladolid - Attempting to travel from London to VLL, via Ryanair.

Much to my surprise, model aircraft (with IC engines, preumably) are very specifically prohibited by the airline!

This despite that the IATA dangerous goods regs allow the transport of engines on pax aircraft. There are a couple of jokes to this - first the galleys & overhead bins contain more alcohol than any modeller could possibly carry, and surely a fully charged Li-Poly battery would be much more dangerous?