MAN 18th July 2021 - HiFly A330-900 CS-TKY and SAS CRJ900 ES-ACK

 A couple of movements worthy of photographing on a lovely sunny evening, HiFly A330-900 Neo CS-TKY was arriving from Birmingham to operate the PIA Pakistan International service to Lahore ....

whilst Xfly CRJ900 ES-ACK was operating the evening SAS Stockholm service albeit sadly running around 45 minutes later than scheduled meaning the sun had weakened a little. The CRJ is one of a few now sporting the new SAS colour scheme.

Chester / Hawarden 14th June 2021 - Airbus Beluga XL F-GXLI

 A nice sunny morning and an en-route A330-700 Beluga XL tempted us over to Chester / Hawarden for the first time in a few years. I had been waiting for the chance since the XL version entered service quite some time ago!

F-GXLI seen here about to land on runway 04 late morning.

MAN 7th July 2021 - Air Baltic A220-300 YL-CSL

 Making its second visit on the airline's new Riga service, A220-300 YL-CSL wears this great "Latvian Flag" scheme, seen here taxiing past the Viewing Park after landing on 23R

6th July 2021 - St Athan, Cardiff, Kemble & Brize Norton day trip.

 A run out to catch the two Air Mauritius A319s that had recently arrived at Kemble saw us visiting a few extra airfields along the way.

We left home just after 4am and made our way straight to St Athan to catch up with a few airliner frames before the axe man had his way with them. Twenty seven numbers were logged including a few inmates at the museum which I hadn't previously visited. Nothing was worth photographing due to positions or schemes, a lot of the stored airliners were lacking any colours!

We then moved on for a quick stop at Cardiff however on hearing that there was an Air Zena (Georgia) CRJ200 due in with a football team we decided to hang around for the arrival to grab some shots. 4L-TGB duly arrived just after 11am.

We headed on to Kemble, arriving there just after 1pm and managed some fairly decent shots of the Mauritian 319s 3B-NBF and 3B-NBH. 

Kemble added only nine numbers this time around but the above certainly made the visit worthwhile!

We headed home via a quick stop at Brize Norton where another nine military transports bolstered the numbers in the book making a total of forty seven for the day, not a bad haul!

London Trip - June 2021

 June 8th to the 11th - London Trip

As we had a few days off together, Ash and I decided on a trip down south as there were a few movements at Heathrow we still had to catch up on.

June 8th

We headed down in the early hours and spent the full day at Heathrow catching the following arrivals on 27 Left.

Great to catch the Rwandair A330-200 9XR-WN to go with the A330-300 we caught last year.

Our first time catching an Aegean A321 Neo with SX-NAB

With little else of interest due for the rest of the afternoon we headed off for some food and early night, eighteen new numbers added to the log book.

June 9th 

Up early and a few shots grabbed from the north side of the approach before the sun moved around ...

Air India's B787-8 VT-ANP wearing the special "Mahatma Gandhi" tail

Finally managed to catch Gulf Air's great looking "Retro" B787-9 A9C-FG!

Longtail Aviation B747-400 Freighter VQ-BWT operating a cargo charter.

Etihad B787-10 A6-BMI wears small titles and logos as an "Eco Demonstrator"

A quick run around to the south side of the approach to catch Air China's B777-300 B-2032 in Star Alliance colours.... 

before heading over the Esso Garage to catch Air India B787-8 VT-ANP ....

...... and Gulf Air B787-9 A9C-FG departing.

Aeroflot's latest A350-900 VQ-BFZ arriving in the sunshine, nice to catch after all my dull shots of sister ship VQ-BFY at MAN!

US Air Force C17 00-0175 arriving in connection with the visit of the US President the following weekend.

Only thirteen more numbers logged at Heathrow for the day but at least we managed to catch a few required photos.

June 10th

Sadly this morning was very dull and murky, Air China's Star Alliance A350-900 B-308M looking rather awful with the lack of sun!

The only bright patch this morning coincided with the arrival of Blue Air's B737-MAX8 YR-MXA

TAP's great looking Retro Jet CS-TJR looking rather grey against the dull sky too

As there was so little else of interest for the day we decided on a run down to Bournemouth in the hope of obtaining a shot of one of the European Cargo A340-600s and a few extra numbers for the log book. The journey down only taking an hour and being well worth the effort despite the grey skies. Two A340-600s snapped in the shape of 9H-PPE and G-ECLB and sixteen numbers noted,

Back to Heathrow via a quick stop at Farnborough where we logged another fifteen Biz Jets.

LHR added another seventeen numbers today which included a few decent gap fillers.

June 11th

Another very dull and drab morning but we had to make an early get up to catch our first Vistara B787-9 when VT-TSD arrived,

along with United Airlines' first B767-300 (N674UA) to wear their latest colours

Once again, we had a very long spell with little of interest so we decided to run over to the Brooklands Museum, somewhere I had wanted to visit for many years. Luckily the sun made an appearance while I was walking around allowing better shots of the exhibits.

G-BBDG, my second to last Concorde frame, this leaves me needing only G-BSST which is on display at the Yeovilton Museum!

Back to Heathrow for a couple of hours to await the arrival of the afternoon's star visitor ...

AZAL Azerbaijan Airlines' B757-200 4K-AZ11, a rather rare aircraft to see in the UK these days, arriving on 27 Left just after 15.30.

We departed Heathrow just after the AZAL arrival and made it back home just after 7pm. 

A very enjoyable four days with plenty of variety and a good volume of new numbers.