Recce between Christchurch and Calshot

Hi All

I went for a recce along the coast between Christchurch and Calshot this afternoon.

There is a very quiet little car park near Barton, 50.733, -1.627, there is a path that goes out to the cliffs, I can’t walk that far due to my peripheral neuropathy. So I didn’t explore this any further.

I then went to Keyhaven, 50.722, -1.568, there is a car park there which is free for disabled badge holders, which I have. So I got my little mobility scooter out of the back of the car and went for a ride.

This is a NATS image, I went out along the gravel path to the T junction roughly in the middle of the image. I would have flown but the wind was just too high, 20mph or more, but it would have made a good place to fly from, especially on a weekday when the kids are at school, but even today i would have flown if the wind had been favourable.

These were a couple of stills with my M6.

I then went on to Lymington and went to the IOW ferry car park, 50.759, -1.530, if you could find a quiet spot I’m sure you could fly from there somewhere. I know @OzoneVibe has flown form Lymington somewhere.

I then moved on to Calshot Beach, 50.812, -1.312, where there is also a car park with free parking for badge holders. I could have flown from the car park today, but again would be better when the kids are at school.

This is the NATS image for the location, it’s just on the edge of Southampton airport class D zone. There is a castle and what looks like a light house at the end, there are further parking spaces available, but not sure of the cost.

I found no signs mentioning the flight of drones at any of these locations and they are all clear of any flight restrictions according to NATS, there are some nature reserves near them but none of the signage was forbiding drones.

All in all it was a nice afternoon out even though I didn’t get to fly, one bonus was finding a classic car restorers and seller, they had 2 MGA’s like I had in my early twenties, couldn’t believe the price of them, one was £35,000. They bought back some nice memories though.

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You should also have checked out the car-park @ Lepe Beach. Very pleasant café there, too.

There’s a nice café at the Calshot Activity Centre that’s open to the public, with sunny terrace to watch all the boats going in to / out of Southampaton.

@OzoneVibe
Just looked on Google at Lepe Beach, it looks another nice spot, have you flown from there?
I drove up to where the activity centre is at Calshot but didn’t realise it was open to the public, I’ll have a look there next time I go, which won’t be too long away, a nice calm day when the kids are back at school.
I was also thinking of flying over what used to be Fawley refinery, but I think it is in the class D zone. Are we legally allowed to fly in a class D zone?

“used to be”? It still is! And the largest in the UK.

It’s also 4km from Calshot to fly from there, it’s well fenced off, too. Not sure of anywhere closer to take off from.

I think it’s somewhere I wouldn’t fly without their permission.

I do have a Litchi Mission ready to fly up Southampton Water from Calshot, to get view of the terminal and tanker ships. But that’s about the limit of range and for a really calm day.

Below 400ft is allowed in Class D.

@OzoneVibe
That’s a great video, from Lepe Beach over to the IOW, I liked the way you speeded it up with the music too, that obviously lets you know it is speeded up.
I looked at Fawley form Google’s satelite images and tought it was closed, no ships and no sign of any activity. I’ve visited many refineries as I used to work on tankers as Chief Engineer and there was always some sort of activety going on, ships or tanker lorries etc. I agree however about not flying over without their permission, they may see it as a threat if they didn’t know about it.
I would like to see your Litchi Mission going up Southampton water when its done, Is Litchi only for IOS or does it work on android as well?

Both.

@OzoneVibe Thanks
I just found it on the Play Store, I think I’m confusing it with some editing software that is only available for IOS

I thought it was Lord Nelson that was reported as saying “I see no ships!”. :wink:

Great info, thanks for sharing :+1:t2:

@PingSpike
Yeah I did a bit of planning with Google maps before I went, and copied down the lat/long info as I could just feed that into my satnav, and put it on the post so others can find the places also.

@OzoneVibe
Yeah ok my mistake. Horrible places to go on a ship though, if you wanted to go ashore you usually had to walk through the refinery to get to the gate, and even then in many places there was nothing there. Fawley at least seems to have some life going on just outsidde the gate.

I quite liked this shot at Keyhaven

I will put it on non drone photos as well

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