Holiday Idea's . . . . .

[Mikey1050]

Hi all,
Does anyone know of any nice (not too expensive) holiday destinations where I would be able to see some good military aviation action ? It has to be somewhere with good beaches and scenery as the holiday would be with my girlfriend, she enjoys coming with me to bases, but I don't think I could get away with making it an entirely geeky holiday !!!
We went to Lanzarote earlier in the year, and spent some time at Arrecife Airport but all we saw was civvy stuff, although it does have a Military side. Annoyingly while we were on a beach 3 miles away on another day 3 military helos flew in, and two jet fighters (too far away to id). Bad timing !!!
Thanks in advance for any suggestions . . . . .

[ArabJazzie]

Not managed too many family holidays abroad, but did do Gran Canaria and managed a quick visit to the airport during our stay. You will need to look up the spotting guides, but the garage was good for us and you could see some of the planes on poles around the base, but i only caught one Hornet.
Arabest,
Geoff.

[Mikey1050]

Cheers Geoff,
I think I may be expecting too much to find sun sea and sangria along with a busy airbase !!!!! But I will look into Gran Canaria.

[Snoop 95]

Sardinia has sun, sea and Decimomannu. Used to be a busy NATO training base but still used by various Air Forces according to Scramble: http://www.scramble.nl/airfield-guide/decimomannu

[Mikey1050]

Interesting, I remember that used to be a very busy base many years ago.
Struggling to find out much information about it right now. Definitely an option though - Cheers Snoop.

[Bushpilot]

Lossiemouth? beaches and scenery

[Agent K]

San Diego! Go every few years, loads of airfields and aviation variety, great beach on Coronado Island.

[slogen51]

Greek islands can be reasonable

I stayed at Zante a few years back and you see quite a few practice approaches over the beach especially by T-6 Texans

Also Crete is quite good - I got the bus to charnia and logged quite a few F-16 from the civil side

Over in the Balearics, Palma can turn up various unexpected types but it does help if you also take civil aircraft

[eagle driver]

Lossiemouth? beaches and scenery

Definetly not recommended if your thinking of camping .
Spent a weekend up there once when a friend of mine was passing out after completing his Buccaneer navigator,s course came out of officers mess to find it was blowing a hoolie ,returned to campsite to find tent wrecked ,
And this was in July .

[SpilsbyPete]

Have a look at my thread on Gando

[ChrisCwmbran]

A couple of times we have spent a week staying at Tattershall Lakes Water Park, right by RAF Coningsby. It was quite nice in the hot tub taking photos of the Typhoons as they came in to land!

Plenty for the kids to do there....and also plenty to see in the surrounding area!

[Thunder]

As nice as it can be, I would be very cautious if thinking of holidaying and spotting in Greece or Turkey.

An extract taken from the law book in Greece.....

"All sites that contain Military facilities, including Military Airfields, Barracks and Ports are under law not to be approached or photographed and are strictly off limits to the general public"

Therefore even to stop and watch aircraft conducting circuits/approaches/taking off etc....., is a criminal offence. You also have to remember that the Greek locals have grown up with these laws and abide them and they don't understand our hobby, so if they see you photographing or watching the base they will more than likely contact the authorities(same as us if we saw someone breaking our laws). Also as of March next year you can forget about your EU rights and so on, which kind of protect you if you just so happen to get arrested.

Spain, France and Italy would be your best bet.

[Bushpilot]

On a more serious note from my last post, if your budget will stretch to it, Las Vegas has McCarron airport near the city centre and Nellis a few miles out of town. I'm sure the other half could be persuaded that the MGM Grand pool complex is as good as a beach - and you might even win the cost of the trip in one of the casinos.

[DeanW]

Get yourself a cheap flight to Marseille, then pop up the road for some Mirage 2000s at Orange.

[Doughnut]

Sadly the C-124 was scraped many years ago

[slogen51]

Las Vegas gets my vote - aviation heaven and plenty to do - Grand Canyon only a 4 hour drive away

Does you partner like Barry manilow - he is in residence?

[Supra]

Edited...Does you partner like Barry manilow - he is in residence?

Talking of criminal offences...That's Threatening Behaviour nee' Assault in any Country!!
OP. is looking for a Holiday.. not Divorce?

[Blackcat1]

Mach Loop even if it's just for the hotels & pubs ;-).

[Stroudy]

As Thunder says, be very careful in Greece especially. A friend and I were held by civilian police and air force authorities outside an air base in Greece simply for sitting near the approach to watch landing NATO aircraft on exercise. All of the camera equipment was purposely bagged up and locked in the boot as it's just a no-no to take pictures of military aircraft there from outside a base. No arrests were made but they held us by the car for an hour whilst they took our passports to check them out. All ended ok in the end as we had the correct paperwork and we were there for a media day the following morning, but it would have been very different I'm sure if we were just there on holiday and had the camera equipment in the car and taking pictures.

Don't forget they are still technically at war with Turkey (and vice versa) and any activity like this outside air bases will usually be met with an armed presense very quickly. Probably ok if you like and adrenaline holiday!

[Mikey1050]

Just came back to this discussion to find some great suggestions !! Cheers people !
Sadly Vegas is well out of my budget otherwise it would be a no brainer !!!
I love Scotland but Lossiemouth is definitely not the kind of temperature i'm looking for sadly.