Bahrain to Jeddah

Just back from Jeddah, this is the airport that is closest to Mecca, so the muslims going on Haj come here.
Consequently aircraft from all over the world park up for several days, many on short wet lease but also lots of private stuff, we use the private terminal and see many aircraft from the usual G4’s etc to big stuff. 😎

We left the Base at 08:30 Zulu on A9C-HWR (again) and flew direct to Jeddah.

Passing Riyadh we could see the incredible geography, who says it doesn’t rain there?

[img=http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/765/riyadh6oi.th.jpg]

Then the real “Crop Circles”, irrigate the desert and you can grow just about anything.

[img=http://img448.imageshack.us/img448/7128/cropcircles1hu.th.jpg]

The approach to Jeddah shows how big in area the airport is, we used 34R you can’t see 34L, but it is so empty!!! It must be the biggest I have visited and I have visited a lot! 😀

[img=http://img125.imageshack.us/img125/8880/approach8qv.th.jpg]

The airport is a joint civil/military and has a unit there operating C130s, many different schemes too.

[img=http://img125.imageshack.us/img125/4987/hercs4wa.th.jpg]

The Haj Terminal is BIG, I dont know if the aircraft park there of if the passengers are taken to the aircraft by bus, it looks quiet.

[img=http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/8406/hajterminal3fq.th.jpg]

The first thing we passed was this L1011

[img=http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/5743/l10113jw.th.jpg]

Then these lines of parked aircraft.

[img=http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/8495/lineup18je.th.jpg]

[img=http://img275.imageshack.us/img275/9532/lineup24jz.th.jpg]

[img=http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/3019/linup36ab.th.jpg]

[img=http://img275.imageshack.us/img275/9282/lineup48ux.th.jpg]

[img=http://img501.imageshack.us/img501/7929/7322xh.th.jpg]

The see in was entertaining, they are pushing the pickup and the mashaller was sending us the wrong way 😮

[img=http://img450.imageshack.us/img450/8493/seein7kp.th.jpg]

After a long wait (3 hours) we re-positioned to the VIP ramp and were parked behind the Bahrain Royal Flight 747SP (again)

[img=http://img251.imageshack.us/img251/8341/74sp0fg.th.jpg]

Finally all the passengers were rounded up and we had another uneventful trip back to base 😀 😀 😀