I recently flew to Cartagena in Colombia for a short trip away from Bogota. We flew on AeroRepublica EMB-190 and had a great experience – although the flight was a little bumpy going out, with the afternoon thunderstorms brewing around the coast.

Cartagena is a lovely old walled city, full of Caribbean charm, colourful buildings, endless vistas of the sea, sunsets, and great wining and dining experiences. But you’re here for the aircraft, so I’ll carry on.

The terminal at Cartagena Airport is very modern. And sadly it does not knowingly cater for the spotter at all. When arriving or departing, passengers funnel through a walkway which leads between the aircraft and the terminal. If you’re in the departure lounge, your view out of the window is of this walkway and its slatted wall. In order to see aircraft, you have to wait until they move, and with binoculars focussed on a gap, hope the registration passes by.

Nevertheless, once you walk to/from the aircraft, you do get a chance to see what’s on the smallish ramp. This usually includes MD-80s and F100s of Avianca, EMB-190s of AeroRepublica, 737-700s and DHC-8s of AIRES, and the odd US airline such as Spirit. Movements are fairly quiet – maybe 4 per hour at peak times.

Cartagena does play host to a number of biz jets each day, however. They park either to the side of the airliner ramp, or on the ramp on the opposite side of the runway. Also, there are a number of Air Force and Navy aircraft in residence, including Casa CN235s.

Around the terminal there are no obvious views of the aircraft, apart from on the road passing the end of the runway, where you’ll see aircraft just as they depart or land. I wouldn’t venture much around looking for holes in the fence, as there ‘s a strong military presence, and the housing area is quite poor around the airport.

AeroRepublica HK-4506 at Cartagena

AIRES 737-700s fly from Bogota

These two biz jets were in Cartagena in July 2009

Cartagena Airport from above

Manchester Airport’s Aviation Viewing Park now has multiple entry tickets available for those who visit regularly and want to save a bit of money on the entrance fee. The TAS Manchester site has full details.

The tickets come in batches of 25, 50 and 100. These are priced £25, £50 and £100 respectively. I’m sure you can work out that means entrance is therefore reduced to £1 per visit. You can buy tickets from the entrance kiosk, but if you present your TAS membership at the Aviation Shop on site, you’ll get 10% off the ticket cost.

There’s no mention whether the tickets are for pedestrians only, or include car entrance. Perhaps someone could comment if they know.

I passed through Paris Charles de Gaulle airport this week, and used the relatively new Terminal 3 for the first time (yes I flew low-cost, for my sins). So I thought this would be a good opportunity to see what the terminal offers in terms of views and spotting, having passed through terminals 1 and 2 a number of times in the past.

Aircraft using this terminal largely use the square apron immediately in front of it, parking in one of two rows. Upon arrival you are shepherded into buses and into the baggage claim, which has no views at all of aircraft, so make sure you see what you can whilst taxying in and leaving the aircraft.

When leaving, I found there were no views at all of aircraft from the check-in hall. However, if you go outside the front doors and walk to the left along the walkway, and past the arrivals waiting area, you’ll come to a fence. From here you can see aircraft using the northerly runways, and the taxiway leading to the threshold. You can also get fleeting views of aircraft at terminal 1, and also aircraft departing the southerly runways.

Once in the departure lounge, I found there are some very limited views of aircraft on the terminal 3 ramp. You need to head to the northern end of the seating area to be able to see past the blast fence. You can also see some aircraft on the taxiways near terminal 1 from here.

View from departure lounge at Paris CDG Terminal 3

One word of warning – once in the departure lounge, there is only one cafe selling food & snacks. For a small sandwich, pastry, crisps and bottle of water I paid nearly 10 euros. This is incredibly expensive, so make sure you eat beforehand!

Here in this post is a picture I took from the departure lounge of an Aegean A320 on the terminal 3 ramp. There are windows, poles and buses in the way, so photography is nearly impossible.

Plane Spotting Hotels website has a nice section on hotels at New York JFK for those wanting spotting views at the airport.

The Holiday Inn and Ramada Plaza hotels are the best options.

The Holiday Inn has distant, but good, views – particuarly for those with telescope poles. Having a SBS is also definitely useful here! Rooms that don’t face JFK have distant views of La Guardia airport, which is also useful if you have a SBS.

From the Ramada, rooms have views of aircraft when landing on runway 13L, but there’s also a grassy bank area a short walk from the hotel with much better views.

The new high-speed train link from Amsterdam Schiphol is due to open in September. This will run directly from the terminal to Antwerp, Breda, Brussels and Rotterdam.

Trains running on the route travel at 250km/h 16 times a day. This makes travel around the Netherlands and Benelux region much faster.

Much talk is currently spreading about Emirates sending an Airbus A380 to Birmingham on 9th September as a one-off to celebrate the airport’s 75th anniversary and the opening of the new revised International Pier.

Whilst this information comes on good authority, and it seems there is a good chance it’ll happen, people are also saying they’re poised to switch it back to the usual Boeing 777-300 at last minute. There’s also the fact that the new international pier is well behind schedule and not likely to open until December.

Any updates would be appreciated if you are ‘in the know’

First of all, apologies for the lack of updates lately. I’ve been off touring South America – airport reports to follow soon!

Anyway, here’s a note about the Marriott Hotel at Philadelphia Airport. If you’re at the airport spotting, then this is probably the best choice for you.

The Marriott has great views over the airport and movements on all of the runways and a lot of the aprons. Since the hotel is tall, you’re better off going for rooms on floor 10 and above to get the best views.

A recent report (credit Bob Smith) states that the following rooms are the best: 1407-1419, 1429-1439. All of these rooms have views of the main runways, but the latter ones look mainly towards the UPS apron.