there is only one rule of XMas flight - to have fun 
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I had the same crash/safe mode issue when MSFS first loaded winter textures down south.
I agree with the others. There’s no wrong way to do this trek! 
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Teniente Julio Gallardo Airport (SCNT) to Punta Arenas (SCCI).
Just a short 101nm hop. Seemed like a good leg to fly the Asobo T-6.
Tucking up the gear…
This is Puerto Natales. Looks like a decent sized town.
Heading south, there are more mountains to cross.
For navigation on such a short flight, I just held my heading. The airport was easy enough to spot.
Touchdown
And parked.
Punta Arenas is an important airport if you are heading to the Antarctic. I’m just 500nm from Stanley at this point but I might make the hop down to the British Antarctic Survey’s Rothera airfield (featured in Aerosoft’s Antarctic Volume 1 scenery). Decisions decisions… 
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somewhere in the forests 
and my second pilot is lost. this time it was worse. I was landing into the field with the medic and decided that I have too much speed for that small field and went around. what looked like too much speed was not enough to get out of there and stalled the C152 and crashed. shame! 
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I should blame my fuel calc, as I was too heavy for such landing… anyway wish me a better luck this time
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Oh no! Is it a high elevation field?
maybe!? 
you see, my planning is even worse than my calcs 
I parked for the night at small strip SNHO and the altimeter says 3k ft… your thinking is correct, seems like the engine would benefit from a little leaner mixture
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How’s the Texan.
My finger has hovered over that buy button for the whole package more times than I can count.
Although, to be fair, I can’t count that high!
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Well, I guess it comes down to your expectations. All the aircraft look great, each has it’s own individual cockpit. Systems wise they are basic. You can’t open the canopies etc etc, but when you break down the cost per plane it is hard to complain too much. In the long run, I doubt I will fly them all that much, especially if we get a decent T6, Mustang and L39 from a 3rd party developer.
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I guess that’s my only hesitation. I’d be fine with basic. But the second a high quality Mustang or Texan is released, I don’t think I’d ever fly the Asobo ones again.
They do look great though!
OMG! I LOVE THE HAT!!! 
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I saw @Elby’s hat and thought we should decorate a bit. The main page has some lights as well. I know not everyone will like it, but that’s what a family Christmas is all about
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Regional Santa Rosa Airport (SERO) - David Armando Abensur Rengifo Airport (SPCL)
This leg included a couple of firsts for me. I wasn’t flying an empty bird, but took on some cargo, for one thing.
The other first was using the ADF system on the DC6. I had two NDB waypoints en route.
My plan was to track the SRV VOR radial from my departure airfield to the LOJA NDB (also the location of the Catamayo airfield), then continue on to CIR NDB, also at a small airstrip, Ciro Algeria, on the eastern side of this section of the Andes.
From CIR NDB, I’d head on a dead reckoning course (with a little help from the ADF pointing back towards CIR NDB) to the TAP VOR, some 156NM away. I’d be initially out of range but hopefully would get close enough to capture a radial and home in from there. From TAP VOR I would fly to my destination, SPCL, which is another VOR-equipped field.
It was cloudy in the climb.
Success! Around halfway through the first leg, I got the NDB signal.
Halfway across the next leg, between the NDBs. ADF 1 needle pointing to the previous waypoint, ADF 2 needle pointing to the next one. Handily, the SRV VOR DME still reached me, giving me a handy way to know where exactly I was on the track between the two NDBs.
I had to get quite close to the TAP VOR before picking it up, and I’d drifted a bit. I happily took it, though. I could soon see the city and the airfield below between the clouds.
The rest of the way was quite easy, with the Huallaga river confirming what my navigation instruments were telling me.
The low clouds made for a somewhat interesting approach, especially as I was in a bit of a rush IRL and eye-balled the final.
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The DC6 is simply stunning… yet another great AAR too!
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Another short hop, this time to try out the freeware Magister.
Punta Arenas (Chile) to Rio Grande (Argentina).
Not the prettiest airplane out there, but there is something about her that I like.
Climbing away…
And turning out to the east.
The cockpit is well modeled, especially for a freeware aircraft. It is all in French, so for me at least, deciphering the instrumentation was a case of educated guesswork. I figured most of it out in the end.
Hmmmm that’s not good. I guess I didn’t bring a lot of fuel with me… At this point I was still about 25nm from the airport. 
Airport in sight and the engines are still running.
I made a steep approach, just in case the fuel ran out at the worst moment…
Safely down.
I shut the airplane down and checked my fuel quantity…12 Liters remaining. That was very close!
Looking at where I parked, it looks like some kind of QRA dispersal.
It’s a nice aircraft. Well worth picking up 
.
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So according to Wikipedia, the original Turbomeca Marbore used 720 litres of fuel per hour in cruise…
Good thing you didn’t cruise a minute longer!
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Where can I get it?
I just checked flightsim.to and they don’t seem to have it.
Edit: nevermind, just saw your post in the other thread.
It is a nice plane, the German Air force also flew it as a trainer. And it has a V-tail and tip tanks so I like it.
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It looks like the time has come to:
- get to Port Stanley
- check out the DC-6 while doing that
I have made two training flights with the DC-6 so I feel I could make it without getting lost on the way or cooking the engines. We shall see…
The plan is:
- take off from Guardiamarina Zanartu (SCGZ),
- track PWL VOR outbound radial 53° till the signal fades away (some 60ish nm),
- continue on the same heading and cross-check my position with a fix obtained from GRA VOR located at Rio Grande (@PaulRix stop over for the moment) on radial 78° and 160nm,
- track inbound MPT VOR and MP NDB located near Mount Pleasant airbase on Falkland Islands and finally
- from there continue towards Port Stanley using VFR navigation and STA NDB.
Ready to go!
And immediately the first challenge of the day - how to get out safely? When reversing, my rudder pedals got stuck in the position opposite to the intended turn. Nice. Re-plugged and continue…
“Full power set”, take off
Climbing away towards the final destination of this Christmas trek.
Picking up some icing on the way. Anyone knows which of the dials show OAT, please?
Nevermind. I was out of visible moisture so I did not bother fiddling with anti-ice equipment. Cruising altitude FL190. Blowers on high and the engines still firmly attached to the wings!
Time to check my fix - 160nm on an outbound radial 78° from the GRA VOR. It looks like I need to correct the heading few degrees to the left.
HMD off and quick glimpse on the LittleNavMap - confirms what I observed.
Here I am already descending inbound to the VOR and NDB located on Falklands. I did not want to mess up (too much) the descent and subsequent deceleration phases of the flight so I allowed some 80nm for descent (from FL190 to 3000ft @ some 300kts ground speed) and another 20nm to decelerate to 140kts.
Falkland Islands! It seems I did not get lost indeed
At this point I levelled off at 3000ft and started to decelerate. Note the distance to the Mount Pleasant airbase of 20nm. So far so good. I am sure Rob Randazzo would be happy to see I learned something from his video tutorials
I almost did not miss the VOR at Mount Pleasant airbase. Here I was already doing some 140kts.
Abeam the airport of Port Stanley.
Approaching in VFR.
A little low on the loooooong finals. I hope Randazzo is not watching.
Though all good in the end.
I tasked the AFE with performing the parking checks and looked over the magnificent cockpit.
Where is the bar please? Is anyone else already here?
So for me this years Christmas trek has just finished. What an experience, honestly! I flew over 8000nm in six different planes and visited places which I have not seen in the sim yet. I also thoroughly enjoyed reading your AARs.
Thanks everyone for watching!
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Congratulations! Well done 
Keep the beers cold, we’re on our way!
Also let us know if we need to bring more beer or other groceries. I picked up some Sol beer and limes, but otherwise got plenty of room in the hold.
It’s this one, if I’m not mistaken:
Most of the de-icing controls are on the left brow panel and the windscreen de-icer by your head on the left.
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Congrats! An excellent report and an outstanding journey.
I believe @Bearhedge is correct WRT the OAT gauge.
And a plug for the windscreen deicer in the back left corner of the Captain’s overhead. That thing works like a champ!
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