The safari lodge I was staying at in South Africa, Ulusaba, booked my FederalAirlines flights from/to Johannesburg (JNB) when I booked my stay with them, so that I knew I was going to be flying to their closest airstrip.

We arrived at JNB after our overnight flight from Europe and were met outside the arrivals concourse by Eric, a FedAir worker, holding a board with our names on it. He gave us a warm welcome to South Africa and pushed our luggage trolley to his liveried minivan outside, then drove us first out of the airport and then back into the mid-field area between the two main runways, where General Aviation and cargo operations are based – a journey of about 8 minutes.

Federal Airlines’ stand-alone facility has kerb-side check-in, where you say au revoir to your bags and get a small card to access boarding (seating is not allocated).  Passengers are restricted to 20Kg hold luggage each, which must be in soft bags. If you don’t have soft bags they’ll sell you some and look after your hard cases until your return.  It seems that if the aircraft load is light they’ll make exceptions, but I wouldn’t suggest you rely on that possibility. Our fellow passengers were allowed their hard suitcases, but I don’t know if they had to pay excess fees, or if they encountered a problem on their return flight.

Once checked-in we entered the lounge area, which has tables and chairs, plus soft seats, toilets, a TV, a small selection of hot and cold drinks and some nibbles (crisps and nuts).  There’s also an outside area with canopied tables where you can watch small planes come and go, and hear the roar of larger jets, taking off behind a fence.  That’s where we sat, and it was very pleasant in the morning sunshine.

Around half an hour before departure we realised we needed some medication we’d packed in the bags which had already been loaded onto the plane.  No problem: we were escorted across the ramp to our aircraft, where ground engineers and the crew were making final checks, got our meds and walked back to the outside lounge area. The joy of a small company with friendly staff who aren’t “jobsworths”!

When we were called to board our flight to Ulusaba we realised that there were only two other passengers, and just one pilot operating.  The aeroplane was a single turbine-prop Pilatus PC-12, registration ZS-DAT, which has seating for just 9 passengers over four rows in a 1-1 configuration plus a bench seat for 3 at the back.  I sat in the front seat on the port side and Mr. A was in the starboard front seat, so we both had clear views into the cockpit, as it didn’t have a door.  This is a pretty impressive little aircraft, with a powerful engine and a relatively high cruising speed, and it’s pressurised, so it can fly higher, above most weather (we flew at 25,000).

The pilot gave the safety briefing, showed us where to help ourselves to cold soft drinks inflight, and invited us to feel free to approach him with questions during the flight, before taxiing out 15 minutes ahead of schedule, at 12:15. A little wait for take-off meant we were airborne at 12:35, and we soared into the azure African skies.

After a while, when cruise had been established, I edged forward for a chat with the pilot.  A few minutes later, to my amazement and joy, he invited me to sit in the “right hand seat” next to him, for the rest of the flight!  I can only assume this was because, through our conversation, he could tell I knew a bit about aviation.  I was in ‘AvGeek’ heaven: how fantastic to be sitting in the co-pilot’s seat of a small propellor plane – and just four hours after I’d been in the cockpit of a huge Air France A380 descending towards JNB!

Notwithstanding my excitement, the flight continued without incident. We started our descent after overflying the Drakensberg hills, sliding and bouncing through occasional fluffy white clouds, until we could see the Ulusaba (ULS) airstrip below our starboard side. Then we looped back and made a smooth landing, as there weren’t any wild animals on the runway, and taxied to a halt close to the tiny terminal building at 13:30, just 55 minutes after leaving JNB.

The return airfare was about £550 each, which is quite a lot considering you can get an economy class return to JNB from the UK for around £600.  But it really is the most convenient way to get to your safari lodge, and the experience of flying with a small and very friendly company is a genuine pleasure (although you might not get as much pleasure out of it as I did, in the cockpit).  10/10

On the return flight we were on a larger twin turbo-prop Beechcraft 1900D, which has two flight crew and seating for 19 passengers in a 1-1 layout over 8 rows, plus a 3 seater bench at the back.  It’s also pressurised, to enable higher altitude flying.  The aircraft was registered ZS-STE.

When we and 4 others boarded we found there were already 13 people seated, who presumably had come from other safari lodge strips, so we had to grab what seats were available to us.

There was a lot more cloud around for this flight, but turbulence wasn’t any real problem, after we took off just before 2pm.  An hour later we were landing at JNB, and once we collected our bags we were driven in the Federal Airlines van, again by Eric, to the main part of the airport, for our flight back to France.

This flight into JNB hadn’t been as much fun as the outbound sector, but I’ll retain my overall score at 10/10 because there wasn’t anything I could find fault with.  Federal Airlines operates a friendly, reliable and safe service to guests wanting to access their luxury safari lodges in the remote South African bush.