As far as scheduled runs, we just got Singapore back after the military decided it wasn't going as well in-house as it was when we did it for so many years. For now, it's short term, but we all hope it gets renewed long term. Otherwise, layovers with time for a beer in Bahrain, Lajes, Thule, Ascension I, Honolulu, and Yakota AB (near Tokyo). Pretty much all the other international work we do is ad hoc and therefore hit or miss, boom or bust. Sometimes the layovers involve a crew change where the dropping off crew stays there until the airplane comes back, usually within the picking up crew's duty day, meaning you have time to see some sights and have a beer and still get rested for the return or repo leg afterwards. Other times you land, drag yourself to the hotel, crash, and get up in time to go. Years ago, we had airplanes all over the place, and you never knew what was coming next if you were out on the road with them. Now the trips are a lot more structured, with the plane generally ferrying from TOL to the pickup point and then heading on to the destination. A few weeks ago, I was snoozing in the hotel in TOL and woke up to the phone's message light flashing. Turned out we had a pop up charter in which scheduling actually did their job by setting a departure time based on our actual required rest, and they didn't wake us up directly to inform us of it. We ferried down to IAH, picked up some oil rig equipment, and flew it to Prestwick, Scotland, had minimum layover time to keep from exceeding 12 in 24, and ferried back to TOL. A really fun trip that would have been made better only by having some more time in Prestwick. A lot of our charters that pass through Europe stop at Frankfurt-Hahn with a great layover.
