Thu Sep 09, 2021 10:54 am
#1869438
For me this seems to be a time of change.
From flying everyday with purpose in a variety of aircraft types to next to nothing.
In November I did my one hour with an instructor in a C152, and five weeks later I could not fly it, need another check out...
In March I did a solo flight in a Warrior, this facility I still have.
Had a few ‘passenger flights’.
In May I tried out an Ikarus C42, dual...
Then I did a CRI course and it took a long while for this rating to be applied to my licence.
Flew an Auster, I can still grease it on, and it was 2004 when I last flew one... Concentrates the mind that, no time for complacency.
Landing the Cessna 185 wasn’t a problem either, so my skills haven’t deteriorated much it seems.
Warrior four times (one of which was dual at another club) including a trip to Bembridge when the wind was 30-35 knots and there were CBs about. That resulted in phone calls, was I competent?
Used the CRI for the first two times in a J3 out of Eggesford... I will go the distance for my friends.
CRI for the third time in the Tiger Moth, yes I’m still competent in these types.
Checked out in the Super Cub, but club rules for renters are half the crosswind “limit”, so five knots. That’s no challenge, so one can’t perfect one’s skills
Up in the Jodel 112, run in and permit flight test, a lovely little aeroplane to fly.
Two flights in the Sherwood Ranger, stately flying in a Brunel structured biplane.
Passenger flight in a Minicab to the Rally.
Yesterday was beautiful, and I might have been allowed to fly the Super Cub, I probably would need a check out again. But I couldn’t be bothered. There was no-one to share the experience (pleasure shared is pleasure doubled), and no specific purpose.
In a way club rules, and that denial of a flight before because of the shifting winds, conditions that I have sent many a student on their first solo in a tailwheel aeroplane, has taken the edge of my enthusiasm.
I am being encouraged to buy a share in a Luscombe in which I have had a few passenger flights... But in my mind is finding a job, earning a living again, and where I might be.
It’s a time of life perhaps to look back on a fantastic aviation life, and accept that the future can never match the past I’ve been fortunate to have.
MichaelP
Wandering the World