Quote:
Originally Posted by Rusty Heap
I'm in my mid 50's and have the cash to get Pilots License and checked out in a Cessna 150 to start.
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You didn't ask, but my advice:
Get the cheapest ticket you can that lets you fly a production airplane. I think that's Sport Pilot now.
Rent, don't buy for 100 hours or so.
You may like it, you may not.
My experience was I put in a lot of seat time just flying around - haze below, haze ahead, no view - just sitting there navigating. They don't put pictures of crappy weather in the brochures.
Learning how to
aviate was fun, I l
oved controlling the airplane. But navigating wasn't fun and communicating was frustrating. It helped to get a radio that let me listen to airport coms from the ground to get used to the grunts and growls and figure out what they meant. But I wanted to
fly.
On the few days in this part of the country when the weather was nice and a plane was available it was FANTASTIC! One morning there was a layer of cloud above me and a layer below and columns of clouds connecting them. It was like being in an immense cathedral. I slalomed between the columns for an hour and got totally lost in the experience. It was glorious! Saw some great sunrises and sunsets and on a few days nice landscapes. I had fun doing stuff with the airplane I wasn’t supposed to do at my stage of experience.
In the end I only got about 100 hours in before I decided it wasn’t worth the $26 an hour it was costing me. (I know – it was a while ago). Glad I hadn't sunk a bunch of money into buying an airplane.