First flying lesson

Today the weather finally cleared for my friend AH and I to take our FIRST flying lesson at the wonderful Freeway Airport. (We couldn’t fly on the weekend because the weather was terrible with very low cloud ceiling). The afternoon grew clearer and sunny and it was a lovely day to look down from above. I was a little nervous and my fear of flying was certainly kicking in. The first hour was spent doing a flight plan and learning how to do a preflight check of the aircraft. I managed to avoid bumping my head on anything so that was definitely a good start. The last time I crawled around a plane was many many years ago during my air force days when it was a much sleeker FA-18 jet. But, today it was a much smaller plane and I enjoyed looking over the rivets, surfaces, probes, prongs and points. I did note that it was pretty small in the back and might be difficult to fit a mountain bike (thinking ahead).

Despite this being a small aircraft (Cessna 172), would you believe I need a booster seat !! I didn’t use it today but in future I will use a booster seater to raise me higher and help reach the pedals a little better. After an intro to all the dials and switches, I turned the key and started the engine. I have to say, it was a sexy feeling hearing that throaty engine sound and seeing those propellers turn around in front of me. Let’s do this Batman.

We taxi’d to the end of the runway and waited for others to land so we could get on our way. Blood pressure rising a bit more at this stage. After some ssshhkk Whiskey Zero Zero, Freeway …sshkkkk and a few more words on the radio that I’m still yet to master, the instructor said we need to get up to 80 knots and then pull back and climb. I can’t even remember if it was 80 so I could be wrong. I was a bit overwhelmed as we raced down the runway. Off we went and I totally couldn’t remember how fast, or when….but thankfully he had the stick and off we went, up and the horizon disappeared in front of me. After I took a deep breath, I nervously said…what now? Take over and keep climbing and then level off shortly the instructor said.

The lesson was great. It was a very smooth flight. I flew almost an hour and over the water with some huge ships below. As soon as we leveled off I practiced turns to learn how each control worked. I have to say, this was a pretty cool feeling. I was turning left, right, left, right and thought that was enough as my gonna-be-sick warning light was flashing. I have been studying the theory but it takes practice to fully understand how things work and today certainly helped. I needed to learn how the controls felt and how much pressure I needed to use for things to move. So the instructor said ‘take your hands off, let go’. I stopped breathing, stomach dropped. You want what? He said it’s not like the movies where the plane dives out of control the second you let go. So I took my hands away and we stayed on course, steady and smooth. It veered a little after a while but yeah he was right, as an instructor would be !!  

We then practiced increasing and dropping engine speed. When the instructor dropped the engine power, my stomach dropped again!!  The nose starts to drop too so I had to ask the instructor – how low can the engine power be before we drop….or words to that effect. He reassured me of the engine power needed and I calmed down once I saw we were totally fine. These are the things that I’m keen to learn and understand as it’s one of my flying fears – those sudden drops in engine power. Anyway, I learnt lots of things and we headed back to the airfield to land. I gently held onto the controls but just so I could feel what moves the instructor was making. It’s certainly going to take some practice and skill to get this mastered. The instructor let me taxi and I soon realized that you steer with your pedals, not the stick in your hands. Very rookie mistake and I guess my mountain bike mode kicked in. We parked the plane, did final checks, tied it down and took my momento photo. It was a very relieved feeling.

I felt mentally drained after the flight. It had been over 2 hours of heavy concentration with some fear thrown in there to keep the blood flowing fast. I waited for my friend to return and he had similar experiences as me – good, nervous and feeling like a complete gumby. But, it’s only the first lesson and we will both improve with more practice. It takes a minimum 20 hours, but more likely 30 hours to be able to fly solo and then another 15 hours at least to get the final license. So we have some hours ahead of us. I watched in awe as those little planes took off and landed with their solo pilots doing their training. Hopefully that will be me in a few months.

I always thought it was a bit corny when people say how ‘a-mazing’ it is to fly a plane. Today, I guess I had my moment when we up there and I was doing the turns over the water. But I think I can now see why it is amazing to fly as I’m sure there will be more of those fabulous moments in the future.

I’ll update you on my progress in future blogs. We plan to fly 1-2 times each week and I can’t wait to take off and land on my own.  

  

California sunshine

It was a long 2 weeks in LA living in a hotel. Eating out every meal loses its appeal quickly and the food in America is not good for the health conscious. I don’t think much of LA – too big, too fake, too much money. The highlight after Batman, was having breakfast twice at a fabulous café called Ruby's Cafe down in Santa Monica. This is an Australian style café, the menu was wonderful, the food was superb and service was great AND the coffee was excellent. Here’s a link to it and I would recommend it to anyone wanting a good meal.

Ruby's Cafe

The pics below are of Venice Beach boardwalk and the famous Muscle Beach Gym. This is a heavy duty mans outdoor gym. I believe Arnold Schwarzenegger used to work out here.

 

After a week of work in LA, we took a few days to visit San Diego which is almost on the Mexican border. Well, everyone said it was a fabulous place and I was very excited to go but I have to say, it’s not as good as San Francisco which is kind of what I was expecting. The weather was lovely and there was the USS Midway ship museum  (which I didn’t go to anyway), but I didn’t find anything else there really worth recommending to anyone. 

We hired a car (not this one in the pic) and drove down from LA, along the coast road which was a pretty drive and not much more time than the freeway running parallel to us. Check out the car that we passed on the way - I did a double take in the mirror when I saw that behind us !!  

There seemed to be ocean on one side and industrial, oil rigs and energy/gas plants on the left so fairly ugly contrast really. We stopped at La Jolla which was close to San Diego as this is the place to watch seals. They are always gorgeous and these guys were huge, maybe sealions, and they were sunbaking on the beach and rocks. This little beach used to be a childrens beach but the seals took over and now is closed for access – except to the seals.

We arrived into San Diego late afternoon and decided to have a late lunch/early dinner. I was hanging out for good Mexican food and around the corner was a good spot apparently. I ordered a Margarita and it blew my head off. It was pure alcohol and I needed food pretty quick but too late, it went to my head. Yes, I’m a lightweight when it comes to drinking. I ordered something different – deep fried pork belly tacos – and it was very very oily which I paid for later that night over the porcelain bus, so to speak. Sadly we didn’t enjoy much else of the traditional Mexican fare. We took a walk along the waterfront and there were plenty of old and new ships to look at. Lots of people were out and about but again, it was nice to be in the sun but not much else to rave about.

There was a new ship, USS Omaha, in dock which was commissioned the weekend we were there. I was quite impressed to see this as it is an LCS (Littoral Combat Ship) which is very stealthy and the look of future ships.

 

The next day we enjoyed a sleep in and then headed out for breakfast to a place with good reviews. Interesting menu but we stuck to eggs bene as my stomach was not up for much fun after the night before. I ordered a cup of tea and seriously, it was ridiculous. The cup weighed about 2kg and it was like drinking out of a beer mug. I didn’t even attempt to drink it. I know coffee is not the common drink in the US but honestly, you wouldn’t serve beer in a tea cup, so why would you serve tea in a beer mug? I wouldn’t recommend this place anyway, wasn’t worth the high reviews in my opinion.

We jumped on the light rail train thing and went to Oldtown where there are markets. Hmmm, it was ok but we may as well have been in Mexico. Deb was interested in some small colourful potplants and a blanket so we checked them out and decided to come back the next day when the arts and craft markets would be open for the Saturday crowd. We spent the afternoon at Coronado Island. There is a huge bridge that links San Diego to the Island and it’s a nice view. The island is home to the North Island Naval Air Station and has a beautiful beach. We took the ferry over and walked the streets a bit but again, not much to see. Yes there were shops and a beach but better suited for the summer beach tourist.

That night we went to Little Italy which was close to our hotel. It was full of great Italian restaurants and I had lobster ravioli which is the 2^nd best pasta I’ve ever eaten. God it was bloody nice. The best pasta I’ve ever had was in Italy at Finale Ligure where I did my Solo 24 hour race back in 2012. It was a small town, they didn’t speak much English, but the food was fantastic. Anyway, it was a great meal.

Our last day was spent on the hop on/off trolley which was a good way to see San Diego. There is a park called Balboa Park which was beautiful and if we went back, we would spend some time there. However, we ended up back at the Oldtown markets to get a few things and then started the drive back to LA where we stayed the night – had an early flight home in the morning. It was nice to get home after 2 weeks away and the dogs were excited as always to see us.

Deb has been doing an online photography course for her iPhone. So far the pictures have been super impressive. I've included some in this post. However, check out the picture of me 'shooting myself'. Deb asks me to help with a photo. Stand there, hands up. Then run around behind me and stand there as if pointing a gun. After 3 attempts and even more strange looks by passers by, here is the outcome. I wish I had my Batman cape on !!