Flying a plane you may ask? Yes, a plane. A flying one at that. One that goes in the air, in the clouds to be exact.
I just made myself rhyme on accident, and I kinda sounded like Dr. Suess?So that’s a cool start to a blog if I may so myself.
For my birthday, I slightly hinted to my dad that I wanted to fly a plane. And by slightly, I mean I told him “Hey dad, I want to fly a plane and there’s a Groupon right here for half off!” I am surprised to say, he got the hint! I took to the sky today to celebrate, and experience, my success of hinting to gift-givers.
The morning started off early – earlier than I wanted- like 8. I don’t do single digits (of the AM, that is). It’s a fact of my life, and always will be. To my utter dismay, my once caffeinated-afternoon self scheduled my groggy, eye-stinging self to fly a plane during the single digit hours. I would do that.
Back to my single-digit self. I asked myself if getting up to fly a plane was even worth it. Are you seriously kidding me? What kind of a question is that? My single-digit self fought hard with my brain’s recollection of what-could-be (in regards to my not-so-groggy self) in about 2 hours. My brain won and I got out of bed, still reluctantly.
The Checklist Before Flying
Words upon words written on this laminated sheet, I couldn’t even make-out what each word said. They were that little, which only means there’s that many things to check. The fuel, all the little circle things on the dashboard, the wings, the rudder (yeah, I thought those were only on boats, too), and all the other fun stuff! ALL OF IT.
The Experience of Flying a Plane
We hit the ground running, or whatever a plane does on the runway, and tilted our ever so little nose into the air. We were flying!! My instructor waited to give me the wheel, or the yolk, until we were over the coastline. Yeah, I wouldn’t trust me with a flying vehicle either…smart call, my man.
Uuuuppppppp and dddooowwwnnnn and uuppppp and back ddowwnn. Yeah, that sounds about right. The damn plane is the hardest thing to control. Keep it level, as in both altitude and wings. Wouldn’t wanna accidently turn or nose-dive, now would we? One second of looking at the gorgeous Florida beaches below, and we would be taking a nose-dive or looking at a view of the lovely blue sky above. Concentration, and a lot of it, and I finally got the hang of it.
Then it got windy. Of course, for me, it would get windy. It was even harder to keep the plane at the desired altitude and we were climbing up, up, and away before I even knew it! Honestly, I couldn’t wait to have him take the steering back under control. A long five minutes later, he took control and we went in for landing. My back – oh, my back. It was hurting. And sweating. So much tension.
Yet, I would do it again. Flying a plane was a bucket-list item I could never forget! Hand me a plane and an instructor and I would be right back in the sky!