Tag: cross-country

  • Exploring Winter Haven: Flying without GPS in a Beautiful Area

    Winter Haven (KGIF) is an exceptionally beautiful place, boasting two concrete runways and a water runway. I hope to try out the water runway in a seaplane one day, but for now, I am flying an ASEL (Airplane Single Engine Land) and sticking to concrete or grass runways. Flying without GPS is an amazing experience.…

  • Rediscovering Visual Flying: Back To Basics

    The next logical step for an Instrument Rating holder is a Commercial License. Finally, I can fly without ‘foggles’ or a ‘hood’! It’s so beautiful outside! I decided that it does not make sense to follow the 141 route for my commercial course. I already have some flight time under my belt above the private+IR…

  • IR Part 141: Long Cross Country Flight

    Every student pilot should undertake a long cross-country flight during their training course. It doesn’t necessarily mean flying across the entire country, but certain flight leg requirements must be met based on the specific program (e.g., private, instrument or commercial). For instance, instrument rating demands a flight of 250 nautical miles with an instrument approach…

  • IR Part 141: Challenges of Cross-Country Flying

    The third stage of the course primarily focuses on cross-country flying. This means that students are required to plan and execute a flight to a remote airport, located more than 50 nautical miles from the departure airport. Although I had experience preparing mass and balance, weather briefing, and fuel, I had never prepared and filed…

  • Flight to Maintenance: Overcoming a Technical Issue

    As you know, I am currently flying to meet the minimum flight time requirements and, of course, for fun. Today, I had a really useful task: flying the airplane to the mechanics for scheduled maintenance. While reading my preflight checklist, I noticed that the flaps do not deploy. I thought about it and realized that…

  • Flying in Hot Windy Weather: A Pilot’s Experience

    I was supposed to fly early in the morning, but it didn’t happen. The airplane didn’t have enough fuel, and the fuel service is usually only available in the afternoon. Anyway, I needed some more sleep. I took off in the afternoon and during the flight, I noticed that my ground speed was way less…

  • Chasing Flight Hours: A Pilot’s Excursion to the North-West of Prague

    Every pilot should have a minimum flight time before taking an exam. For the modular commercial pilot program in Europe, it should be 200 hours of total time. I am currently continuing to gain these flight hours. Today, I decided to fly to the North-West, where I found a nice aerodrome with a concrete runway.…

  • Crossing the Country: A Flight Adventure

    Today, I planned a long cross-country flight. It supposed to literally cover almost half of the country. The weather was not perfect, but acceptable, and I set out towards the east. A significant part of the route went through controlled airspace, making my workload higher than usual. As I’m not yet used to talking to…

  • Exploring New Routes: Flying to Stankovice

    The morning weather was not cooperating, and I thought my flight would be cancelled. But around 10 am, the clouds started to dissipate and the weather briefing showed no thunderstorms in the near future, so it seemed like we could take off after all! Our route today was to the southeast, and I was excited…

  • Flying Adventures: 100$ Hamburger Flight

    Today was a great day for me as I had the opportunity to fly a lot, and I am thrilled about it. I started with touch-and-goes at my home aerodrome, then took a short flight to LKPLES, which has a runway that is 1640 feet long and 15 meters wide. That airfield is pretty close…