My Flying

Extremely misty morning, but it starts to lift at about 9:30. Arrive at the airfield just before 10:30. Just as I drive in through the gate the winch is being parked back in the hangar. Still annoyed from the previous week of no flying and not really interested in standing around chatting, I do and an immediate u-turn and leave. *insert my unhappy face*

Arrive at the airfield at about 10:30am. Bloody hot. Instructor F(3) announces that there will be no training as it is too hot. By midday it is a cool 42ºC. Hung around for several hours chatting. There was also a fly in, a Cessna C172. Nice!

One of the members took me through a DI (daily inspection) with the Twin. This inspection happens before the first flight of each day. Basically checks that the control surfaces are working, the battery is in and that there are no noticeable structural problems. I tried to remember all the important stuff.

Overcast and light rain in the morning. Stayed at home.

Arrived at airfield just as the Twin was being towed to 26L. Excellent! Light westerly blowing. First flight with instructor F(2) and he informs me about the "your plane" and "my plane" communication protocol. Winch launch to 1000ft. I still need to get used to that huge acceleration and those nasty negative G's as the cable is released and the nose quickly pushed down. Instructor finds a weak thermal over the industrial part of town (just east of the airfield) and manages to get us to about 1250ft.

My turn at the controls. First time ever! Have no clue what I'm doing. Even though I know all the basics (in theory), my brain just goes into confused mode. Fixate on the ASI and watch alarmingly how easily it drops from 100km/h to 80 (stall speed). Try a few turns but make a hash of it as my brain overloads with, that once you have established the turn, you must centralise the controls to maintain the turn, and then apply opposite controls to level off again. Makes perfect sense in theory, but my brain doesn't comprehend. Motion-sickness starting to set in. Instructor takes over and lands us. Air time 18 minutes, with me "at" the controls for about 3 minutes (Cost = 67,40ZAR).