Pic of the day… the Finsteraarhorn 14’022ft
Wow! How clear it can be… comparing to what I had today…
I have some 9 months in Flysto… it looks nice 
Is Flysto could import Flitestar routepacks, I could produce something like this (Sicily, Ireland, etc are missing)
but only a very small part would be from 2023 And I do a lot of short trips under VFR, so no Flitestar… I might have a FF track afterwards but that needs to be exported.
Another year with very little flying, and now airplane is for sale. A terrible year professionally, and that’s coming off a few years of some pretty stiff competition… As I was cooking dinner yesterday it dawned on me that in 2024, it’s been 5 years of Covid-mess and bad financial times (at least for me). This has also colored my aviation needs – I’m honestly sick of paying through the nose for it and it has taken almost all the fun out of it. Next plane will be a Cri-Cri or something simple I can work on myself. I’m done paying $900 for a PMA part from AC Delco I can buy at Autozone for $19.
On a more positive note, I’ve always done better in “hard times”. And I think 2024 will be hard for most people, with the markets coming down etc. I’m hoping to buck the trend like it did in 2008 for me.
That’s sad to hear, Adam.
I hope that you manage to downsize to something a little more capable than a Cri-Cri I don’t suppose many people had the courage to tell you this but you did pick about the hardest combination to manage: an old twin turboprop! Well, I suppose a B29 would have been a bigger challenge still
Get yourself a nice fast long range SEP and enjoy yourself while spending a small fraction of what you used to spend.
Covid changed the world in so many ways, taking many long term pilots out of the game in the process. But you don’t need to join them.
@Adam your nice Turboprop Commander is very good value, hopefully Neal Schwartz finds a new home for it. A second hand homebuilt Legend Cub would be my suggestion, you can work on it yourself and it will hold its value.
I just started learning to fly in 2023. Beginning with Gliders and gradually on TMG. I was hoping to complete LAPL (A) in 2023, however couldn’t achieve that goal.
Some highlights of the year:
Looking forward for a more successful 2024 for all of us!
I knew that all roads lead to Rome, but didnt realise that all flights lead to Shoreham. Thank you Peter for illuminating this for us!
One day I will install a custom made tracker which just runs and creates tracks in KML or whatever, but the last 22 years are only partially documented, by loading all Flitestar routepacks on top of each other. Unfortunately I didn’t use FS for a lot of flights, like one spectacular VFR trip around Ireland, with @dublinpilot navigating And I often fly with just a screenshot from the Autorouter, if it shows all the waypoints. The FS screenshots were however great for documenting trip writeups.
One thing I am especially pleased about is how many young people we have here, doing decent trips. The image of GA is often one of “cantankerous old codgers” (a description common in the UK) and it is super to see things changing.
I also hope for a fly to ski meetup this winter
Just over 31 hours for me this year. Lower than hoped, a combination of a bad year of business, primarily continued effects of interest rate increases, 2 terrible business partners (both of whom i should have known better) cost me well into 6 figures.
2024 will be MUCH better, planning to finally get the IR done later in the year and currently planning my business goals for 2024 in a more simplfied format with the right people!
