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Your 2019 flying year, how many hours, and aspirations for 2020?

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Caba wrote:

2019: CPL theory by February, FI theory by April. Hope to have CPL/ IR / FI all finished by October. Want to fly a new type, do some gliding, fly with a kid to keep a promise. Take my family to the sea, finally visit EDXH. By the end of 2019 I´d love to see 100+ more hours in my logbook and a big smile on my face.

Maybe I was a little optimistic, I haven´t achieved all my goals yet, but the smile is there. CPL and FI finished in April and December, paperwork still to come, but there was next to no time for any other flying in spring and summer. No gliding, no family trip to the sea….2020, here I come! :)

EDFE, EDFZ, KMYF, Germany

2019 has been excellent flying-wise. In January I bought a quarter of a Maule, an aeroplane I have wanted since a first saw one when I was aged about fifteen in about 1980. In the eleven months since then I have done thirty-eight and a half hours in it including trips to The Netherlands and Scotland. To use the Maule, I have had to learn to fly it from a tricky farm strip which has been the bigger flying challenge of the year. I also got a CS propeller approval and passed my two-yearly SEP and IR(R) revalidations. I also did about seven hours in PA28s and an hour in an AA5. Oh and a flying mate gave me an hour RHS in his Breezer which was a delight to fly. I also had a buzzard make a hole in the wing-tip of the Maule at 2000 feet over Suffolk. Other notes, showing mate a Class D transit then him showing me side-slipping a PA28 (we learnt at different schools with diffrent priorities!). Finally, not real flying but I did some tens of hours in the Airlander simulator as both pilot and Flight Test Engineer, playing computer games at work my other-half calls it.

Next year, more hours in the Maule is all I want. Hoping finally to get to the the Scilly Isles and for our big trip, The Republic of Ireland.

strip near EGGW

It wasn’t bad year 130 hours, mainly trips to nice places, just few business trips. For the next year I’m planning to do a bit more, maybe a trip to Scotland (following flight to Blackpool for visiting my daughter), maybe a trip to Morocco, probably Sardinia in June combined with cave diving and for sure our fly-ins.

Last Edited by Emir at 27 Dec 22:39
LDZA LDVA, Croatia

36 hrs, finally got my PPL this year! And started IR(R) after doing 10hrs PIC XC. Instructor says that the actual course is completed, passed the theory exam, now I need to book (and pass!) the IR(R) practical. I’ve done a lot of instrument approaches, been to a few places but not may landings away! Aspirations? Get my IR(R) and start flying IFR XC to get hours towards the CB-IR.

EGTR

Good flying year, perhaps the best ever. 120+ hours, got my IR (finally!!) in January, then did a great trip around the SW US in March, followed by some medium range x-countries to Napa Valley, etc. Passed my CPL written test, but had to postpone the practical (oral and flying) due to – fog! Arrghhh. Now rescheduled for later in January, so hope to get that done soon and thus kick off 2020 on a high.

MedEwok wrote in last year’s thread:

In 2018 so far I flew 8 hrs 2 min, down from 25 hrs 36 min as stated above. As for my other goals: I did indeed get checked out in a four seater (the C172) The Bornholm trip was cancelled because I didn’t get the plane (TB20) and lacked currency for it I took one other person with me this year, who is incidentally also the friend I wanted to visit in EDKB, but who has now moved here as well

Generally a highly disappointing flying year, although probably much more typical for the average PPL pilot than what many others posted here. I haven’t given up hope yet to get another one or two flights in this year, but expect no more than 10 hours total. All my trips have been local (no more than 50 nm away) due to needing to be back home by afternoon when the kids get back from kindergarten.

After this disappointing year I am cautios to formulate elaborate goals for next year. If I make it past July 2019 with my SEP rating intact (it expires in July) then I have achieved the main goal, anything above that is a bonus. I’d love to join the Venice fly in but with the very low currency I have this seems unlikely at this point.

2019: 6 hrs 49 min, so it did indeed get worse than last year.

BUT the main goal was achieved, as I still have a valid SEP rating after revalidation with a FE in July, days before my rating would have expired. The main obstacle in 2019 was that the school I used to rent from sold all their SEPs during the winter time, which I was not aware of when the season for VFR flying started again. I only found out in March and then had to look for a new club or school within the short time span until my rating expired. I took a wrong turn once and was about to enter a club that was so fractured by political infighting that I took a step back immediately. I then found a nearby for-profit outfit which offered reasonable rates and had an owner who is also an FE, and he helped me to get current again.

After being checked out in the C172R last year, in the old school, I had to do it all again this year in the new school’s C172N when their Aquila A210, which I had hoped to fly more after the revalidation, suffered from oil overheating problems and could not be rented for months.

I had a short trip planned with two non-pilot friends and had two dates reserved earlier this month when all our calendars had aligned (and how rare is that for three full-time hospital doctors!) but the weather was unflyable on both occasions, with beautiful CAVOK on the days inbetween. That was really sad!

For the next year, things are looking up. I got a SkyDemon subscription as a birthday present and want to make good use of it. Goals will be simple

  • Take my father on a flight (I promised it as a birthday present for him)
  • Take the friends who missed out this year due to weather on a flight, preferably to the East Frisian islands
  • Finally take my wife and kids airborne with me
  • Get checked out on at least one more of the school’s aircraft. They have recently bought a PA28, a type which I have never flown before, and I might try to get some UL time as well.
  • Realistic goal at the end of the year is about 10 hours of flight time. The more, the better.
Last Edited by MedEwok at 28 Dec 00:56
Low-hours pilot
EDVM Hildesheim, Germany

2019 has been down a bit…

2013: 145 hrs
2014: 187
2015: 179
2016: 160
2017: 120
2018: 138
2019: 122

There has been quite a lot of bad weather which resulted in cancelled trips. The May fly-in to Venice was difficult; due to widespread bad wx I went by airline, and only a few others made it. The grass runway resulted in many cancellations.

The longest trip was the fly-in to Tivat/Kotor in Montenegro. Unusually, didn’t do Greece this year; there was a plan to fly to LGIO from Tivat but it didn’t happen.

The most interesting trip was to Ouessant; a little island in the NW of France. This is an FR-only airport so I flew there with a French pilot.

Especially memorable was a holiday on Alderney for my birthday; a super easy 45 min flight and a very different world to explore for a few days.

For 2020, I have no special plans. I’d like to do some fly-ski trips. These are difficult to do especially if you aren’t a great skier and have to be picky about the locations. I would also like to do a flight around the Alps. I did one in 2004 out of Wangen-Lachen and saw some amazing scenery. And as always I hope to meet up a lot of you again at Aero Friedrichshafen in April.

The TB20 continues to do exactly what I need, mostly with the 1990s avionics

The main challenge is as before: keep flying interesting. I am looking forward to the May 2020 one for which we currently have three possible locations.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

37hrs 10 mins for me, including most of the IR(R) course, not to bad as it included a 2 month break brought on by terrible weather, low a/c availability and life in general. Best trip by far was a 4hr round trip from Lee on Solent to Newquay on a lovely summers day for lunch. An incredible privilege. Hopefully 2020 will bring the IR(R) and night rating plus first cross channel trip to LFAT and Jersey. Blue skies to all.

United Kingdom

2019 was a really good year.

65 hours of very varying kinds of flying – the most I’ve ever done in a single year when I was not also training for a license or rating. Voluntary Air Corps exercises, forest fire patrols, some long trips (Friedrichshafen and the Adriatic), local flights — both for my own pleasure and “introductory” flights with pax — ferry flights, some flights in the US…

If the weather hadn’t been so shitty in Sweden this autumn, I would have had another 5 hours…

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

60h/year with 20h in trip UK-France-Morocco and 10h UK flying to Lands End on vintage (with Noe in single seaters), the rest was boring local flying and few London-Paris commutes

Next year: getting my IR this spring and do few IFR trips in good weather and hopefully some instruction instead of wasting time in local flying

Paris/Essex, France/UK, United Kingdom
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