So I had a pretty good weekend. No hurricanes. No earthquakes. Some wonderful weather. Hanging out with some friends. Beer. It would have been an excellent weekend anyways, but yesterday was even cooler than usual. I actually got to fly an airplane. Yes, you read that right. Two people trusted me with their lives, and survived! And I must say, it was pretty friggin’ cool. We’ve got a family friend who owns a 4-seater single-engine plane who came to Sylva to fly some kids around for a special program. Thankfully, he invited us to come and check out his wings. After waiting a little bit, I got to go up with him and check out the views around Western North Carolina. Here’s a few images of the Jackson County “International” Airport (and by “international” I mean one runway on top of a mountain).
Jackson County International Runway, er, Airport
Nice View. Don't look down after takeoff though...
Taking off wasn’t too bad, although I must admit I was pretty much scared shitless for most of the experience. The cool thing about the airport (runway) is that it is literally on top of a mountain. So it drops you off the end of the mountain as you take off, which is a pretty cool (and slightly terrifying) experience. Once we got up to about 4000 feet, our friend let me take the controls a fly around a bit. I did about 17 loops, a barrel roll and a few Immelmann turns once I got the feel for the plane. Yeah, I went from a novice to a professional in under 5 minutes.
You can just call me 'Maverick' (or Badass) from now on
Getting ready for takeoff.
In all reality, it was pretty cool, despite the fact I didn’t get to do any acrobatic maneuvers. Flying a real plane is pretty close to all those flight simulator games I’ve played growing up, except if you don’t pull up in time in real life, you die.
Yeah, I flew so close to the control tower, Brianna spilled her coffee. Actually, there is no control tower and Brianna wasn't drinking coffee, but I was flying the plane here.
Unfortunately, while the Boy enjoyed watching the planes take off and land, he was not that interested in getting too close to the planes, so he didn’t take a ride. Maybe next time he can take a few turns at a few loops. Anyways, he’s a video of us coming down at the airport. I would’ve taken more videos or photos while we were in the air, but I was kicking butt and flying a friggin’ airplane!
So jealous! That’s awesome! Will lead to a new hobby in the future?
It might lead to a new hobby-if for some reason I suddenly have more money that I know what to do with, I think I might buy and maintain an aircraft. More likely I’ll have to stick to making beer.