Much more practice

I went out twice yesterday! The first time was at 1pm out of San Carlos. I went up in 610SP, and did six takeoffs and landings in the pattern. It's interesting -- just because you have your license, doesn't mean this stuff all of a sudden becomes automatic. It's a lot like practicing your swing-out in Lindy Hop; even if you've been dancing for years, you still tweak your swing-out. I don't know if landing is the same way, but so far it sure seems like it.

Anyway, so I think I finally shook off my ground shyness that had set in over the last couple of months of not flying very much. I got my landings to be on the center line. And I learned the hard way that Kaiser is not the same as the AT&T Tower (any SQL pilots reading this are pointing and laughing at me right now).

After that, I went again last night at 7:30pm out of Palo Alto. Sunset was at 6:26pm, so my goal was to go out and do three takeoffs and landings to maintain my night currency. I took 222MF, a really nice plane. It was so nice to do pattern work with nobody else around; while my six landings earlier took 1.3 hours, my four landings at night took only 0.7 hours, with a much, much longer taxi. I did four landings because the first one was kind of flat. The next three were great though, and on the last two I used my soft-field technique with some success.

This week, weather permitting, I'll check out on the Piper Archer. I've never been in a small low-wing aircraft before, so I'm very excited!

And by the way, I'm still lusting after the Diamond DA40-TDI. 5.0 GPH at cruise in a 4-seater! And Jet-A fuel, which is cheaper than 100LL. Trouble is, these aren't sold in the US :-(