Introduction

Well, I always wanted to fly. I took theoretical part of glider course in Gliwice long time ago, but I couldn't stand "social work" needed to be a member of aeroclub. Then a long time passed by...

Then after few years I was browsing polish aviation newspaper while staing in different city due of project work. I noticed quite affordable courses in Czech republic. I called instantly and inquired to all whats, hows and wheres.

Then I though - Hmm, ultralights planes are fine, but lets call some "real" flying schools. I phoned few of them and got really good impression of Normal-Jafernik in Bielsko-Biała. This is not far away from Gliwice, where I used to live, so during my next visit to parents I just went there for a demo flight.

Wow! That was it. I flew just 30 minutes in C152, but I'll never forget first thrills of flying. I decided to continue in vacation time. They had shown me Jeppesen Guided Flight Discovery manuals, so next day I ordered "Private Pilot Manual" and "Instrument/Commercial Manual".

After returning home I recalled price differences of helicopter flying I noticed few years ago. So I started to look for american flight schols. And then real search began. I had two choises - either Florida or California. I decided to go to California, because of very good comments about Anglo-American Aviation and San Diego airspace (it's so complicated that after learning there you can fly anywhere!). Additionally I didn't really like "flateness" of Florida and swamps.
So for a price less that course in Poland I got five weeks stay in USA, opportunity to use english some more, nice planes, all training materials, apartment with pool. :-)

As for using pilot license, I did long crosscoutry around southern USA - it took 18 days and 67 hours of flight time - it was great!

Every time I'm in USA I try to arrange some flying in free time - hopefully my vists to USA are quite frequent.

Recently I also managed to get my licence validated by polish CAA, which will let me fly Katana DA20-A1 which I found available for very reasonable fee. I'll also fly Piper Cub J-3, which is based in Warsaw. Unfortunatly I don't have taildragger endorsement so will be limited to flying with instructor.

For future, I plan to attend Instrument Rating course in April 2006, preferably together with my friend Tomek. Other plans include trips to Alaska and Carribean crosscountry: Bahamas, Dominican Rep, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Netherlands Antilles and maybye Guadeloupe.

Possibly after completing IFR training I'll reach 250 hours total time, and that will be good moment to upgrade my certificate to Commercial, together with adding Multiengine rating.