Almost a pilot.

I’m in a good place confidence wise at the moment. I’ve almost stopped thinking of myself as a student pilot. I guess I consider myself a pilot who just hasn’t passed her flight test yet.

I really think I’ve got the basics sorted now; I just need to gain experience and polish off the rough edges. I honestly know that I can do what I need to do to get my license. It’s just a matter of time now.

Of course time isn’t being kind to me, winter has just been totally brutal this year and the end still doesn’t seem to be in sight.

Last weekend RTH and I took a little jaunt to the base of Lake Simcoe, it suddenly dawned on me that RTH wasn’t doing anything that I couldn’t do. I could have handled that flight easily on my own. In fact, as RTH pointed out, at this point I’m actually more flight current than he is. A quick look in his log book revealed that, due to being in the circuit working on his night rating, he hadn’t been above 2000ft in nearly 6 months.

He actually asked me to remind him if he had missed anything or was about to do something stupid. This was kind of weird, a shift in the balance of power a little bit. I’m not used to being the “experienced” pilot in the cockpit but yes, I’m certainly more “away from the airport” current than RTH is.

The simple fact is that for all intents and purposes I’m a capable and competent pilot albeit a little low on the hours and experience.

I need to widen my horizons a little bit. I’m already expanding my comfort zone in terms of weather and crosswind capabilities.  Now I’m looking at new airports and cross country flights.

I’m also about to do something either incredibly brave or stupid. I’m about to take my first passenger on a trip to an airport that I’ve never flown to before. A full on flight with route planning, filing a flight plan and all that jazz.

Okay so Bob is going to be in the righthand seat but this is a massive step for me. I’m equal measures scared and excited and proud.