My first lesson consisted of only 1/2 hour of flight time. Had I only scheduled with Paul for 1 hour, I possibly could have not flown at all until the next time. Also, by making longer appointments, more flight time can be covered per trip to the airport. While this may sound like a small detail, I think that it will play a big role in saving time and money in the end. Another note on this subject is to schedule for more than one lesson a week. I plan to do that very soon as my summer schedule otherwise becomes more fixed, and I get my first paycheck in the bank. The more often a student has lessons, less review is needed and faster familiarization of manuevers is attained. The determining factor for the frequency may be money flow, but also consider getting burned out.

After some talk with Paul, we went out to the aircraft and spent a very considerable amount of time on the preflight inspection. Not only did we follow the checklist (THE ALMIGHTY CHECKLIST), but Paul stopped to give some information about what was being inspected and the detriment associated with the failure of that piece of machinery. Preflight inspections are not hard and I will quickly perform them myself.

We taxied out of Gulf Atlantic and to the run-up area. More checklist activity is performed here. Paul did all the radio communication. The tower cleared us and we lined up with the center line. Paul said,"Push the throttle all the way in and ease back on the controls." Thinking he was just talking through what he was going to do, I simply nodded and absorbed. I quickly realized he was telling me to take off. That was very exciting.

We got up in the air and he familiarized me with the surrounding area. He pointed out landmarks and such. We landed and were done for the day.