Now that I finally have some time to sit down and start typing, I am happy to be putting some time back into this site.

With the weather on and off since late December, I looked for every open window that presented itself to get back in the air. Before I left for work, I checked the weather outside to see if things would be clear enough to fly later in the afternoon. The weather checks called for some clear skies with high visibility so I brought my flight bag to work just in case.

I waited until about 10:00am before calling my flight instructor and seeing if he was available later in the day to spend some time with me around the pattern. I was upset what I got his voicemail, fearing I may not be able to take advantage of the beautiful weather. It wasn’t long after he called me back to let me know he was free and that he would book 222CV for a 2:00pm flight.

When I got to VNY, I chatted with the people at Continental for a while and then headed outside to preflight the plane. Everything was in tip top shape so I pulled the plane to the red line for taxi and my CFI and myself were ready for departure.

We went into the pattern and did 3 landings together before he asked if I wanted to get some solo time in. I felt confident that I could fly the pattern alone now so I pulled off of taxiway Bravo to drop him off at the new CFI bench. He told me to do a few landings to a full stop and taxi back each time.

I was surprised to find that the nerves I had from my first solo were replaced with confidence. After flying the pattern at VNY so many times, it was almost like second nature to me. My nerves were calm and I was focused on making the best landings to my ability. My first landing was as smooth as I could have asked for. I pulled off of 16L and made the call to tower to taxi back to the runway. My second time around I landed on all wheels at the same time but it wasn’t a rough landing. It wasn’t perfect but it was comfortable. On my third landing, one of the things I fear when landing happened. I came in at a bit of an angle and the right side of the plane dipped a little too much. I was able to keep control and straighten out the plane for a taxi back to my CFI at the bench.

He approved of my landings and told me that he wanted to do another supervised solo and then I would be free to check out the plane (upon his approval) and start racking up solo hours when I have the free time. I was good to get that time in and add to my existing solo time. I logged 1.1 hours and contributed to my logged solo time.