Like most people that get into flying, I was no different. My love of aircraft goes back as far as I can remember and was probably started by my father who told me tales from his time in the Royal Air force both before and during world war II.

From the age of eight or so I had built model airplanes and continue to do so today from time to time. At the age of thirteen I joined the Air Training Corp (402 Squadron in Gravesend Kent) and the RAF gave me my first chance of real flying in Chipmunks mainly at Manston RAF station in Kent. By the time I was 20 I had decided to learn to fly and on 18th. November 1970 took my first flying lesson at Rochester airport in a Druine Condor G-ARVZ.

Although that first flight only lasted thirty minutes, I was hooked and spent the next two years scrimping and saving to pay for my lessons. On the 22nd. March 1972 I passed my PPL test (GFT) and over the next couple of years I did as much flying as I could afford which was never very much. At the same time I had met my wife Jackie and we decided to get married and buy our first home. As I didn't earn enough to pay a mortgage and fly aeroplanes one had to go, and flying lost. Other than a few odd trips here and there, starting a business and raising a family took all of my time for some 30 years or so and the flying had to take a back seat.

After a Long Break.

Now things are much easier, my youngsters have grown up and left home to start their own lives and both Jackie and I have more time to ourselves, Jackie is a  keen horse rider and that takes a lot of her time and I have got back into my flying.

I am flying out of Andrewsfield in Essex and I have an excellent instructor in Carol Cooper who is the CFI there (checkout UK Pilot magazine in the "Fly Like a Professional" series, she's famous!!!) and if you live near Braintree in Essex and you want to learn to fly you couldn't do better that learn here, the club is very friendly, has an excellent restaurant and bar and they can train you for just about anything you need, PPL,FIC, IMC and Night Ratings and they have an excellent radio instructor in Steve Wilkes, I highly recommend him.

Getting my license back has been a great deal of fun, although I had forgotten how stressful exams can be. Carol doesn't let me get away with anything I'm pleased to say, a hard task master but a really good teacher( I have to say that in case she reads this :-) ).

Ok, so now we are getting up to date and hopefully I soon should have finished my PPL re-validation. I hope to go on and do my IMC and Night ratings once the PPL is out of the way.

I needed to decide how to take my flying forward, I could continue to fly from Andrewsfield, renting club aircraft, but I have gone that route before, and its never easy if you want an aircraft for a trip away.

It's not cost effective for clubs to let this happen and I don't blame them.

I want to be able to decide to go flying whenever its convenient for me, so the answer I think is to own my own aircraft.

I have spent the last three or four months looking at what's available, should I buy new, secondhand or build it myself? that's the question.

Addition June 2007

Since originally writing this section I have an update that I wanted to include on these pages. Now I had bought the Pioneer kit I had been trying to convince my wife (Jackie) to make the most of my new toy with me; she was not convinced. I had spent a good few months trying to convince her to take the "Wives course" at Andrewsfield, this involves 5 hours of flying tuition to teach her how to perform basic control manoeuvres and land the aircraft. The idea being if anything were to incapacitate me whilst we were in the air together then she would be able to get us down again.

I eventually managed to convince her to give it a go and to my surprise she did. She has said since that she did it just to shut me up which I believe :-) .

Her instructor was Jon Dyer and to his credit managed to get her to enjoy the flying so much she decided to do the full PPL course, I was amazed, she had gone from being petrified of flying in a light aircraft to an "Anorak" in one easy step!!! . She is well into her course and has already completed 4 of her exams. She often lectures me on air law just to prove she knows her stuff.

We now both have a common interest that we can share which means we will make the most of our investment, I cant wait.

I have G-LEAH insured so that she can complete some of her training in our own aircraft which will let her become accustomed to all the gadgets we have.

Good on you Jackie!!

John Ferguson (June 2007).

Update August 2008.

In August this year Jackie passed her PPL so we are now a two pilot family.

Along the way she picked up the Jim Heelan Memorial Trophy for outstanding acheivement given by Andrewsfield Flying club and I was so proud of her.

It was a real acheivement to go from someone who had a real fear of flying to not only get her licence but to overcome that fear and become a good pilot to boot. Well done Jackie!

Note:-

Jim Heelan was a flying instructor at Andrewsfield who was tragically killed in a road traffic accident. The trophy is awarded annually for outstanding acheivement in his memory.