It'a bird... it's a plane...it's Superm...wait a minute... That's T! Flying a plane!

A while ago I found out that T had a secret wish to fly a plane and drive a stunt car all crazy like. Okay, a secret wish is a bit of an exaggeration. It's more like he thought it would be cool to do those two things.

So for Valentine's Day I bought T a gift card from Leading Edge Aviation for a half hour Discovery Flight where T would actually get to fly a plane.

In March T came up for spring break and it was time to fly. T's co-pilot / trainer was Erin. She had beautiful red hair. I thought we would start out with some training videos or manuals or lectures, but Erin took T straight out to the plane!

Erin told T all the things to inspect before take off.

Here T is slacking off while Erin checks to make sure the plane won't fall apart while we are in it.

Really, I was just trying to get pictures without embarrassing T (and myself) in front of Erin.

I'm sure it is considered tres uncool to have your girlfriend ask you to pose for photos while you are supposed to be learning to fly...

Then we got in the plane and Erin started explaining all the stuff on the dash.

A self photo - I was in the backseat staying out of the way.

We all wore these sweet headsets so we could talk to each other.

Erin telling T how to fly. The whole instructional was about 5 minutes long! That's it!




Don't mind that the shot starts with my shoes. I was trying to be discreet about how many pictures and videos I was taking because it was a lot. I didn't want to embarrass us! Also, don't mind the shaky video. I think it is pretty apparent that I am not the half of this marriage that attended film school.


I was glad T had done some flight simulator stuff and was somewhat familiar with how a plane works because a few seconds later we were taxi-ing!




I was listening to the instructions Erin gave T but if I had to fly, we would all be in trouble. On this Discovery Flight T could do everything except land. He taxi-ed and took off and did swirly dos and turns and lined us up to land and then Erin did the actual landing. Oh, and Erin also pulled a zero G for us. More on that later.

T doing take off:



Remember I am in the back seat and could hardly see anything out the front window so these are all side views.

Flying in a big 747 is way different than flying in a little Cessna type plane. It is much more apparent that only a thin sheet of metal is stopping you from plummeting to the earth. I actually wasn't scared of the "plummeting to the earth" part because I've already done that (skydiving - my parents said, "Why would you want to jump out of a perfectly good plane?!")! It was such a rush to be with T flying in that little plane.

Don't worry, we are much higher in the air than some of these photos suggest because I was zoomed in:

Just over the airport (this one isn't zoomed)

The Utah State Capitol

Temple Square area

The Grand America

On our way into Immigration canyon we hit a bit of turbulence (more startling than it would be in a big plane), but it was over very quickly. T made this huge turn and we were almost parallel to the ground. I'm not moving the camera in this video; the plane is doing all the moving.

Immigration Canyon

You better believe it gets cold in a little plane with no insulation that high up!

Also, the engine is so much louder than I thought it would be.

That swirly do down there is a road. We are pretty high up at this point.

Once we were past Immigration Canyon, Erin asked us if we liked roller coasters because she wanted to pull a zero G. We said yes, and it was a roller coaster ride to be sure. Erin actually did three for us. The first one was the best and that was the one I didn't take video of! I was pulled up out of my seat and wished I had done my seat belt just a bit tighter. (In reality, I don't think my seat belt could have been tighter. I am the girl who sucks in so she can make the seat belt just a bit tighter at Lagoon so she is sure she won't fall out.)

The second time around I got the cup floats video:



It's hard to film in this situation!


The third time T caught a pencil:



Apparently this catching stuff after it floats from a G is pretty popular. My dad used to catch keys after a zero G when he would fly (as a passenger) with his buddy in California.

I'll be straight with you: I liked the first zero G but the second and third made me feel sick. Not sick like "I need a bag" sick, but sick like, "I would really like to lie down and be still for a while" sick. I didn't get over it until we were back at my house.


The propeller and the mountains. I just thought this one looked cool:




Coming out of Immigration Canyon check out how sideways we get! It's the plane doing that, not my fantastic professional quality camera work!

Downtown as we head back to the airport

T at the controls:




T lined us up for the landing, but Erin actually touched us down:

After we were done I got out and told T to stay in the plane and look "pilot-y."

I love this one!

SO much fun!

Erin said that T did a really great job, better than most people. I thought so too.

I was expecting it to be more bumpy, but it was a very smooth ride. Way to go, T!

When we got back to my house T was just like a little kid who played so much that he tuckered himself out.

So now in the event of an aircraft emergency T can fly us to safety and do an emergency landing! Or maybe only the first half of that...the second part was the one thing he didn't learn how to do...