Well I'm going to try and do this a bit different. I just got home from the
airport and I'm determined to try and encapsulate my day's flying in writing
*before* I have a hot bath to relieve the aches and pains (and boy do I ache
today) or fall asleep and wipe my memory of the flights. Hopefully this
will prove a useful learning exercise for me also, cementing in the lessons
learnt and the mistakes made to avoid next time.

A misty morning saw my departure for the field delayed by a couple of hours.
No big deal, I spent it leading an OCA strike against a Balkan airfield in
Falcon 4.0 :-) I thought about trying a few circuits in FS2004 but decided
I ought not to fly my helicopter sim too soon before trying it again for
real. So, I arrived just before midday as the haze had lifted revealing a
7/8 cloud ceiling at about 1800 ft. The wind was a bit strong, around 20
knots. That'll scupper the hover turns I'm supposed to learn today I
thought! Great, I'll get to practice something easier, consolidate my
learning a bit. No chance! As I was soon informed, the Schwiezer 300 has
no crosswind limitation so we're going for it anyway...

So I got to practice a couple of take-offs and landings first. My take-offs
are pretty much spot on most of the time, but my landings are really clumsy.
I can manage it to where the left skid touches down and then I just loose
it. Anyway, plenty of time to work on that so onto the hover turns. I was
amazed at how violently the wind catches the tail rotor as it aproaches 90
degrees on. Doing a right turn from a headwind really freaked me out the
first time. I completely miscalculaed how much left pedal would be needed,
and how suddenly. It gets to about 70 degrees and then wham! Jump on that
pedal or you're totally out of control. Then again at about 170 degrees the
tail fin gets caught and wham! again. So a few sloppy left and right 360
degree turns and I was knackered. I found myself gripping the cyclic with a
death grip for the first time in my training. I've been really good and
light on the control until now, but every muscle in my body couldn't help
tensing up as I struggled with those turns. Next we did a bit of sideways,
backwards and hover taxi flight. I found that a lot easier, and didn't
really have to think about the opposite pedals to cyclic required.

To give me a bit of a break we then headed out away from the field to
practice some autos. After the mental battering hover turns had given me I
actually found normal flight both easy and harder at the same time. I felt
comfortable aiming for direction, altitude and airspeed, but I also had to
consciously remind myself of Attiude, Power, Trim, and Power, Attitude, Trim
for the climbing and descending. I really felt like I needed an easy hour
just practicing the basics! But alas, it was straight into auto practice.
I stuffed up the first one. My mind had just completely forgotten what I
was supposed to be doing. I entered the auto well enough and I controlled
the airspeed ok, but completely forgot to watch the rotor RPM and my brain
didn't even consider that I might have to do something to control it!
Second time I gave myself a mental slap and talked myself through it,
forcing myself to focus on what I was doing rather than let my subconscious
simply take me along for the ride. It was better, but I think I need to get
the instructor to verbally brief me through it again when I do the next lot.

After a break for lunch and a coffee we were up again. I did the takeoff
and hover taxi across the runway to the practice area and it was straight
into more hover turns. I coped *much* better that time. I anticipated the
pedal input and didn't scare myself as I'd done an hour or so earlier. And
guess what? I realised after doing a few hover turns, and a bit more
sideways flight that I can hover really comfortably, after about only a
total of an hour's practice. He made me track the outline of a mown square
using lateral flight and I did it. Ok, the backwards bit was a challenge
since the wind was at a diagonal angle, but I didn't get too far out of
shape. (Actually, thinking about it.. I did that before the break for
coffee. See, it only takes an hour for my memory to fade..)

Then we did transitions from the takeoff into forward flight and climb-out.
I didn't really struggle with that, but it was only on the fourth or fifth
attempt did I really keep the nose in line. I'm sure it looked awful from a
spectator's view! We did some approaches too, but I keep overshooting the
mark. I know what to do: "constant picture" is familiar to anyone who's had
any time with PC simulations, but I just haven't quite got it yet. I think
I did one that was ok, but it was only just the good side of ok.

My instructor then gave me another exercise to try. He had me keep a
constant heading and hover around another square outlined on the floor about
50 ft in each direction, side on to the wind. I did that with little or no
difficulty, but try as I might I just couldn't land in the middle
afterwards! I was beginning to feel quite tired, though I didn't notice
until after we'd finished. It wasn't until later that I figured out what I
can't cope with the last couple of inchesin the landing. It's because the
H300 hovers left skid down and nose low. So as the left front skid touches
down, it then rocks backwards and sideways as the other comes down and it
settles on them both. This has me freaking as I'm subconsciously assuming
that my hovering picture is with the aircraft level, and of course it's not.
So I feel as if I'm actually rolling the thing overbackwards and to the
left. I did one landing that was ok, but I really had to fight the
temptation to compensate for the rolling motion on landing. Hopefully now
I've figured out my mental block it will sort itself out!

I then got to try a nose-in circle around a mark on the field. That was
very hard, especially with the wind, and I found myself creeping towards the
marker all the time. I kept having to hover backwards and then continue
around. It was a fun exercise, and one I'm looking forward to being able to
do well.

So that was it for another day. I was truly pooped. I don't think my
instructor realise dhow tired I was (neither did I) until after I'd tried
miserably to put it down on the pad and I commented that I felt like I was
almost dreaming. I'm glad we called it a day at that point. I could have
quite easily hovered about for another hours, but I certainly wouldn't have
learnt anything new.

Oh, and I did a mock Air Law exam, and failed! I'm not disheartened though.
I got 72% which isn't bad considering I've only read half the book and it
wsa my first attempt. I know now which areas I need to concentrate on, and
I'll do that over the next couple of weeks. I should be ready after that to
do the exam, which I have to do before first solo anyway.

That's it, another 2.5 hours in the bag, now 8.4 total. Another 2 tomorrow
and then it'll probably be a week before I can fly again because of work
commitments. (Though I've managed to wangle a day at Helitech'05 at Duxford
on company business!) Now to try and relax those knotted muscles with an
exceedingly hot bath!!

Si