I finally made it, too!

First of all, congratulations to John (BucFan), whose posting of a
successful checkride prompted me to write.

I've rarely posted here, but I've been consistently lurking, and I have
learned a lot from the group in the last year-and-a-half. Thanks to
all of you for that.

I passed my PPL-ASEL checkride yesterday, out of Morristown, NJ (KMMU).
It's a great feeling!

My stats, for those who might be interested:

Started, August, 2005
First Solo, December 2005 at 18 hours
Completed, November 2006
Primary training aircraft, C172 (with a couple of hours in a 182, and a
Piper Archer II on vacation trips back to my native Idaho)
83 hours total logged at time of checkride, about 70 of that dual
instruction in 46 lessons.

I averaged just over 3 lessons a month, despite all efforts to do two a
week. I endured lots of cancellations due to weather, or rarely,
aircraft or instructor availability.

I don't feel too bad about the total hours. I'm based just 15 miles
from Manhattan, and 12 from Newark International...I knew that learning
at a busy, towered airport with lots of bizjet traffic would add time,
and while I'd love to have bragging rights to earning the cert at, or
just over, the minimum require time, I know I feel more comfortable in
this environment having the extra time under my belt.

Total cost (I should have known better than to keep records...) was
just a hair under $10,000. I did get a lot of hours for that, and the
figure includes my buy-in for a local flying club. I've not only got
my ticket to show for the investment, I've got a small equity stake in
two Cessnas and I pay hourly rates significantly lower than those
offered by any of the local flight schools or FBOs. I picked up a nice
handheld nav/com radio and a couple of DC headsets, too, which are
included in the total cost. The only bit of bad luck was that I
started lessons about a week before Hurricane Katrina struck, and the
subsequent rise in fuel prices drove up the hourly wet rate on the
plane by nearly 40% over the course of my training. It's only now
starting to come back down.

I did ground school on my own, using the Gleim books, Jeppson CD, and
"Stick and Rudder" and "Say Again, Please" as additional references.
Passed the knowledge test with a 97%.

My favorite part of the whole process: My first short solo CC to a
nearby airport. I took off from MMU between a Gulfstream and a
Citation, I passed a Pitts biplane over Somerset (SMQ), and I entered
the landing pattern at Solberg (N51) behind the Metlife blimp! It
felt like I'd flown through the entire history of aviation, in just 20
NM.

Now the real learning starts...

Gary