Do you fly in your own neighborhood?

When you fly VFR for pleasure, do you prefer to limit your flying to the area
around your home base, where you know the geography and airspaces and
navigation points, or do you prefer to fly to many different places that
you've never seen before?

Personally, I prefer long cross-country flights to new realms. I am
never happier then I am whilst over-flying areas of this continent
that I've never before seen.

Reality, however, is inconvenient. Unlike the sim world, I am
constrained by finances, weather, and time. This means that most of
our flights are within 200 miles of Iowa City, since we (at most)
usually have 4 or 5 hours off at a time. After flying twice a week
for 12 years, simple math proves that most of our flights will be to
areas we've visited multiple times before.

Luckily, partially because of the seasons in the Midwest, it's hard to
get bored with flying. For example, flying into St. Louis in January
is NOTHING like flying in July, and the fall colors along the
Mississippi River in October are hard to beat.

Ultimately, three or four times each year, we launch ourselves toward
areas unknown, comforted by the knowledge that all those local flights
have kept us sharp for the challenging longer ones.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"