My Discovery Flight
| 3 minutes read, 428 wordsA couple weeks before my discovery flight, I noticed something that made me stop when I scrolled through my Facebook wall. The local airport, which I of course follow, shared a posts from the local flying club, which I amazingly enough had never heard of.
![Haugesund Lufthavn on Facebook](/post/2021/04/flyopplaering-under-korona/hau-hfk-facebook.jpg)
The Facebook post that started it all
Can I really do this
I’ve dreamt about learning to fly for a very long time, and with the option to do it only 15 minutes from home, I didn’t have any other choice - I had to give this a try! But first I needed a discovery flight, since I was a bit afraid that I might get severe motion sickness.
After a couple cancellations it was finally time for my discovery flight!
![Me in the airplane](first-flight.jpg)
Ready for my first flight
Just being on this side of the airport fence, without boarding a jet, was a new experience for me. We started with a quick briefing and the daily inspection of the airplane, a Cessna 172, LN-HOG. Shortly after, we were rolling onto the runway.
![On the runway](on-the-runway.jpg)
On the runway
Taking off
I was a bit nervous, not because I’m afraid to fly, but because I didn’t know what to expect. And climbing with the nose high meant I didn’t see much, which was also very uncomfortable (that feeling luckily only lasted for 3-4 lessons).
I got to see both Utsira and Haugesund from above, but this wasn’t just a sightseeing trip, I also got to control the airplane. Only a few basic maneuvers, straight and level flight and some simple turns. Even though it was a bit stressful at first, it didn’t take more than a split second to realize that this is something I wanted to continue doing!
![Overhead Haugesund](haugesund.jpg)
Overhead Haugesund
The best part of it all, I didn’t get motion sickness! I had some ginger candy I chewed on, which may or may not have helped.
Some procedures before landing
After I had done some flying myself, the instructor demonstrated some emergency procedures, stalls, and steep turns. Stalls were probably the scariest of them.
![Flying over Karmsundet](karmsundet.jpg)
Flying over Karmsundet
After about 45 minutes, we returned to the airport for a touch and go, and then a full stop landing.
![The airport](the-airport.jpg)
The airport from above
It was a bit windy, with a relatively large crosswind factor, so the instructor demonstrated the crosswind technique as well. We taxied back to the hangar, and did a quick debrief and talked a bit about what my next steps would be.
A couple days later, I booked both the theory course and the medical check…