In the summer of 2013 we began looking for an introductory flight. A search on YipIt and Groupon revealed a few schools in our area that offered a 1-hour bay aerial tour for close to $200 for 2 people. After dillydallying for a few days I gave up. Srinath didn’t. During the christmas break, I took the next step of calling up a couple of places and finding out more about the introductory flights they offered. Ahart aviation out of Livermore (KLVK) was the closest and I scheduled a bay area tour for January 18 to leave at noon.

The day arrived. We had no clue what to expect when we arrived at Ahart’s lobby. We checked in and were asked to wait for the pilot to arrive. There was a bookshelf in front of the couch so we asked the receptionist to give us a book to flip through. She handed us the FAR AIM as well as the Pilot’s Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge (PHOAK). The FAR AIM looked daunting but Srinath seemed familiar with it and was ready to peruse. I randomly flipped through the PHOAK and remember skimming through stalls and weather patterns.

Our pilot was James and he drove us to a Cessna 172 that was tied down. After walking us around the plane and through a preflight checklist, we soon took to the air with Srinath on the left seat and myself on the backseat with a Canon 6D ready to shoot videos and images. This was supposed to be an opportunity to evaluate James as a potential instructor but after the flight I had no idea what to ask him. The only piece of information I recall from our conversation was him mentioning an interest in working for an airline and that he was building up hours.

We have quite a few pilots at my workplace and an interest mailing group. Upon seeing a note from Bill that indicated he was a CFI out of Livermore, I reached for an opportunity to pick his brains. A day later we were chatting about advice on choosing an instructor. He suggested that I look for somebody who I didn’t feel would leave before my training was over. He also strongly suggested undergoing unusual attitude training with an aerobatics instructor. His work involved quite a bit of travel so he wasn’t ready to sign up a new student. A few days later, I met with Ron who was another CFI and a colleague. His two pieces of advise were to train on the same type of aircraft which I would most likely fly after receiving a license. And to find an instructor who would be open to let Srinath and I train together. One of us observing from the backseat while the other was flying will be a very valuable learning tool, he said. Unfortunately, he flew out of Palo Alto which was too far for us, otherwise I would have seriously considered signing up with him. At a pilot’s lunch a few days later, another colleague strongly suggested going through a ground school.

Right around this time I called up Tradewinds Aviation in San Jose to find out about their ground school. The person who answered at the front desk mentioned they had a Groupon offer for a 14-week ground school program plus a 1-hour demo flight for $189. That was a sweet deal and I really enjoyed Don’s class. Tradewinds was too far away from where I lived and more importantly, their hourly rates were quite steep otherwise I would have signed up with Don as my instructor in a heartbeat.

Bill had suggested that I check out the Flying Particles club at Livermore. The club meets once a month and an hour prior to the meeting the membership chair takes prospective members on a tour of their hangar. Srinath and I signed up for their February tour when we got to see all their aircraft up close. It was at the meeting later that night that we met Steve who was one of their CFIs as well as the Safety Pilot for the club. He was quite vocal, funny and introduced his student who had just received his private pilot’s license. We spoke with him after the meeting and decided to do a demo flight with the intention of seriously evaluating him as our instructor. The club was largely comprised of members who had retired from the Lawrence Livermore Lab and clearly didn’t have any ambitions of going on to work for an airline.

It all started with a trip to the Hillier aviation museum in San Carlos, CA in early December 2011. After touring the exhibits inside and outside, we went upstairs where a few computer stations were setup with Flight Simulator. We all had a chance to try our hand at flying and landing a plane. My elder son Srinath was hooked by this experience and asked Santa to get him Microsoft Flight Simulator X and a Thrustmaster T-Flight Hotas X Flight Stick for Christmas. He has been flying the simulator ever since, starting with gliders tracking guideposts in the sky, then slowly graduating to larger aircraft and now working his way up through Virtual ATC.

My interest in aviation started when I was growing up in India. We were located close enough to and on the approach route for Meenambakkam airport (MAA) that we could tell the rough time without looking at the clock simply based on the roar of jet engines as the occasional scheduled flights flew overhead. From the terrace we could see planes take off and land at the airport in the distance. It remained an interesting pastime. A number of years later when living near Denver, I used to frequent a local airport to watch GA flights and shoot pictures. What was an interesting pastime graduated to an interest but it was trumped by the other priorities in my life at that time. When Srinath became interested in flying is when I began looking more deeply into flight training options.

After months of superficial research, we finally called Ahart Aviation in Livermore, CA and scheduled an intro flight on January 18, 2014.  The weather was perfect – SKC, P6SM, 00000KT. We were paired up with James as our pilot and I let Srinath fly the left seat. My plan was to shoot images and video to remember this first flight. After going through the pre-flight checklist, James obliged our request to fly to the Golden Gate bridge and execute a touch-and-go at Oakland en route. The Cessna 172 felt very compact and my nervous jitters vanished upon takeoff.

Here is the video of our first flight: