'What can you do with a Helicopter?'
Tim, I'm not qualified to respond regarding long trips, land aways or any aspect of Heli flying with regard to experience or ability.
But with 68 hours R22, 1 hour R44 and a PPL(H) I'm only a breath away from where you are now.
I think the thing about Heli flying that will hit you in the mouth is the wonderful, delicious, slow integration of all of your limbs and muscles into the machine itself.
Before 40 hours I was just a puppet with the instructors voice in my head pulling the strings.
I found that around the 40 to 50 hour mark, your body realises it has to be part of the machine. At that point I understood what Mike Smith meant when he told me that the pilot was the stabilising input.
I have hundreds of hours on Hang Gliders and (as with most fixed wings I guess) you can go hands off for yonks. They hardly need a pilot, I've seen them blown of hills pilotless and land themselves after a 360 in a raging gale.
No such luxury in a 22, one seems to be making a host of millimetric control pressures every second and having to 'A.N.C' simultaneously. And that moment when you have all controls and you manage to hover? It is totally priceless.
I can't fly anymore, hopefully temporarily, but I don't regret one penny of the 8,000 my PPL(H) cost. I knew then I would never be able to regularly fly Heli's but I wanted the experience of just doing it. That money didn't just get me a licence, it bought me an education and I found out a lot about myself I didn't know (good and bad).
I don't know for sure but I think learning to fly a Hang Glider might be on a par with learning a Cessna and for me the fixed wing memories really do pale into insignificance with my rotary memories.
You sound like a chap who likes to test himself - well there is no better and more enjoyable test then learning rotary.
It sorts the men from the boys in as much as you can for a brief time become that boy again.
Regards
Cron.