How far do you drive to fly.
Joined: Jan 2008
Posts: 980
Likes: 21
From: Uxbridge
Through the nineties I had a 220 mile round trip to where I flew. I once drove there, got in the 172 with some friends, then flew past my home area and on a further 35nm to fly gliders from a grass strip. When the gliding finished we flew back and I drove the 110 miles home.
Joined: Apr 2008
Posts: 1,086
Likes: 36
From: France
I begged the use of a bit of pasture from my neighbour when I got my autogyro. Two years of regular cutting has given me a strip 230 metres by 12 metres. But I do have to taxi 300 metres from the barn along the access track to the house. From there I can fly to the Club at which I instruct in 3 axis microlights.
Joined: May 2004
Aviation Qualifications: CPL
Posts: 965
Likes: 46
From: Ташкент
My god.. lighten up... point was I didn't drive due to an inability to drive, so was driven, however if it makes you happy I'll add the distance... approx 24 KM!
Joined: Dec 2011
Posts: 253
Likes: 16
From: Augusta, Georgia, USA (back from Germany again)
Through the nineties I had a 220 mile round trip to where I flew. I once drove there, got in the 172 with some friends, then flew past my home area and on a further 35nm to fly gliders from a grass strip. When the gliding finished we flew back and I drove the 110 miles home.
Joined: Jan 2003
Posts: 517
Likes: 37
From: Kelowna Wine Country
When I kept my aircraft at Squamish I had to drive an hour each way, however the owner of the floatplane company 30 yards from my house let me add a small finger on the back of the dock so part of the Summer I kept my seaplane there.
My main complaint about keeping the aircraft so far away was not the drive so much as the lack of a any social content at the airfield. When I learned to fly there were flying clubs with social space or a bar. These days everything is commercialised so it is arrive, fly and leave. Not the same at all.
My main complaint about keeping the aircraft so far away was not the drive so much as the lack of a any social content at the airfield. When I learned to fly there were flying clubs with social space or a bar. These days everything is commercialised so it is arrive, fly and leave. Not the same at all.
Joined: Jan 2004
Posts: 5,658
Likes: 501
From: Canada
5 minutes to the airport to get my Grumman AA 1 and then a 45 minute flight to the glider field
I got my drivers license as a teenager mostly because my father got tired of driving me to the airport and then waiting until my flying lesson was over to drive me home
I got my drivers license as a teenager mostly because my father got tired of driving me to the airport and then waiting until my flying lesson was over to drive me home
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 660
Likes: 1
From: UK
I begged the use of a bit of pasture from my neighbour when I got my autogyro. Two years of regular cutting has given me a strip 230 metres by 12 metres. But I do have to taxi 300 metres from the barn along the access track to the house. From there I can fly to the Club at which I instruct in 3 axis microlights.
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 408
Likes: 6
From: Melbourne
When I started flying lessons I was driving 8km to the airport (YSCB). By the time I completed my training I was living in a different city and flying from a different airport (YSCN) which was about 80km from home by the quickest route.
Fleet Manager
Joined: Aug 2006
Aviation Qualifications: CPL
Posts: 7,090
Likes: 2,952
From: Ontario, Canada
I'm looking at my airplane as I type this from home, so driving to the airport is not required. But... I bought the property, I cleared the land and built the runway, I cut the grass, and I clear the snow, so it's not a freebee either. Sometimes after a couple of hours on the tractor caring for the runway, some highway time to the airport does not sound quite so bad. The convenience of it taking 15 minutes to take my plane for a ten minute flight cannot be beaten though!
Joined: Sep 2015
Aviation Qualifications: PPL
Posts: 663
Likes: 398
From: London
You never finish gliding, there's always something else to do...
Mine's a 1h45 drive to get there, first thing in the morning, more like 2h30 to get back in the evening. I actually drive past 4 other gliding clubs to get there, but it's worth it...
Mine's a 1h45 drive to get there, first thing in the morning, more like 2h30 to get back in the evening. I actually drive past 4 other gliding clubs to get there, but it's worth it...
Joined: Feb 2015
Aviation Qualifications: PPL
Posts: 1,765
Likes: 360
From: Cincinnati, Ohio
I, my (then) wife, and young son (now a 51-year-old physician) lived on Georgia's coast on an island paradise called St. Simons. I learned to fly there and received my ticket in - Gulp! - 1977.
The asphaltic runway in the foreground, now 16/34, used to be 15/33. I soloed on 33, but the reciprocal took me directly over our home which was situated directly beside the Atlantic Ocean. I'd be climbing through 400' and would give my family a wing waggle or two. They'd always wave back. That happened a hundreds times. One never forgets.
It took me less than three minutes to drive to our hangar. Three minutes of pre-preflight which lasted half a lifetime. The equidistant return lasted a minute or three or less, for I had stories to tell, and my boy thought I was The Master of the Air.
Those were the days....
- Ed
The asphaltic runway in the foreground, now 16/34, used to be 15/33. I soloed on 33, but the reciprocal took me directly over our home which was situated directly beside the Atlantic Ocean. I'd be climbing through 400' and would give my family a wing waggle or two. They'd always wave back. That happened a hundreds times. One never forgets.
It took me less than three minutes to drive to our hangar. Three minutes of pre-preflight which lasted half a lifetime. The equidistant return lasted a minute or three or less, for I had stories to tell, and my boy thought I was The Master of the Air.
Those were the days....
- Ed
Last edited by cavuman1; 20th September 2021 at 00:02. Reason: Add Photograph
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 375
Likes: 0
From: london uk
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 375
Likes: 0
From: london uk
I was based in Belgium 4 years ago and EBSG had hangar space at a very good €150/mth, but I moved to EBKT @€250/mth as I needed to clear in and out most flights back to the UK. It was the huge hangar on the NE side just past Qualiflight.
Joined: Dec 2017
Posts: 16
Likes: 0
From: Bedfordshire
At a previous company, we had a Capt. who lived in Texas, he would jump on company a/c overnight to London, walk down road to crew check in, look at paperwork and then transport to a/c, usually the same a/c, and then operate to Texas, two local nights and then operate back to UK, stay in terminal and pax back to Texas and home. He would do this 3 or 4 times a month, quite the commute, nice work if you can get it!
Joined: Aug 2015
Posts: 599
Likes: 61
From: ex 5Y. Now G
About an hour.
I have all of my checklists recorded on my phone and run through them as I drive, physically reaching for the controls and touching the non existent dials as I go. That probably makes my flying safer and my driving less safe.
I have all of my checklists recorded on my phone and run through them as I drive, physically reaching for the controls and touching the non existent dials as I go. That probably makes my flying safer and my driving less safe.
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,681
Likes: 10
From: Just South of the last ice sheet
It's 35 miles for me. 20 on motorways and 15 through the lovely Cambridgeshire countryside. Usually got the top down cos if the weather isn't good enough for open top motoring I probably won't be going flying! Usually takes around 45-50 mins.
Time to fly
