Flying with Ryan

          Thanks to your prayers, this week has been a pretty productive week. As I said
in previous blogs, I am under a lot of pressure to get the Maverick building finished.
And this week I got a lot of work done in there. We are nearly done with the office, but
there are plenty of leaks to fix around the place, after that we are pretty much done. The
main doors are a huge part of the waterproofing project and that alone will take some
time, mostly cause I almost always work on my own, but also because it is complex. I won't bore you with its lovely problems, but please keep praying that we don’t run into too many
difficulties.
           I have had two flight lessons this week, and they were really great, I just need to
keep practicing what I learn so I don’t forget it. Ryan Leeward is my age and is an intern
here, not the mechanic I wrote about in a previous blog, another Ryan. He has his private
pilots license and the two of us went flying on Saturday after I was finished working. We
took off about 4:30 or so with no real plan in mind. I had mentioned that I wanted to
practice some stuff that my instructor had taught me, but other than that, we really
weren’t sure where we were headed. We flew to Lake Weir, roughly a 10 minute flight,
and he swooped down pretty low to the water, just below tree top level, and simply
weaved back and forth a little then pulled up and climbed back up to about a thousand
feet. It was really pretty, at least where you couldn’t see the bottom, the water was really
low, so when you were really close to the edge, you could see how nasty the water was.
It was also really funny to see board walks that lead out to a lonely dock about 10 or 20ft
from the shore. He told me that there are a several people with Sea Planes there.
Ryan’s family lives near an airstrip built by his dad called Leeward Air Ranch.
His house is right next to the landing strip, along with several other houses. So after
flying around the lake for a little bit, we went to his house. I must say, it is kind of funny
to pull up to a house in a plane rather than a car. After landing, we “parked” the plane in
the front yard and went inside to see his mom and dad. They were great, I met them last
week when they came to through a surprise birthday party for Ryan at itec. It was almost
like going home, well I suppose it was for Ryan. We just walked in and his mom, Donna,
greeted us, and then gave us some food, always a welcome greeting:) Dirk, Ryan’s dad,
went with us to fly his Cessna 185. It is a much larger plane then the 150 we flew over,
and it also is an Amphibian, meaning it can land on land or water. We flew back to the
lake, and Ryan landed it. It was pretty awesome.
           When we got home, it was nearly dark, Ryan and I pumped the water out of the
floats before going inside to an incredible dinner that Donna made while we were flying.
It was great spending time with his family, and I look forward to doing it more often. It is
only about a 10 minute flight from itec. Ryan and I headed home after that, night flying
is really awesome, and from our height you could see lights from several cities and
neighborhood. I could see the whole route I take to church and from that height it looks
like it would be a quick drive, boy I wish that was so, it takes about 35 or 40 minutes. I
have never been in the front of an airplane that lands at night, it was pretty neat. Ryan is
a really good pilot, and understands a lot about aviation, having grown up around it his
whole life, I have learned a lot from him. He told me that he made his first flight when he
was two weeks old, and was steering when he was 2 years old.
           If all works out, he and I are going to fly up to TN, he will drop me off and fly
back while I am at my mom’s wedding and then he will come get me after it is over. But
we will see, itec might need him too much.

Thanks so much for your prayers and support, it is much needed and much more
appreciated. God Bless

Your brother in Christ,

Austin