I couldn’t help but wonder if I love soaring so much because it’s the first thing I tried after my long hiatus from flying. Temptation won out, and I got checked out to fly power again in a little Katana.

She’s a fun little ship, but as I flew around the airport I kept feeling like something was missing. I kept feeling like I had too much time on my hands… No hunting for thermals, no constantly thinking “where can I glide to now” in the back of my head… No constant adjustments of speed and pitch to surf the sky as smoothly as I could. Just looking at the engine gauges and thinking “everything is green. Been another X minutes, used another 1/2 gallon of fuel.” Hmph.

Don’t get me wrong… I love being in the sky, but slipping into the cockpit of this little beauty didn’t feel like slipping into my real skin like my little Grob. I’ll probably hop over to the dark side of power planes every now and then, but ultimately my heart wants to soar