This was the second year of setting and tracking flight hours goals for the year between annual inspections. Starting just after the 2016 annual inspection completed, I began working toward goals I set for myself for the “year” of flight. By that, I mean the year’s worth of time between FAA-required annual inspections. This is the time between June, 2016 (when I got my airplane back from its annual) and the end of May, 2017 (when my airplane was returned from its next annual).
My goals for the “year” were as follows:
- Fly at least 120 hours
- Land at at least 16 new destinations
- Of the 120 hours, at least 60 hours will include water time
- Of the 16 new destinations, at least 6 will be water-based
What follows is the status of the 2016-2017 flying year’s progress to goal.
I landed at the following new locations:
- W04 – Ocean Shores WA (22 August 2016)
- 3W5 – Concrete WA (26 August 2016)
- Black Lake, Olympia WA
- S60 – Kenmore, WA
- Lake Tapps, WA
Summary Conclusion
This was an unfortunate flying year. I miss almost every goal. I had a planned to visit 16 new located, but I managed only to get to 5. I logged 37.5% of my 120 hours goal.
There were a few reasons for this: First and foremost, the weather was much worse. There were stretches of months on end that were not VFR. In addition, I was working a lot more this season than last, so even on the rare good days, I couldn’t fly.