...And my solo cross country is around the corner?

[Rocket_Bird]

Heres a tip for your diversion:
First of all, you need a good reference for distance.  Take the width of your thumb and line it up with the side of your E6B or a ruler that indicates nautical miles, you will need that when determining your distance.  When you know where you are going to divert through, use the side of one of your fingers or hand and draw a straight line from where you are to your destination (simple enough you already know).  You got your track, now, use your thumb and measure your distance.  You got your distance.  To find your approximate heading, my pre-flight test instructor told me this, take either your thumb or your pencil and line it up with a track line, then without twisting it, move it over a VOR station (we have the odd one here and there in Canada, not so much, but im sure you have plenty of them in the states... if your from the states ), and normally on the map the VOR will have the magnetic headings printed around them, therefore no need to calculate magnetic variation!

Do your 5Ts, (turn, track, throttle, time, talk), have a glance at your fuel, tell your instructor that you would tell flight services or whatever that you are diverting, and go for it

[BFMF]

Thanks for the tips!

[jknight8907]

I'm going on my first dual XC tomorrow afternoon/night. We already tried to go once, but had an "open cockpit" experience.....my door popped open on takeoff, and in this type of aircraft the door cannot be shut in flight, so we offset a bit and landed back the other direction, and shut the door. Then I started looking for all my notes on courses, distances, and times. Gone. Nowhere. Drifting along in the breezes, I imagine.


$#&@

Now I have a clipboard and a zipping 'portfolio' to put everything in.....cant wait!!

[Boss_BlueAngels]

This stuff kind of goes out to all working on their PPL... presolo and everything else.

Try and not worry too much about your previous performance.  Focus on what you will correct and what you will be doing for the next flight (or portion of the flight).  Dwelling on the previous flight (again, or portion of the flight) only results in neglecting what you need to pay attention to next.

What I did during my PPL training was immediatly after the flight I would grab my notepad (I never have fewer than three in my flight bag BTW) and write myself a personal evaluation.  Everything, the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Even if it was something stupid like losing the pencil.  That helped A TON.  

And as everyone has been saying... the thing about the XC flights is not the stick and rudder flying, but the planning and orginizational skills.  You're just starting, it takes time to develope your personal rutine.  Also, it is far more difficult to keep the cockpit all nice and tidy with the flight instructor with you.  When she's gone you'll have a whole other seat to pile your stuff on.  

As for stumbling over your words... everyone does that.  I do that, (especially when I'm flying N5429... just cannot seem to ever be able to say that clearly) every now and then.  Mostly my problem now is saying the correct airplane I'm flying... (ie, Warrior XXXX, Arrow XXXX, or Cessna XXXX lol)  What I do to help anunciate is just say the full transmission at least once to yourself aloud before actually saying it over the radio.  After a while you'll just be able to spit things out as fast as they say it to you.

All this stuff just comes with experience.  I've finally gotten over the 200 hour mark and am at the stage where flight planning only takes about 30 minutes (I still like to be thurough though.) and I finally feel somewhat relaxed during enroute phases of flight.  But, that's also what instrument training does to you. haha.  After getting that rating, this VFR stuff will seem like a cake-walk and you will be LOOKING for stuff to keep you busy.  

And you just found one of the great things about flying at night... low traffic!  And (on average) extremely helpful ATC who actually volunteer's extra info.


And last but not least... where are you based out of?  I did a bunch of XC flights this summer up to Spokane and whatever that place is called up by WSU. lol   I'm based out of Ellensburg.