As I sat in the classroom at the Johannesburg Flying Academy at the quaint Panorama Airfield, my young South African instructor started our lesson by writing three large letters on the whiteboard: TIA. The initials stood for “This Is Africa,” a well-known euphemism that the local pilots refer to fondly when summarizing flying on the continent. It’s a phrase that perfectly symbolizes the culture, beauty, and occasional bureaucracy of flying in a tamed—yet still wild—environment.
Getting Licensed
The starting point of my epic flying safari was to first become a “certificated” South African pilot through the foreign-license validation process. While this is normally just a paperwork exercise for many countries, South Africa requires both ground school and a flight test. South Africa is different from most western countries that employ what pilots there call an “open ratings system.” In South Africa, a pilot’s license—and it’s called that here—must specifically list each individual type of aircraft that a pilot can fly, and each requires its own proficiency check ride and submission to the South African Civil Aviation Authority. My mission that day was to get licensed to fly the SkyReach BushCat, a light sport aircraft I have flown extensively in the U.S. and Canada. I previously worked for the model’s distributors and its manufacturer, ferrying new and used airplanes to new owners.
