Like anyone else I am concerned about the high cost of avgas, so I decided to see how long I could fly on the least amount of gas. I managed to fly almost two hours using only a couple gallons of gas. Even better, the cost of the airplane was only $10 and the total cost for the flight was a miserly $55.
As you may have guessed, I was flying a glider, the original green machine. Gliders, or sailplanes as the higher performance versions are called, are my favorite way to fly. The basics of powered flight are pretty simple. As long as you keep the airplane pointed in the right direction and don’t run out of gas you will end up where you want to go. With the modern glass cockpits and handheld GPS navigators, you don’t even have to work hard to put together a mental picture of where you are and what is going on around you.
