Hello all,

Just joined ERA Virtual Airways after having watched the experiences of the real-life ERA on the wonderful "Flying Wild Alaska" series of DVDs.

I am by no means new to flight simming however - my first (as far as I recall) flight sim was Digital Integrations F15 on the Commodore 64. I then progressed via the Commodore Amiga into the world of "PCs" - or "IBM PC Compatibles" as they were known back then.

My first PC flight sim was "Bruce Artwick's Flight Sim", which was then bought out by Microsoft and the rest as they say is history. Yes children, Microsoft did NOT invent the flight sim genre!!

After many years of solo flying, I joined the Noble Air va & eventually became Ops Manager of their hub in Manchester. After some time I left and assumed a similar role with another va - again based out of Manchester. Eventually I tired of flying the heavy iron, & teamed up with "Bush Flying Unlimited", an open outfit that are still in existence on AVSIM today, although things do seem to have gone rather quiet over there.

This sparked off a love affair with flying "in the bush", and it's where I have spent the majority of my time since. However, having been a pilot in real life, I also enjoy accurate flight models & aircraft responses. I therefore have a number of the superb A2A Simulations aircraft, although the only bush aircraft that they do currently is the J3 Cub. Must admit that I am tempted to acquire their civilian P51D, & use it for high-speed charters!!

Done three flights for ERA so far, & found all of them quite challenging as I always fly with real world weather. Still, that's what flying in Alaska is all about & if we didn't enjoy it we wouldn't be here!

ERR194 out.