I Believe I Can Fly

Photo: Alex Souza. My friend Simon flying over Miami South Beach, FL. This photo was 2nd place at Paramotor Magazine Gallery contest of Feb/Mar, 2009.

As I mentioned in my first posting, I am a beginner pilot, travelling around as much as possible. Of course, during my trips, mostly in Florida, I always try to fly in new places. Unfortunately it is not always easy to find fellow pilots in different cities. I had to try hard to find clubs via search engines and the ppg big list. Most of times people do not reply you.

One day, I planned to went to Saint Augustine. I asked the list for places or pilots around. No news. I asked in my hotel if people flew around and the guy in concierge replied me: “all the time”. So, I took-off but couldn’t fly more than 5 minutes as it was too windy. Months later, another pilot in the list asked the same question about Saint Augustine. Politely I replied telling that I had flown months ago there, point the spot for my GPS coordinates. Few minutes later I got an email from a member of the list telling me that I flew over a nature park (a non-flying zone). Not good!

Deciding to make our life easy and considering my background in web design, I decided to create a site where people could share spots with others. I bought some books about PHP/MySQL and Dreamweaver, downloaded the 30 day trial and start to code. Fortunately I could make my deadline launching the first version of ppgplaces.com in the very last day of the trial.

Before made it public, I sent the link to a group of friends and Jeff Goin. Like a prophet, he replied:

“Love the idea.

My observation is that many pilots are reluctant to share their sites for fear of outsiders ruining them. We do, unfortunately, have a few disrespectful pilots who seem to think it’s their right to fly wherever and however they like. And some sites just don’t tolerate much traffic.

Having said all that, I love the idea and will gladly mention it on FootFlyer. I’ve got a section on my website with sites I’ve visited although I’m very careful with what I put there.

Thanks for doing it.

Jeff Goin”

Like always, he was right. As soon as I announced it at the big list, people started to express worries about their sites. I received great feedbacks either. In fact, many of the feedbacks came with suggestions for improve the site.

Regarding sharing sites, my suggestion to all was:

1) If you can share the site without any problem (like airports, etc), just share it;
2) If you want to hang out with fellow pilots but you are worried about your site, share the site informing CONTACT XYZ (and inform the contact email/website) and put the map point on top of the city name (instead of the site area). With that, travelers will need to contact you (or someone else) to discover where the site is and to be briefed;
3) If you are interested only in finding places, just use the site and do not publish any place of yours;

Saying that, people started to share and join the site. I sincerely expect to have done a good thing for the community and I appreciate any feedback or suggestion you may bring.

Thanks a lot for your support!

Alex

Photo: Rodrigo Souza (my oldest son) took this picture during my first training day. The guy with me is Oscar from Fly2Now. Belle Glade Airport, FL.

First of all, welcome to my blog at ppgplaces.com! I will use this space not only to inform about the news of the site but also, to share my personal experiences flying around the States.

Although my first flight happened in June 2007, I still consider myself a beginner pilot. Due my previous work, it was hard to keep flying my paramotor due my constant trips to Latin America and Europe.

I am from Brazil, living in Florida since October, 2005. In the “sunny state” I had the privilege to discover the sport thru my friend John Perez, a paragliding pilot (he don’t like the idea of an engine in his back and the noise disturbing the sound of wind). John introduced me to two amazing people: Jose and Javier from Aerolight.

First time I talked to Jose I was interested in to buy a paragliding kit. He kindly alerted me about a mistake I would do, because it wouldn’t be useful in Florida. With his advice, I met Carlos Segnini, which became not only my instructor but also a really good friend.

With Carlos I learnt to fly and had the opportunity to meet such amazing people like Oscar, Simon, Rons (Nolan and Majestic), Mikes (Donati and Minnars), Robert, and the list goes on. Also, some problems with my engine made me met another awesome person, Paul from Planet PPG.

With their support, I went to my first fly-ins and discover even more fellow pilots. What was a dream became a passion. And that’s what PPG Places.com is all about: share my passion with other passionate people.

I sincerely hope this site can be a extraordinary resource for all the community. Please keep sending me suggestions to improve it.

In my next posting I will talk about the history behind www.ppgplaces.com. Meanwhile, enjoy the project!