Originally Posted by wbl-mn-flyer
"...Cost of flight instruction is roughly $230/hour for flight time..."
since this is the only figure mentioned in your post, hopefully you can clarify a few things.
the casual reader might think that for $230, with no previous flight training, you can take off and fly and land your own place (with an instructor), taking a bunch of pictures and generally having a grand old time, making out like a bandit in terms of "fun hawaii stuff per dollar" terms, as long as you don't crash!
I suspect you had to sit through at least a few hours of classroom before getting behind the wheel, etc...
If you can, please summarize the total time and dollar investment you made.
Aside from this question, anyone know of a similar deal on the island of Kaua'i ? It sounds like a BLAST to me! And got to be twice the fun on the Garden Isle compared to Hawai'i !!!
There is a different rate for ground instruction, which is under $230/hour. I had no "classroom" lessons though ...everything was at/around/in the airplane. (Although I suspect as I fly more, I would need some classroom time.)
For the entire first experience, which was roughly 3 hours total, which probably broke down to 2.25 hours of in-motion airplane time and .75 hours on-the-ground-not-moving time, I paid about $495.
You chose the flightplan with the instructor with weather in mind. Obviously, the more terrain you cover, the more time it'll take. On the Big Island, figure at least 2 hours+ for a full island flight or just 1 hour for a trip over to the Volcano area and back.
I thought about flying over Kauai (and Maui) but selected the Big Island over them because the terrain isn't as rough and the weather isn't as wild. While the volcano was a big plus for me, the weather was the greatest concern for me and KOA airport provides the best weather in the chain for first takeoffs/landings.
Some islands also offer helicopter flight lessons --there's a helicopter training company based at LIH airport if that's something you'd want to try too.