A quick update

I know what some of you might be thinking. "They've been there for coming up on 5 months. Shouldn't they be moving?" Well, here's the scoop.....We've been thinking a lot about this. Cameron has gotten up to 1100 hours and most of the airlines that are hiring have minimums of 1000. He has heard of a couple really interesting sounding jobs from the students he trains, one includes a corporate/charter job, flying jets, that's out of LA. It pays really well for a 1st year First Officer. The other is with Sky West and everyone has good things to say about them.

As we were thinking about all of this and if we should be tossing out resumes Cameron was given the opportunity to start being trained to instruct in the seaplanes.

Piper Cub

Lake Buccaneer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The condition was that he'd have to stay put with the company for 6 more months. We thought that flying seaplanes is what we wanted but Cam was getting excited about the next job and flying a fast jet. He went back and told his boss to hold off on training him because he was thinking about applying elsewhere. That brought out the big guns. They started throwing money at him to keep him there. Effective immediately, he got a pay raise to what a 2 year CFI makes (he won't be one until July) and to sweeten the deal he would get another pay raise once he's all set to instruct in the seaplanes. Needless to say, this is the most money we've ever made. That's not really saying a lot but it's quite exciting for us. It's also nice that a company is willing to offer us more money to keep Cameron.

Of course, we had to rethink our original decision. After comparing Pros and Cons we came to the conclusion that we're going to stick it out here in the desert. To those of you who may be confused or in shock at our willingness to stay, let me explain.
First of all, let me tell you that the first year pay for a FO (first officer) is horrible. We're talking $1300-$1600 a month. We've always been prepared for the downgrade in pay and knew that it was going to be tight. But now, we'll be able to start saving, REALLY SAVING, so when we do make the jump we'll have a cushion to live off for the first year. This is one of the biggest reasons we're staying. Because moving (which would include buying out our contract) is expensive and pay is bad and we would deplete everything we have to get to the next job. I won't go more into it because you probably really don't care all that much but that's what's going on with us.

They'll start him in the Lake Buccaneer to train him in the aircraft and when he's good to go in that they'll move him to the cub and he'll start instructing. To get him more excited yesterday afternoon I made him take us down to the river where they keep the seaplanes. That did it. Cameron will spend the summer on the Colorado River. That means that pictures like this will be common place in a few short months!