Hawaii Glider Rental

Is there a commercial operator in Hawaii that will rent gliders to qualified pilots for them to give friends and family rides?

Several years ago I rented from Soar Hawaii at Dillingham Field on Oahu. I contacted them ahead, and they sent some things out to me. The check out seemed quite reasonable if you have any ridge experience.

Took my wife up for our 25th. Was great.

Kevin

On Sunday, February 22, 2015 at 2:26:01 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Is there a commercial operator in Hawaii that will rent gliders to qualified pilots for them to give friends and family rides?

When I was there I went up in one of the operators motor glider (Grob). Had a blast cruising/soaring around the island with one of their instructors. I did all of the flying, he acted as the tour guide pointing out stuff....

On Sunday, February 22, 2015 at 11:26:01 AM UTC-8, wrote:
Is there a commercial operator in Hawaii that will rent gliders to qualified pilots for them to give friends and family rides?

Check out Dillingham on the North Shore - about 45mins to an hour drive from Waikiki. I wasn't interested in actually getting checked out, so I called for a flight lesson with a CFI. When I showed up, I explained my qualifications and he said "lets go fly". The flying is mostly ridge soaring but it is fantastic! BTW, there are a lot of restricted areas and I think a few prohibited areas so maybe that is why their checkout is so intense. The only thing I found weird, is that the gliders are parked diagonally next to the runway and the tow plane pulls you out to the runway and into take-off.. It was a handful because I have never done that before.

At 01:12 23 February 2015, gotovkotzepkoi wrote:

;897551 Wrote:
Is there a commercial operator in Hawaii that will rent gliders t
qualified pilots for them to give friends and family rides?

www.hanahouair.co




--
gotovkotzepkoi


Not without either joining their flying club or the operator has an
extensive
check out entailing numerous rides. I gave up on the checkout and just let

them give rides. That is their bread and butter. Giving rides to your
family
will be frowned upon when they want to make a buck. Im just sayin.

On Tuesday, February 24, 2015 at 4:45:06 PM UTC+13, Doug Mueller wrote:
At 01:12 23 February 2015, gotovkotzepkoi wrote:
Not without either joining their flying club or the operator has an
extensive check out entailing numerous rides. I gave up on the checkout
and just let them give rides. That is their bread and butter. Giving
rides to your family will be frowned upon when they want to make a
buck. Im just sayin.

I don't doubt your word that this particular FBO acts as described, though that seems rather churlish and counter to the principle of making happy and loyal customers by selling them what they want.

My experience of commercial glider operations in the USA is that once they've ticked the boxes to make sure their insurance company will pay out, they point me to the (rather high) list of prices for retrieves etc and tell me to do whatever I want.

Certainly that was the case at Turf Soaring when I was in Phoenix for a month once, back when I had about 100 hours. I picked the ASK21 as I'd never flown one. We did a flight with some boxing the wake, slack line recovery, thermalling, various stalls, a chandelle or two. After, the instructor (who happened to be the local FAA examiner) said I needed two more landings on type for insurance purposes, so I should do two 500 ft tows with another instructor and they'd only charge me for one of them. I then proceeded to take half a dozen people for rides over the next couple of weeks.

For the last 8 years I have rented gliders at Dillingham field on Oahu and given my friends and family rides. It takes about half a day to get checked out. Always has been a highlight of our trips.
Just remember to call and schedule the checkout and plane rentals well in advance.
The trade winds blow just about every day. You get off tow at 500 feet on the face of the ridge and you are up as long as your bladder can retain fluids.