I understand totally where you're coming from Gerry. I love FS and I have just mastered short-ish hops in PMDG's 737. The furthest I've gone is Gatwick to Tenerife - and that was mind-numbing at times. I'd love their 747, but I know I'll never put it to use on a proper long haul flight. I just have too many other things I have to do. Plus, I have two kids, one and three years old, and having just hit 40, I'm going through phase where I'm thinking I really ought to be living real life with them rather than staring into a monitor for hours on end (however realistic it gets).Simon

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzGet a lifeSpend less money on PC/Garage and fly the real thing!

I am actually doing my second long haul ever, the second in 2 days! Unlike most it seems I dont spend all my time at the computer, the LDS gives me a fairly accurate ETA and I just take an hour and a half off of that and return then. On Vatsim obviously I couldnt do this but unless there is ATC whats the point of being on Vatsim?Im doing EGLL-KSFO

I was wondering the same and did my first transatlantic EGLL-KJFK in PMDG 747-400 a few days ago. I didn't use time acceleration and flew in VATSIM. I must say that it wasn't anything interesting, but it was cool to arrive in USA as it was pretty different from Europe :) However, shorter flights with the LDS767 are indeed much more interesting.

I fail to see the point of starting a flight and then going to bed and waking up in time to land, seems to defeat the purpous of playing the game. But we all have different intrests.

>Makes me wonder as well. >>Is everyone on these forums retired? I don't have the time (or>inclination) to spend 10 hours sitting in front on my PC>pressing buttons. In fact I'd rather go flying..>>Regards>>Adami'm not retired(35 years to go still),but yes,i like sitting in front of my puter for7-8 hours,programming the ins,checking fuel,preparing arrival,checking drift,etc etc.i do like short hops too,but given the time i put intothe preparation of the flight,i feel i should have alenghty time enjoying the fruits of said preparation :)now,i sometimes leave the cockpit for 5 minutes to fix me a cup of coffee,or something to eat,but generally,i'm in front of the puter the whole time.i'm not the type of simmer to start my flight,go to bed,then wake up,have breakfast,and land.that's not how i like it.btw,i do enjoy short hops on FSEconomy as well,the last few months.cheersJP.

Hi,1. I have a life!2. What makes you think I don't fly the Real Thing?.Mike

The only reason why I bought big airliners (DF 737, PMDG 747, Level-D 767, if I remember all the numbers well... ;) ) is that like to learn how they work! I'm a manual nut! I love reading them from cover to cover and I love starting with a cold and dark cockpit and then do everything as realistic as possible! But as soon as I've know how it works I lose interest... Starting up is still nice but flying get's boring. Luckily you can do short cityhops even with a big airliner in FS... ;) But even then, all that preparing in the cockpit is too much like work.... ;)The last weeks I'm having big fun with the DF Beech A36 in which I can really fly myself... ;) Long hauls are nothing for me. Pity those small GA planes all have small manual... Although... the A36 has the Garmin GNS 430 for which you can download the official original THICK and good manual! Yes, I love it! Read it twice already! :)

I often start up a long haul flight when I have some other work to do on the 'puter, (mostly in Autocad ADT since I'm an architect.) Then you can sit and work in the cad, and now and then have a look over at fs too see that everything's ok! (The framerates aren't the best though with autocad running simultaneously! :-)rgrds fredrik

Haven't done many long hauls but when I do, eg the Aukland - Buenos Aires polar route which is about 12 hours, I start the flight climb to cruise then tell the "FO" to take over and do other things - catch up with what is happening on AVSIM, walk on the beach, do the shopping etc but I usually go to bed and get up in the morning just in time to see the coast of Chile. If you didn't adopt this multi tasking approach, then I agree long haul flights are just as boring on the PC as they are in real life. You can of course speed up the simulation but that is sort of "cheating" IMHO.Bruceb

I've done a few long hauls, and do other things at the same time (I speak Russian, too, and usually my other task is studying the language, check FS, study, peek at FS...)...however, FS9 usually crashes on me after too long anyway so long hauls are generally out of the question for me.

A time ago I had the time to do long hauls, and they are fun in itself.Its about extreme boredom, to extreme terror.just as in the real world.Imagine anxious to go, and the first hours are fun, but then one gets bored and tired.Then, when the approach finally comes, the hours pay off, and the landing is een more difficult then it normally is, due fatigue.Thats the fun part to do on long hauls: getting the press-on-itis feeling when doing the approach.Do it like the pro's: start departing in the evening in the US, and keep awake.. (should be around 8 hrs of flight) then you have the most rewarding and thrilling landing you ever had!What to do in between depends on de plane, otherwise read a bit..Then a second pc comes in handy!After the landing go to bed, and bang.. you have some sort of jetlag too!Johan[A HREF=http://jdserver.no-ip.com]Personal Server[/A]A LITTLE LESS CONVERSATION, AND A LITTLE MORE ACTION PLEASE!HELP:http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=238882

>I fail to see the point of starting a flight and then going>to bed and waking up in time to land, seems to defeat the>purpous of playing the game. But we all have different>intrests.Just so that you fool your conscience into believing you didn't cheat. ;-)Keith

Donny AKA ShalomarFly 2 ROCKS!!!Ocasionally I read or go away on a long haul. I did one full round the world but I don't do long hauls exclusively, the vast majority are local and regional or I may just go where the weather's the worst and do ILS touch and go's. The attraction for me is fuel planning when I do a long haul. Long hauls are relative, KABE to Bermuda in an unmodified Beech Baron, Navaho or Seneca can be very interesting. I once managed to fly a Hawker TR-800 KABE-Zurich nonstop, I cheated cuz I climbed to 51,000 feet. (41,000 feet official max. Got a pressure alarm till I reset the dial lower than my actual altitude, also cheating.) It's something different, a change of pace, I WOULD get bored if I did long hauls exclusively. Once in a while the urge sets in and I'm psyched. Usually the ideal is 1 1/2 to two hours for a cross country flight for me regardless of type. (maybe 45 min to one hour in some unturbocharged singles) You pick your best altitude, plan your fuel, spend enough time in cruise to make a climb to altitude and speed worthwhile, and if monitoring or tracking VORs go thru a fair number, plan the descent and it's just short enough I don't usually reach for a book.The one thing I almost never do is speed the sim. For a long time I almost never teleported, but I have some great scenery in France, like BFU in Alaska and enjoy flying near my home town in PA USA so something had to give.Best Regards, Donny:-wave

Interesting question!TBH I do not find real-time long-haul flights interesting at all. I do fly "wannabe" long-hauls by taking off, getting up to cruise altitude and then slewing to within 250-300nm of the destination and then switching back to real-time flight. I then reduce to fuel-load to make out that I've "burned" some during a 11-hour flight http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/contrib/fk/devil.gifThis method cuts out the boring (to me) cruise phase. Of course this will not appeal if you are a hardcore simmer but for those casual flyers like me who still wanna thunder around in A330s...you should try the slewing trick if you have'nt already :)A poster in this thread mentioned he is building a 737 mockup...now with a rig like that the immersion-factor would be doubled (even more so if the displays, sound etc. are realistic) and I would not have a hard time sitting in there for 3 hours or so!Of course....*all* of us would gladly lock ourselves in a CAE full-motion Level D and destroy the key to fly Frankfurt-Santiago http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/contri...y/corkysm20.gif