During alpha I focused on KingAir 350i and using it in my FSeconomy flights, flying my usual cargo routes. The sim connect issue with the release hit my controllers hard, rendering half of my panels unusable. And I hate ingame binding. I find it limiting, and frustrating.
Instead of trying to bind KA350 to my liking, I thought it might be a good time to do some VFR flights with smaller aircrafts that need minimal control binding. The thing is, I don’t enjoy hoping on a plane, and aimlessly wondering around. Landing challenges are great, but not that healthy for my OCD.
Bush trip activity on the other hand seemed like a perfect fit. Just enough sense of direction, simple aircraft, no frustration due to quirky avionics, missing features, etc. I fired up the first one, Sierra Mountain area. Took off with the decision of tackling it in hardcore mode, no in game map, no back to track, no google/bing satellite images, just vfrmap.com charts.
Oh boy, first two legs drove me crazy. It is quite challenging to try deciphering the navigation instructions, matching those with VFR chart, and keeping positional awareness on the fly. And doing that in an area I never been before, in real life or in sim. I got lost quite a few times. First leg itself took triple the estimated flight time. Back tracked couple of times after following wrong roads, or streams. But the moment I finally recognised Inyokern airport was priceless. Landed safely, checked out the leg, and grabbed myself a beer from the fridge. And it tasted just as good as the ones I got after a challenging real life trip.
I started to get used to it after third leg. I even got a FSeconomy passanger on my way to KHTH. But then curse of the american small dirt strips hit. Two of the later legs, I touched down on wrong airstrips. Especially the Palomino valley one made me pull my hair; with 3 other nearby strips, and nobody around to ask for directions 
I am half way through the route and simply loving it. Flying half frustrated, half confused, but with fully heightened senses and mind blowing immersion, mostly thanks to amazing scenery and shaders. Looking back the part I flew, I feel great satisfaction with the knowledge that I can tackle the same route in real life with ease after this.
I’ll probably take my time, and finish all trips in a month or two. Then I can see my self harrasing Asobo for more content, or searching for popular routes online and creating my own bush trips. Apart from that, only thing I can wish for is a Reality Expansion Pack from SimCoders. Their usual treatment on Cub. Fine tuned flight model, with wear, failure, and maintenance simulation. That might keep me busy at least for a year, before itching for study level airliners again.
