You wake up on a Wednesday morning in Rotterdam. The weather is good. You have a busy day ahead of you: a meeting in Brussels, deskwork in the office, invited by a supplier for lunch in Amsterdam, a customer visit in the office and tonight you may be able to make the “away” Champions League match of your favorite team against Bayer Leverkusen.

After the habitual morning routines you kiss the family goodbye at 07:50 and enter your PAL-V which is parked in front of the house. You call the FIO at Rotterdam airport from the PAL-V, file a flightplan and get clearance to drive onto the airport. On the way to Rotterdam airport, you drive past a gas station and fill up the tank.

You park the PAL-V on the apron at 08:15, press the Transition button and the PAL-V extends its folded rotormast and its tail. You slide out the rotorblades, do a walkaround to inspect the in gyro-mode, and go through the short checklist presented on PAL-V’s flight mode LCD screen. Everything is set for take-off.

You start the engine and the propeller unfolds. On the cockpit display all systems are functioning OK. At the beginning of the runway you press the prerotator button and spin the rotor up to 200 RPM. When done you pull back the yoke and set the engine at take-off power. The PAL-V accelerates quickly and after 70 m and 10 minutes after arrival at the airport, you are airborne. At an altitude of 1000 ft you head due south towards Brussels. As the weather is great you have a good overview of the surrounding area. You feel especially great because thousands of cars below you are packed on the highway in traffic jams.

You stay high enough to overfly inner city areas and the PAL-V navigation display informs you about airspace restrictions. Using your VHF aircraft radio receiver, you inform the tower of Charleroi airport of you intentions, as your meeting is south of Brussels. You bridge the 170 kilometers between Rotterdam and Brussels in an hour and 10 minutes and land in Charleroi. After landing, you are greeted by airport staff, who is somewhat surprised as you fold your gyroplane to a “small car”!

You pay the € 20 landing fee (including airport handling) with your company credit card and ask for clearance to enter the airfield after your meeting. After that you speed to the southern Brussels area to make it to your meeting at 09:30 within an hour and 40 minutes after leaving from home.

As you have had no stress in traffic, you feel fresh at the meeting. You strike a quick deal. After a successful meeting, you carve back to the airport and drive to the beginning of the runway. There you unfold to flight-mode, do the walk-around and take-off to Rotterdam. After a short drive into the center of Rotterdam, you arrive in the office at 12:05 in time to check your emails before you leave for Amsterdam for lunch.

Lunch is at 13:30 in the Amsterdam Hilton. You leave the office at 12:20. You take off at 12:45, land at 13:12 and drive into Amsterdam to arrive 2 minutes late. Your supplier is waiting for you. You enjoy the good lunch.

After lunch, you decide to drive back to Rotterdam as the weather turns bad. You make an average 75 km/h on the motorway as the traffic is fairly dense around The Hague. You make it into the office in 1 hour and 20 minutes to arrive at your desk at 16:15. After some internal office work and emails you receive your customer with a small drink in the office bar at 17:00. You discuss tonight’s Champions League match. He is very passionate.

You excuse yourself and call your friend at the big telecom company who had offered you tickets for the match. He still has 2 available and you invite your customer to the match in Leverkusen. He smiles and says “Yeah, of course…”. You convince your customer of the possibilities and invite him into the (somewhat limited) space in the back of your PAL-V (like the backseat of a Porsche).

You leave at 18:10, arrive at the airport at 18:27, unfold, check and take off at 18:37 for Leverkusen. This time you don’t choose the economic cruise speed of 150 km/h, but fly at a maximum speed of 185 km/h to be on time. By car it would have been a 260 km drive, but after flying 210 straight kilometers “ as the crow flies” in 1 hour and 15 minutes, you land at the airport in Köln, to uncheck and drive to the Bayer Stadium in 22 minutes at 20:14. You park the PAL-V in a pillar-wasted half parking spot in the stadium and find your friend in his skybox at 20:25 for champagne and canapés. The match starts at 20:30…

Unfortunately, it’s a draw but you are not unhappy with the result. You stay for a few drinks (although you drink coke) and at 23:10 the two of you drive back to Utrecht, where your customer lives and home to Rotterdam. You cannot fly in the dark but the roads are clear and you test the speed limits…

You arrive in Rotterdam at 01:00. It was a busy but successful and fun day. Tomorrow it’s down to Paris for a management course……