Pilot on Reserve: A Week in My Life (Off Days → Flying?)

Hey guys, welcome back to my channel. Hope that you all have been doing well. I know a lot of you that watch my channel are aspiring pilots, so I wanted to show you what the lifestyle is actually like as someone on reserve, not just inside the flight deck. I just finished the four-day trip yesterday. I'm very excited to have some days off now. I'm currently on a stretch of three days off. This is day one of three, and then I go back on reserve for four days straight. I could work or I could not work and get some extra days off, so I just want to show you the real reality of what it's like. Starting with my off days though, because I also want to show you that this job really does give you so much free time and flexibility and opportunity to pursue things that you're interested in outside of aviation. If you want to like start a business, travel. I've traveled the most I've ever traveled in my life while being a junior pilot on reserve, and that says a lot. As someone who's relatively junior, I've been at this company for only a year and a half, and especially in my category, I'm number three or four from the bottom, which means I'm very junior. Even being that, I'm still able to maintain a social life, travel, pursue my other interests. I just recently started getting into surfing again, so that's been really fun. Obviously the gym and this YouTube channel. I enjoy making videos for you guys. I know a lot of you like watching them. Thank you so much for watching. I guess I want you guys to see that being a pilot doesn't mean you have to give up your hobbies or your social life or your identity. You just have to build a system and kind of create a routine that works around your work schedule, but truly once you're off, that's your time. As of right now, I'm going to head to a coffee shop, get some work done, and then show you what I do this week. I really don't know what's in store for me, especially with work, but we're going to find out together, and I'm going to take you through all of it. I just finished getting my hair touched up, and I love it. So cute. The girl that does my hair, I love her so much. Her name is Soobin. I'm going to tag her Instagram in case you're ever in LA and want to get your hair done by her. But right now, it's like peak traffic time, and I'm in Koreatown right now, so I think to avoid the traffic, I'm going to go to another coffee shop here and do a little more editing on my laptop. I want to try to get this Tokyo video up for you guys and then go home. I think that's it for today. I'm making a pre-workout snack right now. I'm having some Siggy's Greek yogurt and this sprouted honey hemp granola that I got from Whole Foods. I'm going to drizzle it with a little bit of honey. It's 3 30 right now, which if you've been watching my videos for a while, you know that I don't work out at this time, but I've been editing all day sitting at my computer, and I just need to get out of my apartment. I need to move my body because I've just been sitting. It's not good for you. Today is going to be leg day. I am honestly not looking forward to it because leg day is my hardest day, most taxing day on my body, but it's all right. Okay, this is what it looks like. Cheers. I did get a trip on my schedule this morning was when they put it on, and it's not for tomorrow, but the day after tomorrow, I'll be starting a four-day trip. It's really nice because when they're able to, scheduling will try to put a trip on your schedule as far out as possible, and I like it because obviously I don't have to wonder like where I'm going. It's not super last minute. I can plan a little bit better. I'm laying over in Austin, Miami, and Syracuse. I've never flown into Syracuse. My layovers in Austin and Syracuse are not that long. They're like 12 to 11 hours, but my Miami layover is 19 hours, so that should be really fun. Now I know where I'm going, and I can plan accordingly and pack tomorrow and whatnot, but as of right now, we're gonna hit legs, so let's get it. I just finished my workout. Surprisingly, had a really, really good workout. I thought I was gonna be way too tired to do anything, but sometimes those are like the best. I feel like it's always like that. Like the days that you don't want to go to the gym, you end up having the best workouts. I'm really happy that I went, but it's pretty late now. Like before I went into the gym, it was sunny, and now it's dark and nighttime, so I'm gonna go home, make some dinner, and chill for the rest of the night, and then tomorrow, we have a busy day packing and getting ready for our four-day trip. Good morning! We are gonna go surfing right now. Recently, I started getting back into surfing. I haven't surfed since I lived in Hawaii. It's been a minute, but I spontaneously bought a 5'10 shortboard. I just decided to get back into it. I live close to the beach. I'm in California, so I was like, why not? I love the beach. I love the ocean. The thing that was like keeping me from surfing here for so long was the fact that the water is really cold, and I have to wear a wetsuit. Like I'm not used to having to wear a wetsuit, but I got a wetsuit, so we're gonna go to the beach and go catch some waves. I'm not that great at surfing. I can like catch the wave and ride it and like stand up and stuff, but this board has been a little bit tricky to learn on, but I'm determined to get better. Alright, we got our beach towel. This one is really cool because there's a zipper pocket. You can put your keys, your phone, and kind of hide it so it doesn't get stolen. And then my wetsuit. She's a thick one, but this keeps me so warm in the water. I love it. It's just so bulky, like look. All my sunscreen and water. We can't forget the most important thing. Say hello to my new baby. This is a 510 Rocket Wide by Channel Island Surfboards. It's super light. I'm not a pro or anything. This is actually my first ever surfboard that I own. Growing up in Hawaii, my dad would have a bunch of surfboards, and then me and my sister would just use whatever board he had. So this is like my first baby here. It's been super fun to like go surfing and just get out in the water and whatnot. I'm gonna put you guys away though, and I'll see you at the beach because I need to obviously carry this down to my car and my beach bag and everything and whatever. So it looks so weird like holding this in my kitchen. But yeah, I'll see you guys at the beach. Alright, we just got to the beach. Before we go, I'm gonna make myself a drink using Kion Aminos. This is their watermelon flavor. Thank you to Kion for sponsoring a portion of this video. If you've never heard of essential amino acids, they're essentially the building blocks that your body uses to maintain and build lean muscle. And I really like Kion Aminos because they deliver all nine essential amino acids that your body needs in the ideal ratio. They're also clinically shown to be up to six times more effective than whey protein when it comes to stimulating muscle protein synthesis, which is huge for endurance, performance, and recovery. Got our scoop right here. Not to mention, it tastes really good. This is their watermelon one. I also have their mango flavor. I love the mango flavor as well. But you just put a scoop into your water and shake it up. I love when the water is like really cold. It just tastes so refreshing. Initially started taking these when I was starting my cut because I just wanted to give my body everything it needs to maintain muscle and help my performance and endurance and energy level. And now I just take it every day because it tastes so good and I know I'm doing something good for my body. Their formula is also super clean. They're non-gmo, third-party tested, sugar-free, no weird like additives or fillers. A very clean product and very refreshing too. So if you guys are interested in trying Kion Aminos, you can scan the QR code on the screen or click the link in my description to check them out. They're so good. Now we are ready to go surfing! It's currently 6 30 p.m and I'm gonna start packing for my four-day trip. I honestly don't have to pack that much because two of my layovers are really short so I doubt I'm gonna do anything. I do have a decently long layover in Miami though so that's gonna be fun. Definitely gonna pack for that. It's also officially blazer season which is very exciting but also not because that means it's gonna start getting cold everywhere. I'm not a fan of the cold. Let's do a little review of this trip shall we? Tomorrow's day one of four and I'm starting this trip out of Long Beach so I have to be there at 12 15 and I'm flying from Long Beach to Salt Lake to Austin and then I'm done for the day. Then my next layover will be in Miami and then day three will be in Syracuse and then day four is go home day so obviously I'm not gonna layover anywhere. I'm gonna come back to LA. I'm really excited for the Miami layover because I have not stayed in Miami yet and I haven't been there in so long so I'm really excited. The weather's supposed to be really nice in Miami when I'm there. I really want to find like a good coffee shop and a cool gym. Those are like my two things. I'm gonna stop talking because I have like 30 minutes to pack and whatnot before I have to go to my facial appointment. I don't want to be late for that. My skin has been breaking out like really bad on my jawline so I want to get a facial. I think I need one. Good morning. It's currently 7 48 a.m. I just woke up. I didn't go to the gym this morning. I set an alarm for like 5 5 0 5 5 10 5 15 and I snoozed all of them. I was so tired. I'm gonna go get a cappuccino right now, my favorite, and then come back. I have a few hours before I need to leave my apartment but we are going flying today. Thank you. I'll see you next week. Bye. All right guys, first sip. Here we go. The best. I'm clearly ready for bed. It's currently 10 38 p.m. and I'm actually editing a vlog right now. Gotta do it when I can. But today was really chill. It was like non-eventful which is always a good thing in aviation. Really easy, relaxed flights to Salt Lake. It was like only an hour and 15 minutes, really short, and then from Salt Lake to Austin was about 2 hours and 30 minutes. It was originally scheduled to be 2 hours and 19 minutes I believe but there was some weather we had to deviate around so it took a little bit longer. But we made it and I'm editing my Tokyo vlog currently. This is what it looks like. Say hello to my selfie light right here because otherwise the lighting is like so bad. See, I just exposed myself. Our layover is not that long. The van is picking us up at 10 a.m. tomorrow so less than 12 hours from now. So I'm gonna go to bed soon because tomorrow is actually our longest day out of this whole trip. Tomorrow we're flying from LA to JFK and then JFK to Fort Lauderdale and that's it. Both flights are not super long but it's our longest day out of the whole four-day trip. Almost every single day of this trip has two legs a day which is really nice. I really like that. On my last day I'm actually just flying one leg to Atlanta and then I deadhead from Atlanta back to LA which is interesting because this trip started out of Long Beach but ends in LA. In LA we have co-domiciles so there's LAX, Ontario, John Wayne and I think that's it. Usually out of the co-domiciles like the trip will start and end there but this one it's starting at one airport and then ending at another airport so I don't know how that's gonna work but not my problem because I ubered anyways so I could just go straight home. But yeah I'm gonna edit a little bit more and then go to sleep. It is 10 30 a.m. Last night I told you guys that the van was picking us up at 10. Well our flight is delayed. As you can see here this app that I use is called Flighty. It's the best app ever. You can find out what gate your flight is out of, where your plane is currently, if you pay for the full like subscription which I think is 100% worth it. Not an ad by the way I just genuinely love this app and use it every single day. Our plane that we're taking to New York is coming from New York right now but they were delayed for whatever reason getting out of New York. So you can see here that they're landing in two hours and 47 minutes so because the plane is running late our airport time changed because obviously if we get to the airport at 10 30 or whatever we're just gonna be sitting around waiting the whole time which is never fun. So our new van time is 11 30 so I have a little extra time. I'm kind of sad though because since our flight is delayed it creates like a domino effect so once we're in JFK our flight to Fort Lauderdale is also delayed which means we get in later at night which means my layover is not as long. I was really looking forward to having 19 hours in Miami. I mean all it really means is that I'm gonna go to bed later. As long as I go to sleep as soon as I get to the hotel and I don't stay up editing like I did last night my plans remain unchanged. It's so funny because in my last pilot week in my life vlog I was talking about how one of the days I was flying is gonna be like super chill and really easy because it was just one leg and I completely jinxed myself because we ended up like diverting. It's so funny because in aviation it's kind of like a thing to not jinx yourself. Don't say how a flight is gonna be like really easy or don't say how a layover is gonna be like super fun because I feel like something always ends up happening. For example this I was like I can't wait for Miami I have 19 hours and then of course delays happen and whatnot but that's just the nature of the industry too. It doesn't bother me at all it's just different from what I was expecting you know but that's just how it is in aviation you gotta love it and go along with the ride and be really easygoing and just kind of go with the so that's what we're doing. When I get ready I have to allocate myself like 10 minutes to put on my uniform because it's such a process. We got our hundred year centennial scarf. Sometimes it's kind of difficult to tie like it starts folding really easily. Okay I'm gonna finish packing up my stuff and head downstairs. Morning from Miami. It's currently 9 0 5 a.m. I woke up at 8 this morning. I set an alarm I didn't naturally wake up that early because I went to bed at around 2. We were delayed coming into Fort Lauderdale didn't get here until about 12 30. By the time I was able to unwind and everything it was 2 30. So yesterday was the longest day of our whole trip so hopefully today everything will run really smoothly. We do have a short layover tonight it's only like 11 hours but tomorrow's go home day and we're just flying one leg to Atlanta and then deadheading Atlanta back to LA so should be a good rest of the trip. I am obviously ready for the gym right now. I'm gonna go to a gym called Elevation Fitness. I saw it on Instagram and it looks really cool so I'm gonna Uber there and buy a day pass. I called them it was like $40 but I haven't worked out this entire trip yet so my body is like dying to move. Also I really want to do some mobility work and like stretch out my hips and whatnot. I think just from sitting at work all the time I've noticed my hips being really tight especially yesterday it was bothering me a lot during my flights. That is something I really enjoy doing on my layovers is checking out cool gyms that aren't like a commercial gym like Crunch or LA Fitness or something like that so I'm excited to check out this new gym it looks really cool and then our van today picks us up at 4 p.m. I have all morning and most of the afternoon to explore Miami and it should be really fun. On our way to get some lunch at Pura Vida. Good morning it's day four four which means it's go home day. I am so excited to go home. Today we're just flying one leg from Syracuse to Atlanta and then we deadhead from Atlanta to LA on a 350. I'm really hoping I can get Delta 1. I don't think I'm gonna get Delta 1 but last time on my deadhead from LA to Atlanta I got Delta 1 and it was so nice to have a light flat seat and lay down on my deadhead. I really don't think I'm gonna get it today. Honestly this four day wasn't that bad. Sometimes four days feel a little long like my last four day felt so long it just felt like it was dragging on forever but this one went by pretty quickly and then we landed in LA at around 6 p.m. I believe and then I'm off for three days after which I'm really excited for. I think I'm gonna go down to San Diego and go see my sister and we're gonna go surf but yeah I'm just gonna fly this one leg and then deadhead home and we are done.