Ducati Sporting Club UK > General > Idle Chat > A more expensive pastime than Ducati ownership

[Jools]

I've just achieved a lifetime ambition and done something that is just as exciting as riding my Duke, just as addictive but exponentially more expensive.

As a birthday present from a few weeks ago I've just been up in a helicopter for the first time and briefly taken the controls of a Robinson R22. The thing is incredibly sensitive to control inputs and it's almost as if you just have to think where to go and it goes there. Just keeping the thing straight and level is an art - and that's when they only let you loose on one set of controls at a time - goodness knows how much coordination and practise you need to balance all three controls.

An amazing and addictive experience, but at £200 an hour I don't think I'll be doing much of it, if at all