Carlos Castillo has always wanted to fly. For years his dream was stashed in the “someday” file, but the time came when he realized his current career wasn’t going to give him the future he wanted. His desire was both to fulfill his dream and to plan for a still distant retirement. His wife, Cyndi, is an accountant and agreed to her husband’s plans to change careers “after a bit of convincing”. Now Carlos is about to complete his Private and begin working on his Instrument rating, while looking forward to the day he can instruct.

“This is the first thing I’ve ever done for myself,” Carlos explains. Other than becoming a mechanic at 18, his life has twisted along a path not necessarily of his choosing, but of opportunities that came to him. Now it’s his turn to make life go his way.

Having never been in a small airplane before coming to American Flyers, Carlos started with an IntroFlight. The flight was everything he dreamed it would be and he began full-time flight training. “It was harder than I expected. Information-wise it was much more than I thought it would be,” he said. “You have to have patience. It’s a process and you can’t force it.”