Flying Sayings and Quotes

Flying has become such a common mode of transportation that it’s easy to take for granted. We seldom pause to reflect on what an incredible feat of technology cruising through the skies, often with wifi and entertainment, is. Gain a new appreciation for aviation with the collection of wise and insightful flying quotes below.

When you think about flying, it's nuts really. Here you are at about 40,000 feet, screaming along at 700 miles an hour and you're sitting there drinking Diet Pepsi and eating peanuts. It just doesn't make any sense. David Letterman
Flying may not be all plain sailing, but the fun of it is worth the price. Amelia Earhart
Flying is hours and hours of boredom sprinkled with a few seconds of sheer terror. Gregory ''Pappy'' Boyington
Sometimes, flying feels too godlike to be attained by man. Sometimes, the world from above seems too beautiful, too wonderful, too distant for human eyes to see . . . Charles A. Lindbergh
The exhilaration of flying is too keen, the pleasure too great, for it to be neglected as a sport. Orville Wright
Flying is more than a sport and more than a job; flying is pure passion and desire, which fill a lifetime. General Adolf Galland
Flying is a lot like playing a musical instrument; you're doing so many things and thinking of so many other things, all at the same time. It becomes a spiritual experience. Something wonderful happens in the pit of your stomach. Dusty Mctavish
Flying has torn apart the relationship of space and time: it uses our old clock but with new yardsticks. Charles A. Lindbergh
Once you have learned to fly your plane, it is far less fatiguing to fly than it is to drive a car. You don't have to watch every second for cats, dogs, children, lights, road signs, ladies with baby carriages and citizens who drive out in the middle of block against the lights. Nobody who has not been up in the sky on a glorious morning can possibly imagine the way a pilot feels in free heaven. William T. Piper
Flying was a very tangible freedom. In those days, it was beauty, adventure, discovery - the epitome of breaking into new worlds. Anne Morrow Lindbergh
When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return. Leonardo da Vinci
There is no sport equal to that which aviators enjoy while being carried through the air on great white wings. Wilbur Wright
More than anything else, the sensation of flying is one of perfect peace mingled with an excitement that strains every nerve to the utmost — if you can conceive of such a combination. Wilbur Wright
I learned the discipline of flying in order to have the freedom of flight....Discipline prevents crashes. Captain John Cook
I have often said that the lure of flying is the lure of beauty. That the reasons flyers fly, whether they know it or not, is the aesthetic appeal of flying. Amelia Earhart
Flying alone! Nothing gives such a sense of mastery over time over mechanism, mastery indeed over space, time, and life itself, as this. Cecil Day Lewis
Any pilot can describe the mechanics of flying. What it can do for the spirit of man is beyond description. Barry M. Goldwater
Flying is inherently dangerous. We like to gloss that over with clever rhetoric and comforting statistics, but these facts remain: gravity is constant and powerful, and speed kills. In combination, they are particularly destructive. Dan Manningham
Flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss. Douglas Adams
There is no more exciting sport than flying, for if you lose, you die. Christopher Paolini
Flying is awful, there's nothing to do when you're up in the air. I bloat up, my skin gets dry, and when we hit turbulence, I'm terrified. Daniela Pestova
I don't have a fear of flying; I have a fear of crashing. Billy Bob Thornton
Why fly? Simple. I'm not happy unless there's some room between me and the ground. Richard Bach
I think it is a pity to lose the romantic side of flying and simply to accept it as a common means of transport.... Amy Johnson
There are only two emotions in a plane: boredom and terror. Orson Welles
You haven't seen a tree until you've seen its shadow from the sky. Amelia Earhart
The higher we soar the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly. Friedrich Nietzsche
There are no signposts in the sky to show a man has passed that way before. There are no channels marked. The flier breaks each second into new uncharted seas. Anne Morrow Lindbergh
That's the thing about flying: You could talk to someone for hours and never even know his name, share your deepest secrets and then never see them again. Jennifer E. Smith
Flying can be easy at times, but with the wrong machine or the wrong person at the controls, it is the most difficult thing in the world. Paul Gallagher
He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying. Friedrich Nietzsche
To most people the sky is the limit. To those who love flying, the sky is home. unknown
I was sold on flying as soon as I had a taste for it. John Glenn
If you are bored flying, your standards are too low. Lauran Paine Jr
In flying I have learned that carelessness and overconfidence are usually far more dangerous than deliberately accepted risks. Wilbur Wright
Flying is within our grasp. We have naught to do but take it. Charles F. Duryea
We who fly do so for the love of flying. We are alive in the air with this miracle that lies in our hands and beneath our feet. Cecil Day Lewis
[Flying] fosters fantasies of childhood, of omnipotence, rapid shifts of being, miraculous moments; it stirs our capacity for dreaming. Joyce Carol
All my life, I've never been able to get enough airplanes. This will keep me flying every day. Astronaut Robert 'Hoot' Gibson
Flying prevails whenever a man and his airplane are put to a test of maximum performance. Richard Bach
Below twenty, boys are too rash for flying. Above twenty-five they are too prudent. W.J. Abbott
Flying is hypnotic and all pilots are victims to the spell. Their world is like a magic island in which the factors of life and death assume their proper values. Thinking becomes clear because there are no earthly foibles or embellishments to confuse it. Ernest K. Gann
I fly because it releases my mind from the tyranny of petty things. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Flying without feathers is not easy; my wings have no feathers. Plautus
There is no flying without wings. French Proverb
Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly. Gilbert K. Chesterton
The good thing about flying solo is it's never boring. Steve Fossett
It's only when you're flying above it that you realize how incredible the Earth really is. Philippe Perrin
Flying is done largely with the imagination. Wolfgang Langwiesche
See driving is like stabbing someone, it's very personal. While flying is like shooting someone, it's more distant. Bushwick Bill
Pilots are drawn to flying because it's a perfect combination of science, romance and adventure. Charles Lindbergh
We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly by embracing one another. Luciano De Crescenzo
Flying has torn apart the relationship of space and time. It uses our old clock but with new yardsticks. Charles Lindbergh
Flying. Whatever any other organism has been able to do man should surely be able to do also, though he may go a different way about it. Samuel Butler
Just because there are flaws in aircraft design that doesn't mean flying carpets exist. Ben Goldacre
To seize the flying thought before it escapes us is our only touch with reality. Ellen Glasgow
The virtue of the soul does not consist in flying high, but in walking orderly. Michel de Montaigne
The focus and the concentration and the attention to detail that flying takes is a kind of meditation. I find it restful and engaging, and other things slip away. Harrison Ford
All the science of flying has been captured in the breadth of an instrument board, but not the religion of it. Beryl Markham
You can't keep the birds of sadness from flying over your head, but you can keep them from nesting in your hair. Sharon Creech
If anyone wonders why the airlines are not doing well it is because flying has been made such an unpleasant and degrading experience. Keith Henson
Anyone can fly. All you need is somewhere to go that you can't get to any other way. The next thing you know, you're flying among the stars. Faith Ringgold
If a bird is flying for pleasure, it flies with the wind, but if it meets danger it turns and faces the wind, in order that it may rise higher. Corrie ten Boom
One thing about flying that he never got used to was that no matter how awful the weather was on the ground, if you flew high enough you could always find the sun. Tom Clancy
Human thought, flying on the trapezes of the star filled universe, with mathematics stretched beneath, was like an acrobat working with a net but suddenly noticing that in reality there is no net. Vladimir Nabokov
Life is a frail moth flying Caught in the web of the years that pass. Sara Teasdale
Flying fosters fantasies of childhood, of omnipotence, rapid shifts of being, miraculous moments; it stirs our capacity for dreaming. Joyce Carol Oates
All really great flying adventures begin at dawn. Stephen Coonts
Flying does not rely so much on strength, as on physical and mental co ordination. Baroness de Laroche
Every wind is fare when we are flying from misfortune. Sophocles