I flew around the world and built a plane w/ JP Schulze E368
About this episode
JP Schulze shares his journey from a boy in Namibia to flying around the world and becoming a filmmaker in aviation.
In 1999, a handful of people gathered at a dusty Namibian airfield to meet two men flying weight-shift microlights around the world. One of them was Mike Blyth. Watching from the crowd was a boy who had never left the country, whose family couldn't afford much flying, and who had no real concept of where these men had come from — only that whatever they were doing, he wanted to do it too. Twenty-five years later, JP Schulze has flown around the world himself, built the first Sling High Wing off the line — designed by the same Mike Blyth — and become one of the most distinctive filmmakers in aviation. This one took a while to make happen. We finally met at Oshkosh this year, and JP is candid about being a naturally shy person who ended up with a career in front of a camera. He grew up in Namibia with no art classes and no creative outlets, thinking in German and Afrikaans, teaching himself English from the Discovery Channel at eight years old. He was taking the controls of his dad's microlight at ten. He funded his first licence by free-diving for crayfish, selling snake venom, and restringing tennis rackets. The around-the-world trip nearly didn't happen twice. Sponsors walked…
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