A cold front had just moved through. The clouds were huge white animals gathered in thick herds, drinking from a pool of blue. They stood close, as if they didn't want to let the little ultralight airplane through.

The pilot, an instructor, was hovering below them, looking for a hole. When he saw one he told the passenger visibility might get sketchy for a second or two, and then he pulled the stick back. The ultralight's nose lifted, then they were surrounded by white. Not the kind of fog where you can see a little. Hold a sheet of copy paper to your face. That kind of white.

Up there in the clouds, flying blind, time moved slowly.

One thousand one. One thousand two. One thousand three.

The passenger was amazed. White had never looked so complete.

One thousand four. One thousand five. One thousand six.

The passenger, squinting into a sky made of milk, wondered what the pilot was thinking. The headphones were silent.

One thousand seven. One thousand eight.

It was taking too long.

One thousand nine.

Were they turning? Level? Oriented properly? The passenger was far from sure about anything. He was aware that the mind plays tricks on itself when there is no horizon. In zero visibility some pilots get so scared they start listening to the things their fear is screaming. This was long before the death of JFK Jr., but the passenger knew that when pilots go beyond their training, people can die.

One thousand ten.

Somebody snipped off the top of the cloud with scissors. The white dropped away. Seconds later they were at 7,500 feet, a mile and a half up, and the clouds, now below them, resembled chunky Utah powder. The sun set them on fire. The men dove and rode the cold red flames.

That's when the passenger started to get it. This, he thought, is why people fly _ to visit the Blue Room. To see the true color of the sky and the sun and the clouds. To have a stick in your hands, to move it and feel the aircraft respond like a motorcycle. You don't get this on United, he thought. If you want this you've got to have a friend with some kind of flying machine, or you have to do it yourself.

Some people learn to fly so they can go places. Some people fly because they love it.

For people who love it, there are a lot of options now. All those machines in the air _ the powered parachutes, the ultralights, the gliders, the hang gliders with motors, the kit planes and experimentals _ they're not all that good for getting places. But if you've always wanted to fly for the beauty and pleasure and the challenge, there have never been more opportunities. Here's some of what's out there.

No motor, no worries...

Otto Zauner of Franklin Township has been flying since 1942, when the United States government sent him to Biloxi, Mississippi to train B-24 bomber co-pilots. He's built seven airplanes and has flown many others. In all his years he has found nothing more fun and challenging than gliding.

He is a member of the South Jersey Soaring Society, which flies out of Hammonton Airport. They've got their own tow plane, their own gliders and their own perspective on why soaring is one of the most challenging and yet economical ways to fly.

"There's no comparison, really," said Zauner, who is 79. "When you're in a powered airplane, chugging along, it just doesn't have the feel of a glider. When you're in a glider, in that little cockpit, you become a part of it.''

Zauner's glider is nothing short of beautiful. Form follows function, and Zauner's ship is extremely efficient. Over the years the glide ratios have increased from, say, 20 to one (20 feet forward for every one foot down) to nearly 50 to one. A typical small plane's glide ratio might be about eight to one. This is why a glider in Hammonton _ a decent area for soaring but not the best _ can go up at 11 a.m. on a good day and stay up until dusk. On days like that, pilots find currents of rising air _ thermals _ and circle lazily up, like hawks.

You have to be good. You only get one shot at the landing, and the takeoff isn't cake. Getting towed means flying formation. That's never easy.

Mike Fadden, a member of the club from Mays Landing who hadn't flow before getting into gliding, said it took him about 50 flights to solo. It can be done faster, but Fadden's instruction flights were spread out. This lengthened the learning process because each session required some relearning. It's possible to go to a gliding school and solo in a week or so, after only 20 flights. But be prepared to land "off," as in off the field, especially if you're going to compete. Gilders are built rugged and low to the ground, so they're much less likely to go end-over-end in a soft, plowed field than a Cessna. Zauner has lost count of how many times he's landed "off," but he remembers farmers bringing out beers to greet him.

Ray Roberts, a member of the club from Vorhees, also flies powered airplanes, even multi-engine ones, but gliding is his love.

"You don't bulldoze your way through the air in a glider," said, Roberts, an engineer. "You have to know Mother Nature. Air flow is a very complicated thing. Mother Nature doesn't make it easy.''

It's the difference between sailboat and powerboats. And just as sailboats aren't absolutely quiet, neither is gliding. There is wind noise. But it's as quiet as flight will ever get for people.

""There's an awful lot to learning this sport," said Roberts. "There are layers of complexities. It's a sport that can keep people absorbed for a lifetime. You fly with engines when you want to go somewhere. You fly a glider for fun."

An FAA license is required. The club's initiation fee is $400. Monthly dues are $35. Instruction is $20 an hour. Glider rental is $12 an hour, and tows are $4 per 1,000 feet. Most pilots go to 3,000 feet, so an hour of gliding from that altitude costs $24. A typical small plane might rent for about $50 an hour, wet (gas included). Which makes gliding not a bad alternative for getting to the Blue Room.

Yes, he's still alive

He had to land in a field, see, because his buddy forgot to make sure there was no water in the gas tank. So he walks to a bar while he's figuring out what to do, and one or two beers later - maybe more - it's 1 a.m. and he doesn't feel like taking the airplane apart and towing it home. He figures he'll just fly it home. So he taxis it out to Route 561 and tells his buddy to drive behind him in his new Buick so he can see the road while he's taking off. Trouble is, the Buick's lights fade behind him too soon, and he can't see where he's going. He aborts at the takeoff, the wings start clipping telephone poles, and the airplane winds up in a field again, surrounded by sparking utility wires. What the hell, he thinks. He gets in his buddy's Buick and goes home to bed.

At 4 a.m. the troopers and the guy from the FAA come knocking.

"Matt," one of them says, "give us your license now and we won't press charges."

That was many years ago. Matt Daly, now 73, has calmed down considerably. He could probably get his license to fly back with not much trouble. But he's not all that keen on it any more. He doesn't need one. He flies ultralights, no paperwork required, and he's having a great time.

Ultralights are bringing flying to the masses. They're smaller and slower that "regular" airplanes, but they're great for landing on southern New Jersey's many small grass airstrips. If you haven't seen one since the days when they resembled flying lawn chairs, look again. Today's ultralight looks like an airplane, except smaller.

Used ultralights can be purchased for less than $10,000. After that you're pretty much on your own. It's advisable to learn how to fly before you solo, but not required. This reminds some people of the old days, when an aviator was a person who could walk away from his landing, not a guy who filled out forms. The flip side is that a lot more people got hurt in the old days.

Ultralights attract people who believe you don't need be rich or licensed to fly, just willing to bounce occasionally. Real aviation, they'll tell you, is about freedom, and freedom is made of a joystick and a machine that feels like a motorcycle, not a mini-van.

The FAA's attitude toward ultralights might be illustrated by an FAA spokesperson from a New York office, who repeatedly told a reporter that "ultralights are not airplanes." Ummmm, right.

After the FAA pulled his license, Daly stopped flying for 35 years. Then, in 1993, his wife died. He got the urge again, so he decided to build an airplane from a kit. It took him four years. He said he could have done it in two, but he wasn't in a hurry, and he was having fun. Now he folds it up and takes it to the airport in a trailer, where it's ready to fly in 30 minutes. Even with the trailer his costs are still under $13,000.

Please, don't tell Matt Daly _ or anybody else who flies an ultralight _ that this isn't real flying.

"I love this airplane more than my woman, let's put it that way," said Daly, who lives in Mullica Township.

Southern New Jersey is filled with grass strips, and on some of these strips, especially on weekends, you find all kinds of people with all kinds of urges. They want a stick, and their lives, in their own hands. They trust themselves and they trust their machines. You'll see some very good pilots in ultralights, including retired commercial pilots and FAA-qualified pilots who want to have more fun. You'll also hear other Cessna-type pilots say there's no way they'd get into aircraft whose airframes have so little time in real-world use, compared to, say, a Cessna 172.

Yes, ultralight pilots occasionally die. Vincent Vittolo, an Ocean County man considered one of the godfathers of ultralight flying in New Jersey, died last March in a crash that remains unexplained. But many ultralight pilots will argue that their safety record is better than what is portrayed in the media. It's difficult to know if they're right. The United States Ultralight Association declined to comment on safety, and the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board don't keep numbers that would allow a fair comparison between the safety record of ultralights and Cessna-type aviation.

It's certainly not true that ultralights are unregulated. They must be one-seaters (two seats for instruction only, supposedly). They're also supposed to weigh less than 254 pounds empty and be capable of no more than 55 knots, flying level, although, truth be known, many ultralights are pushing those limits, pushing them hard. Anything over that is supposed to be inspected by the FAA and flown by a licensed pilot. Ultralights also aren't supposed to fly in bad weather _ poor visibility and thick clouds are considered bad weather _ or over congested areas. How often these rules are broken, especially the ones concerning weight and power, isn't the point. The point is that this real flying. Some of these folks even laugh at the "real" pilots, the ones with the FAA paperwork and the superior attitudes. They think they're better aviators. Some are right.

Flying lawn chairs

Who said an aircraft has to look like an airplane? Not Justin Speer. He's been flying for three decades, and his latest love looks more like a hang glider.

It's called an Aerotrike. It's basically a hang glider with a motor. You want easy? You want maneuverable? Watch Speer take off from his home base at Woodbine Airport. Then watch him cruise the beaches and land on a sandbar. Now try telling him he's not having fun.

"I don't particularly want to fly anywhere.," he said. "I just fly because I love flying."

Powered hang gliders like his trike are easy to learn. The pilot works the throttle with his right foot. His hands rest on a bar attached to the wing. To ascend, push the bar forward. To descend, pull back. To turn right pull with your right hand.

Speer said 15 hours of dual-control flight is sometimes enough to solo. At his hourly rate of $75 for instruction, that's $1,125. No FAA license is required. trikes cost about $12,000 new and up, and used models start at about $5,000.

Trike-like machines are claimed to be the most common form of ultralight in Europe. With fewer moving parts, they're usually cheaper.

"I've been flying 30 years and this is the most exciting thing I've ever flown," said Speer. "It's a natural way to fly. And I think it's the easiest thing in the world to fly."

During a ride over the Woodbine airport, the trike seem much more nimble than it appears from the ground. Its motor was well-muffled, and that's a big plus. Speer kindly informed the passenger that he believes trikes "are the strongest things in the air."

The passenger liked hearing that. He also liked his ride. Speer is now designing a model that can land and take off from the water. The passenger likes that idea even more.

Parachute with a motor

Anybody who flies long enough has a story or two. Jim Romano, 45, collected a story the first time he flew his powered parachute.

Romano, who lives in Dennisville, is a contractor who had always dreamed of flying. One day he was cleaning his pool and he saw Speer fly over in his trike. Thus inspired, Romano drove to the airport. They talked. Soon Romano and Speer were flying along the beach. Romano thought: "Yes! This is it!"

As it turns out he wound up doing some work for a guy who owned a contraption not much different than a sport parachute _ the kind that looks more like a wing than an umbrella _ except it was attached to a motor and a seat. Romano wound up bartering for it.

It was just about as easy to fly as he imagined. All he had to do was find a place to take off, arrange the chute in back, apply throttle, make sure the chute filled and then apply more throttle to gain altitude. To turn he pushed the bars that his feet rested on.

Romano's aircraft is also called a paraglider. With some of these machines, the pilot actually wears the engine like a backpack, running to land and take off. Others, like Romano's, are flying lawn chairs of sorts, but much stronger.

Look at it this way: What could be safer than flying with a parachute that's already deployed? These chutes are so big that even when engines quit, they only come down at two-thirds the speed of regular sport parachutes. For this Romano is glad.

During his first flight he buzzed his house, and it was beautiful. Unfortunately he got so caught up in the ecstasy of flight that he ran out of gas and had to land in a field, missing a fence by so little that the chute wound up on the other side.

Romano, who sometimes feels compelled to take his Waverunner out in the ocean when hurricanes are lurking, is thinking about moving up to a trike.

The passenger, browsing the Web, saw used paragliders for sale for $5,000 and less. Romano was quick to say that his could be had for $3,500. Hmmmmm.

No wings at all

Why is it that every aviator thinks the machine she or he happens to fly is the safest and most fun thing in the air? Consider Maria Hoban, who flies helicopters out of South Jersey Regional Airport in Medford Lakes.

Ms. Hoban, you fly fixed-wing aircraft as well, is that true?

"Yes I do but I don't like it," she said. "I'm kind of spoiled with helicopters. They're more maneuverable and they can do anything. It's much more like real flying. And it's much more challenging. Truthfully, airplanes are boring to fly."

Ah, but what happens when the motor quits? With no wing those things must drop like rocks, right? Nope. Hoban said that if the main rotor keeps spinning, she could bring you down so softly, without power, that you wouldn't even know there was a problem.

So there you have it. Helicopters are the best. Especially if you like lots of moving parts and big budgets. See, the main problem with helicopters is money.

"You get what you pay for," said Doug Herlihy, who owns Helicotper Flight Services, which flies out of South Jersey Regional.

Lessons at South Jersey Regional run $220 an hour, and while the FAA requirement for a license is the same as with fixed-wing aircraft _ 40 hours, minimum _ helicopters ›may require more hours to learn. It costs roughly $12,000 to get an private license at Helicopter Flight Services. Then you can rent one for $220 an hour or buy one. A used helicopter worth owning might run anywhere from $90,000 to $160,000.

"You can't just play with it," Hoban said. "If someone's not paying me to fly, I'm not flying."

She bills $550 an hour and says most of that goes right back into the machine. It takes a lot of money to beat the air into submission. Unless you're a hummingbird.