CHAPTER 9 
/ How to Get into a Super Cub: 100 Ways to Humiliate Yourself in Front of an Audience / 1. THE HOBGOBLIN HOP™

Before we even dream of taxiing to the runway—without veering into a goat-infested drainage ditch or becoming a cautionary tale whispered at fuel pumps—we need to address the most publicly humiliating ritual in tailwheel aviation: Getting into the cockpit of a Piper Super Cub.

This isn’t just a pre-flight step. It’s your opening act of self-destruction. Your one and only chance to declare: “I have no idea what I’m doing, and I’d like to demonstrate that with my entire body.”

Because if you can’t pull off this trapeze act without dislocating your spine or dignity, you have no business taxiing anywhere.

This is ground zero for public embarrassment.
Where your aviation reputation will either be forged in grit and grace…
Or go full Titanic. Bow down, ass up, never to recover.

Sounds exaggerated?
It’s not.

If you’ve never tried entering a Super Cub, here’s the picture:
Imagine a hammock mounted at shoulder height, fused with a jungle gym designed by drunk Soviet engineers with a PhD in medieval torture.

There’s a ridiculous excuse for a step—clearly the revenge of an underpaid aviation designer.
No ladder. No logic. No mercy.
Just a gaping void inside a canvas death canoe, daring you to swan-dive into orthopaedic shame.

You crack open that split door like it’s a rusty safari Jeep from a failed anti-poaching documentary, peer into the abyss of tubing, oil stains, and emotional trauma, and realize:

There is no right way in.
There are only witnesses. Regrets. And pain.

And yes—there are techniques.
More ways into a Cub than unpaid hours in a CFI’s logbook.

Unfortunately, most of them were conceived during a Cirque du Soleil team-building retreat by engineers who hated both humanity and knees. Especially your knees.

What follows is not a guide.
It’s a warning.
And possibly the start of your permanent ban from the apron.

1. THE HOBGOBLIN HOP™

For pilots who skipped yoga, balance training, and common sense.

This is the most common Cub entry “technique”—
Common not because it works…
…but because it’s the default setting when your brain panics and your body commits to chaos.

Step 1: Place your left foot on that absurdly small metal step.
This is the trap. This is how it begins.
It looks like a step. It is, in fact, a lawsuit in waiting.

Step 2:
With the grace of a dying flamingo, you now fling your right leg skyward—aiming for the cabin floor like it’s a moving target.
Your centre of gravity?
Long gone.
You’re now levitating purely through shame and adrenaline.

Step 3:
Your torso follows—but not voluntarily.
It’s sucked in by momentum and regret.
You grab the doorframe, the tube, maybe your own thigh—anything to prevent collapse.
Meanwhile, your headset cable has wrapped around your neck like a vengeful anaconda.

Step 4:
Midway through this Cirque du Psychotic contortion, you discover your belt buckle has snagged on the door latch, your foot is wedged behind the rudder pedal, and your shoulder is dislocating itself out of protest.

This is the Hobgoblin Hop:

Half lunge, half seizure.
A spiralling ballet of desperation, watched by a hangar full of silent witnesses and one mechanic who just shook his head and walked away.

If done perfectly, you will land inside the cockpit.
In the foetal position.
Facing backwards.
Upside-down.

If done poorly?
Well… they’ll name a crater after you.