Welcome back to the Kubeastronaut Adventure — Part 3 of a journey that started with ambition, procrastination, and a hopeful gaze toward orbit.
Now we’re officially deeper into the mission.

CKAD: Passed.
Astronaut mode: upgraded to 60%.
Only two exams left — CKA and CKS — the final stretch before full liftoff.

Why I Started with CKAD

Before tackling the heavy cluster administration topics of CKA or the deep security trenches of CKS, I wanted something that would help me warm up.
Something to get familiar with the exam environment, the pace, and the workflow.

CKAD was the perfect entry point — focused, practical, and not as mentally draining as the others.
And yes, I’ll say it openly:
I picked it first because it’s simply easier than the admin or security exams.

How I Prepared

My preparation this time was a mix of structured learning, custom exercises, and some helpful tools:

• Completed Mumshad’s Udemy course — very solid, especially the final labs
• Used AMP CLI to generate custom exercise sets tailored to my weak spots
• Heavily used NotebookLM
• Discovered an excellent CKAD exercise repository: https://github.com/ibrahimatay/CKAD-Exercises

By the time exam day arrived, I had built a complete CKAD training ecosystem that strengthened my speed, accuracy, and confidence.

Thoughts on CKAD

CKAD is definitely on the easier side of the Kubernetes certifications.
Not trivial — but predictable, focused, and fair if you prepare properly.

It’s all about muscle memory, speed, and staying calm while navigating through YAML, kubectl commands, and task-based scenarios.
A perfect warm-up before the real spacewalk.

What’s Next

Next week: CKA.
Two weeks later: CKS.

These two are the final missions.
CKA will be technical but manageable; CKS, on the other hand, is likely to be the most mentally exhausting one since security isn’t exactly my favorite domain. But finishing the sequence this year is the goal — and I’m committed.

If all goes well, I’ll complete the full Kubernetes certification orbit:

KCNA → KCSA → CKAD → CKA → CKS

And finally achieve 100% astronaut status — closing a long-standing mental tab that’s been open for months.

Just imagining that feels incredible already.

Part 4?
Coming soon — either from orbit… or from a dramatic re-entry burn.

Stay tuned.