Producing nice stuff depends on what techniques you use and how much help you are prepared to accept. Once you're used to basic handling of the tools you can produce nice non-blown stuff like paperweights quite easily. Which isn't to say that paperweights are necessarily "easy" there are always more difficult techniques to challenge - difficult paperweights with precise flowers and so on are extremely hard!
Blowing is the next step and it's not really difficult to produce decent small stuff. Then you get to challenge yourself with more difficult techniques - What was really hard about the pieces above was putting the feet on the goblets, as they are made separately. It's like that cycling quote about it not getting easier, you just go faster. It doesn't get easier, you just blow bigger and more complex pieces.
Our first ever course was with Peter Layton in London. We got to take home some really nice stuff from that, but knowing what we now know we realise that the amount of help we must have received was very high. (And Peter Layton is more expensive than Adam!)
We've been doing it for about 8 years now and are at the point where we don't need help except for rescues and disasters (picking things up off the floor!, completely losing control of a large piece).
Yes it's expensive. Or at least it can be. Adam's prices are on his website.
You're right about watching glassblowers. We were at the Kosta Boda factory in Sweden a couple of years ago watching the wine glass production line. It's mesmeric.
