There are some advantages to flying your own two-seater antique plane. There are no tray tables to place in the upright position, no need to put your iPod into aeroplane mode, and, at times, an invigorating 70 miles per hour breeze blowing through the cabin.

This summer, brothers Jack and Larry Durner spent 24 days flying across 11 American states in Larry Durner’s 1942 J3 Piper Cub.

Jack, a Bermuda resident, first learned to fly in the 1960s through an air force flying club. He took the trip to have fun with his brother and to get some air miles in to maintain his flying certifications. His brother’s major interest in the trip was sightseeing.

“The first phase was to fly from Larry’s ranch in Colorado to Oshkosh, Wisconsin to attend an annual air show and fly-in, attended by over 500,000 people and over 10,000 aeroplanes,” said Jack Durner, who is retired from a career in computers. “It is the busiest airport in the world for one week a year. It’s considered to be a kind of a flying mecca for Second World War aircraft, homebuilts and lots of other small planes.”

After getting their fill of aeroplanes, it was back to Colorado to catch their collective breaths, replace some equipment and stock up for the next phase which was to fly from Colorado to California and back. The entire trip was 4,692.5 flying miles.

The Durners flew down through New Mexico, Arizona, California, took a few days of well-deserved rest in Sonoma Valley to enjoy some fine wines and then up through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming and back to Colorado. The reason for that routing was to take advantage of the prevailing winds.

“It’s much better to have the wind at your back than on your nose to help you move along faster,” said Mr Durner. “Also, we had to avoid the many, many miles of very tall mountains that the plane couldn’t get high enough to fly over.”

One of the highlights of the trip was the Enola Gay exhibit at Historic Wendover Airfield in Utah. Enola Gay refers to the Boeing-B29 superfortress bomber that on August 6, 1945 became the first aircraft to drop an atomic bomb.

“We also enjoyed Sonoma in California, (before the recent earthquake),” Mr Durner said. “We enjoyed some fabulous wine. If you like wine it is not a bad place to be. Napa and Sonoma are two valleys next to one another. We met some great people all along the way. People on the two coasts can be uptight but people in the middle tend to be wonderful and accommodating.”

Often they were flying over massive expanses of nothing except mountains, valleys, and deserts with no signs of life, other than a few bushes or scrub trees.

“The saving grace was that the geology was phenomenal along the way,” said Mr Durner. “We saw all sorts of colours and shapes of rocks and plains that are a geologist’s dream.”

Their antique plane was originally built by the United States military to be used as a training aircraft. It was converted to private use in 1946. Larry Durner purchased the aircraft after it had been restored, 30 years ago.

“They are treasures to find,” said Jack. “The gentleman who restored it opened up the hangar door and Larry said, ‘I’ll take it’, because it was such a beautiful piece of restoration. It still is today. A lot of tender loving care (TLC) goes a long way.”

It is known as a tail-wheel aeroplane or a conventional aircraft. When they first designed aircraft they all sat on their tails. Now aeroplanes sit on their nose.

“You have to pay attention,” said Mr Durner. “I call it real flying. It is basic. There are very few instruments to follow. We had supplemental equipment on the plane. There is no electricity on the plane. We had electronic backup in the form of iPads and Samsung tablets, paper charts and the like. We had to watch our battery supply carefully for the tablets.”

The highest they usually flew was around 9,000ft, so they didn’t need supplemental oxygen. They often flew with the door and window of the aircraft open which meant it could be chilly, something Mr Durner hadn’t anticipated.

In the mornings it could be 50F (10C) and at 70 miles per hour, it could become cold.

“I hadn’t expected that since we were flying over desert,” he said. “Luckily, I had a jacket with me. Sometimes we would close the door, but very few times would we close the window as well.”

He said the only time he really felt nervous was flying over mountains, as it was his first time doing this. Some of the mountains were 14,000ft high, so they had to research ahead of time to find an “alleyway” through the mountains, or they followed a highway which tended to follow the easiest route over the mountains.

“It was refreshing to stop at local airports and be greeted like a celebrity,” Mr Durner said. “A lot of people did come out just to see the old plane and talk about how someone they knew learned to fly in one a long time ago.”

Mr Durner said the trip was a “trip of a lifetime”.