Wax or anyone else:
From the webpage in first post:
http://lend-lease.airforce.ru/english/articles/sheppard/p39/p39map.jpgA 'hop' is a single flight, one take off, and one landing.
A 'hops list' is a series of take of and landings.
That photo shows the planes flight path with all of its stops from the log book.
Microsoft flightsim has most of the worlds airports in it, although only a 'popular' places have a detailed cities or landmarks around them. One can download many homemade 'sceneries' from flightsim.com
One could try to virtually fly the flight that this particular P39 flew, in a virtual P39, gassing up at each airport as they go, 'doing the hops.' This would start at what looks like Buffalo, New York and go to South Bends, Indiana (which would be the first hop), and then though the many other hops, finally ending at Novinka Russia. Actually, the flight would end where the plane went down, (salute) to Lt Baranovsky, rip.
Options: do you bring a GPS (navigation, whats that?), or fly by VOR and NDB signals, or try to fly it by visual landmarks and a clock?
Aircraft:
Fly a virtual P39? The flights might take days of real life time. There is a save flight function though.
Or how about upping an SR-71 or a Firefox, with GPS ofcourse. The take offs and landings would take longer than the flight between the cities.
And ofcourse the weather and time and season would be a thing to, but if we just set it to day with clear skies then we actually get to see the ground and sites.
Immersion