He hand flew all the way home... Earlier in my life I had had to hand fly a York at cruising level for alternate hours, from UK to KIN before FTL had been appied, as the A/P seldom worked. (I had 1000 hours total time at this stage and was the only other pilot apart from the Capt.)
The aircraft I fly (Metro 3) has no autopilot. That means hand flying it all the way up to FL250 with passengers on board (or FL310 without pax). I've been up to FL310 once before - it feels more and more like balancing the airplane on a pin the higher you climb above FL250. It's a cool experience.
An autopilot would be nice for legs that are over 1 hour but we survive. What's a copilot for anyways?!
And as far as the copilots, they all have around 200-250 hours when they start flying this airplane.