'onetrack' when you were 19 (we are same age) I was being taught low level navigation at c.500 feet in a dual seat RAAF Vampire over the (it seemed) mostly sheep paddocks west & north of RAAF Pearce 1968. As initially taught low level in the Winjeel we made two strip maps from paper contour maps (one for instructor). We memorized the route using obvious ground waypoints to aid our memory and notes on a kneepad. We looked at the strip map very briefly, holding it in our face, just to refresh our memory but of course relied on looking ahead and to the side if required for navigation and/or birds (wedge tail eagles only give up an attack at the last seconds). We would take off five minutes apart and know we were on track (or at least on the same track) when the sheep were in the same corner of the paddock - driven there by previous fly overs.
Same strip map techniques used in the A4G but with a much more cramped cockpit so memory of route - with obvious waypoints, was standard - except when over the sea, the albatross could be a problem if we were wave skimming.
My longest A4G flight c.19710 was high level air refueling over RAAF East Sale from a partner TA4G tanker (we had departed NAS Nowra together with my wingman - TA4G returned to Nowra). Then descent west of Melbourne to the border of SA/Vic, on the coast, to turn north for a long low level leg, skimming the sand dunes to Broken Hill, where we climbed out to 40,000 feet for return to NAS. That low level leg was just a matter of holding speed and heading as there was nothing to see, except eventually, the outline of the city and steel works etc at Broken Hill.