We contacted national aviation leaders for comments and downloaded megabytes of facts and figures from the Internet.
But we weren't fooling anybody. And after two weeks of flying across deserts, over mountains and around thunderstorms, we conceded to ourselves that this highminded-sounding project was nothing but an old-fashioned romantic adventure.
RELATED: Wright Memorial historian follows in Wright’s path
Even Phil Boyer, president of the 300,000-member Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, had us figured out before we took off. We were flying for the romance of it, he told me in a telephone interview.
But that notion didn't put him off. In fact, he said AOPA surveyed pilots extensively a few years ago and found out that romance is why people fly.
`People do not learn to fly for transportation,' he said. `It's the recreation and romance that starts this thing off.'
And just as we tried to sell our project on journalistic grounds, Boyer said pilots try to rationalize their flying.
`We apologize for it all the time. We want people to know that we use our planes for business ... we don't want to admit that we own a plane to expand our horizons on the weekend,' he said.
Nobody apologizes here at Oshkosh. Since July 30, thousands of airplanes of every description have covered the ground and filled the air. This is the home of the Experimental Aircraft Association and the site of its annual fly-in convention, which runs through Tuesday.
RELATED: Storms make airport look beautiful
It's part air show, part convention and part flea market. Hundreds of thousands of people who love aviation come to show off their planes or gawk at the planes of others. Homebuilders rub shoulders with legendary designers and astronauts. But, despite its vastness, it has the air of a small-town festival or a big family reunion.
Pat Wagner, a wingwalker from West Milton, has been coming to EAA fly-ins since the 1960s. `It's like coming home. I don't know why. You're only here one week.... You just kind of feel like family,' she said Sunday.
We got the same feeling as we closed in on the airport Saturday afternoon in my little orange Grumman AA-1B. When Ty radioed our position to Air Show Control, we heard air show performer Patty Wagstaff jump on the frequency.
`That sounds like Ty's voice,' she said.
We didn't answer - the frequency wasn't for chatter - but we grinned at each other, knowing we'd soon be seeing a lot of aviation friends.
RELATED: An airport that feels like a country store
Flying for romance is a notion Boyer said aviation manufacturers and organizations are trying to revive to stir up new interest in general aviation - the broad field of flight that includes everything besides airlines and the military.
They're trying to get people excited again because, despite the enthusiasm here at Oshkosh, general aviation is sagging.
Since 1979, Boyer said, the number of U.S. Licensed pilots has dropped by about 25 percent, from 827,000 to 622,000. Less than half as many new students sign up each year as in the 1970s. And airports are closing around the nation.
We saw what all those facts and figures meant during our flight. The average small airport office has a rundown look. Aging airport managers struggle to keep the airport open for aging pilots and their aging planes. Airports that once had two or three runways open have one, while weeds consume others.
It was a sobering aspect of our trip, because we also saw many of the ways that general aviation touches our lives - from seeding and treating crops to fighting forest fires and studying wildlife.
And we steeped ourselves in the romance of it, which is something that defies quantification. We couldn't find a way to put a value on the sense of wonder that comes from watching the colors and patterns of land and sky change as we crossed from one side of America to another and back again.
RELATED: Fighting fire with flight
Romance is more than just sizzle to sell the product called general aviation. It's the root of it all. Call it a challenge. Call it excitement. Call it an affliction, as Wilbur Wright did nearly a century ago. It's why we all fly, and it's the best reason of all.