Riding the blue roads of Google Maps

[Venturous Randy]

One of the things I do occasionally when I am playing around on the computer is to go to Google Maps and go to an area of the country I have never been and pull up the map and drop the little gold man down on the blue marked roads. It is amazing how you can drop down on a road in the middle of nowhere, or stop by a quaint little town and go up and down each street and see the houses and places where people live. Sometimes I will go to the Rockies or the Bad Lands and just ride along.

Sometimes I will go to places I have been, such as Okracoke Island on the NC Outer Banks. It is so neat to ride around the little village and see neat houses and curvy wind blown trees. Sometimes when I am looking for a place to take a ride, whether on the bike or in the Miata with the top down, I can still find a road that I have never been on not too far from home. I can look at intersections and landmarks to help me on my adventures. Sometimes I will click on some place to eat or spend the night and check the reviews to see if I want to make that part of my adventure. Sometimes if I am looking for a particular address, I can go to street view and see the house or business and maybe get an idea how best to get to it, as sometimes my GPS will take me to hell and back if I just follow it, especially if I had it on "shortest distance"

If you have not spent any time doing this, I think if you will, you may enjoy it.

Randy

[kevin-vic-b.c.]

I did this often when my son was cycling across Canada. It gave me a view of what lay ahead for him the next day so when we spoke with him at night I could explain what was ahead. As well as the terrain I could tell him what condition the road looked to be in and whether or not there would be good shoulder area for him to ride in.

It is kinda neat.

[Midrsv]

I use the street view often. I find it useful when booking hotels. I look at the area around the hotel to make sure it looks like they have portrayed on their web site and to see what food choices are near by. Great tool.

 

Dennis

[Sailor]

We travel quite a bit to far away places and usually rent a car once we are there. I use google world to get the route and skim the road from the airport to our hotel then to various places we might want to go to. If there is a complicated intersection on the way ( eg. Manchester to Exeter-- 7 multilane high speed roundabouts..) and print it out so I can refer to the print and get in the proper lane in advance. Makes things way easier.

[cowpuc]

Is this one of those double edged sword trick questions Randy?

 

I am not even sure how to put this into words:scratchchin:,, may need to fall back on child talk:missingtooth:...

Many years ago my oldest daughter and I were rippin across Wyoming headed toward the Grand Canyon from YellowStone. Even though she was just a kid, she always amazed me at how strangely "deep" she could be in her thoughts about life and all that. She was also (and still is) the most verbal of our four children. As we rode along on "Beeg" (our first 1st Gen) she made a comment that has stuck with me to this day = "Dad, motorcycling is a lot like being in a really fun movie and being able to look out at the world who is watching the movie that we are in". When we tour on our scoot, it is "normal" for me to avoid GPS's and maps (especially maps like Google Earth) because I dont wanna know about the "movie" until I am there.. For some crazy reason, it is not uncommon for the surprises that happen along the trail due to traveling like that to end up being the things we always remember the most favorably in the end. I guess I am one of those strange characters who dont want to know whats out there till I see first hand whats out there.

On the other hand, I can certainly see where if a person was looking for something in particular, didnt want to waste a bunch of time and money trying to find it or just wanted explore the outer realms from the privacy of their own home than absolutely

 

PS - just spent 45 minutes playing around with Google Maps,, indeed brother - LOTS of fun!!!

[Howard B]

That is how we determine how to get into places. Since we drive an old converted Greyhound bus with the 1st gen on the rear bumper and towing a Grand Cherokee there are some turns we are told to make that are simply impossible. It also gives us an idea of what we are looking for. Fun pasttime as well.

[etcswjoe]

Like we use throw darts at a map.

[midnightventure]

My Garmin can be programmed to take an exact route I want to ride. I can then open it in Google Earth. Most of the areas I like to ride will have little photo emblems all over. I can click on them and see most of the best sights. That is how I found the best waterfall that I know of here in Mo.

[djh3]

Puc, even though I try to "preview" a route I have built and uploaded on the GPS. More often time then not its still an amazing "holy crap where does that road go" or "how did I get here?" LOL Unlike you I dont cherish 2 trackin on the 2nd gen. I have not been on a dirt bike in oh...35yr or somtin and shure as heck dont want to on this behemoth. Now I do use the google maps thing to check out the roads and kind of see what the scenery is going to look like. that way if it dont look interesting I can develop a plan B.