The new Google Earth is a mind blower and I don’t say that lightly. For a couple of reasons, it’s been probably more than a year since I’ve dropped by Google Earth and the transformation in the interim truly shocked me. The main reason I haven’t wandered over to Goggle Earth is Google’s fault, I just haven’t had the need to go there because Goggle Maps is so terrific and handy (and it didn’t help that the Go-To-Google-Earth Icon – for lack of a better name – mysteriously disappeared from my toolbar for some reason, maybe because Google Earth is now only reachable from my browser). Anyway, once there, I found it difficult to leave. This has to be the best map(s) in the history of Humankind.

Everything is just seamless, from Earth floating in space down to the fisherman trails around Thousand Island in the Sierras. It is addictive to follow a trail I hiked decades ago and then just wander up a side trail that I didn’t take.

We can do this seemingly anywhere, although the quality of detail suffers in areas where it appears everything was only mapped by satellite and/or has lots of tree coverage. Still, this is an amazing jump in mapping. Google deserves a standing ovation.