Interstate Exits: California KML File

It's finally here! I've been putting off doing the Google Earth (GE) KML for California interstate exits because of its size; but, I guess there's no stalling any longer. Somebody's gotta do it and I guess I'm the one.

This is the tenth such file I've created for the interstates in the west so you would think it would'a been easy, but it wasn't. Well, not so's ya'd know it much.

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Interstate Exits: Montana KML File

Montana! Big Sky Country! Yellowstone! The ninth in the series of Google Earth (GE) KML maps I'm making to snazzy up the labels on the interstates in the western part of the country.

Now that I can open this map up in background of GE, I can tell where I'm at when a trail book advises "turn south at exit 27" as they all are want to do these days.

It's been no small feat but this is the ninth in the series of such files and leaves only California and New Mexico left to do.

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Interstate Exits: Arizona KML File

We're on the home stretch of our journey through the interstate exits of the western states. As you can't possibly not know, I've been laboring through making Google Earth (GE) KML files in order to make up for the program's lack of labels.

It's been a thorn under my blanket for years that when nearly all the trail books I've read tell me to "turn left off interstate exit 253" I have absolutely no way of following along on Google Earth – cause there are no labels! Frankly, often when I zoom in to be able to even see some of the back-country roads, I have absolutely no clue where on the globe I've got to.

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Tony Hillerman Quote on the Sierra Club

I think that if you have even casually read the Offroading Home blog you realize our interest in pretty much all things Native American midst our intense interest in providing free offroad trail maps.

Tony Hillerman is a world renowned Native American historian, author, conservationist and advocate of the land who has written upwards of thirty books, always informing and entertaining.

He not only understands and appreciates the land and landscapes but he probably is one of the most skilled observers of people, their needs, habits and motives of any author alive today.

Here is his take on the Sierra Club and people like them.

"I must say that some people look on me as, at best, a mixed blessing. Especially guys like Dan Murphy. The people who really love the landscape. They love it because it's empty. And it stays empty only if people stay away from it – and nobody's there but them, right?

Sorta the same as - I sometimes think it's the same attitude that causes a lot of people to support the Sierra Club. I mean, they love the country. And they love it better if the hoi polloi [Ed. - ignorant masses, common people uncultured and apt to act stupidly] is not there – the barber and the working man, you know, and it's left for the culturally elite who really appreciate it… right?

So they don't have to mingle when they get there with somebody who went to a state supported teachers college, you know strictly ivy leaguers."
Tony Hillerman

Pretty much sums it up, doesn't it?

Interstate Exits: Colorado KML File

This is the seventh of our maps of the U.S. interstate exits and puts us well on our way to completing all the western states, which is our goal. Here is the Google Earth KML map for Colorado.

Eventually, we'll be able to load these files in the background and make up for the fact that Google Earth doesn't handle interstate exit labels very well - in fact not at all.

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Interstate Exits: Idaho KML File

The sixth, and nowhere near the end, of our posting about maps for the interstate exits of the western U.S. states – this one for Idaho.

These, of course, are Google Earth maps, of the .kml file type, which can be loaded in the background whenever you are trying to find locations in the state. This because GE really doesn't handle the area navigational labels at all well. The National Geographic and other advertising placemarks it inflicts on us all too well, but the road labels leave a lot to be desired.

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Interstate Exits: Nevada KML File

This is the fifth in our series of Google Earth (GE) files containing all the interstate exits located within the western states is for Nevada, one of my home stomping grounds.

After serendipitously stumbling upon the data which I've been searching for the past several years, I decided to digitize them for others to use; because, as you know, good old GE doesn't have them in its repertoire.

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Interstate Exits: Oregon KML File

The fourth installment in what seems like is turning out to be almost a life's work. I'm trying to make up for Google Earth's (in fact the entire internet's) lack of publicly accessible geo-coordinates for the exit locations along the interstate system.

It's a maddening exercise trying to follow along one of the trail books which gives directions in terms of freeway exit numbers - cause Google Earth has no such labels. Then try and "Google" it - you do get one or two worthwhile hits but they all want you to join their society or download sophisticated software (for a fee) or merely display the numbers on a proprietary, protected PDF file.

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Interstate Exits: Utah KML File

This is the third in a series of KML, Google Earth, files I am preparing for Offroading Home concerning the Interstate Road system, its exits and the lack of labels for them on digital maps.

When the DOT didn't respond to my several requests to make their Geo-data available in a user-friendly form, I kept seeking for other sources. I did find some and have begun the painstaking process of coding them into the .kml file type structure which can be used in Google Earth. This one joins the group with coverage of Utah.

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Interstate Exits: Washington KML File

This is the second in a series of KML, Google Earth, maps that I am creating covering the Interstate system of roads and their exits in the western US states.

Google Earth is conspicuous in its absence of labels for exits on the road system; yet, that seems to be the favored method of describing routes to the various destinations in offroading trail books published these days. In fact, you need to navigate so close to the ground that you can't even tell where you are before Google even turns on many of the state road labels – and none of them are for the exits.

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Interstate Exits: Wyoming KML File

One of the deficiencies, if you can call it that, of Google Earth is that it doesn't list the interstate exit numbers as one of its many options for labels. Perhaps it's just us map-making geeks that even notice it but it's been a thorn in my side for years and years while I've been trying to digitize trail maps on Google Earth.

And for just as long I've been trying to get the Department Of Transportation (DOT) to cough up their data in a publicly useable format – no joy. I'm not even convinced that I ever reached an official DOT employee. Now, I've found a source for the coordinates and have spent more hours than I thought it would take in producing Google Earth files for all the western states (where most of our available trails are located.

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Norgay and Hillary on Everest: 60 Years Ago Today

The world – well, a lot of people – are commemorating the 1953 first summit of Mount Everest today by the late Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tensing Norgay. It's a huge to-do in Nepal, Australia and New Zealand.

The Auckland Museum has been publishing the last 19 days of Hillary's diary to cover the final push to the summit. I read it completely and had such a difficult time navigating through the thing due to all the redundant advertising and navigation issues that I didn't want others to have to wade through it. I've included the diary entries below. I've also included a Google Earth map that you can download.   [A free Google Earth file of this route is available: Get the map.]

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The Scott Expedition: Greenland

If you're thinking that you didn't need to follow the Scott Expedition because I would probably do it for you – you were correct, I did.

Not quite like being there any more than reading Bill Bryson's book about hiking the Appalachian Trail, but for us armchair relegated types it was a good adventure none-the-less.

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The Scott Expedition - Antarctica

Hold onto your hats, the Scott Expedition is back underway. Perhaps you remember when I posted a year or so ago that I had discovered the blog of Ben Sanders after viewing a TED talk.

He's the guy that was the third in history to ski solo to the North Pole and holds the record for the longest solo Arctic journey by a Briton.

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Offroad: Radio Crystal-Helifino Pass

I'm still trying to clear out a couple of trails that were neglected from last years (2012) riding season and this ride is one of them – a terrific day with Dad and Gordon on our ATVs down to "the lower butte." To places we've already seen a few times.

Why go again? Well, I'll tell you. First, as far as I'm concerned there's no better place to be in southeast Nevada; Second, if "Harry and the fiends" [Reed, D-Nevada and Sierra Club PAC] have their way, most seniors would never see it again; and, Third, its better than Disney – you can never see it all!   [A free Google Earth file of this route is available at: Offroading Home.]

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