With regard to Google Mapmaker I’ve done a before and after shot of the area around Reykjavïk. On the left is the shot of google maps as it stood a few minutes ago. Blank.

On the right is mapmaker - the data here, once it is more consistent and complete should find its way over to google maps proper.

Google has opened up its mapping software for certain areas. It can be a little clunky at times (the list of edits I’ve made isn’t exhaustive, if something is awaiting moderation it cannot be tweaked easily and so on). It’s not always clear what the road classifications are supposed to be - but I’m working on the basis that if I put in a best guess, it can always be tweaked if not quite right.

Nevertheless, it can be fun, as well as useful (I’ve been mapping Iceland, I’ve done a lake, Klerfarvatn, a glacier, and lots of roads concentrating around the Blue Lagoon and Grindav&iaciute;k in the south west). Some of my changes have been accepted immediately, some depend on other changes, and so are pending, and some are in moderation awaiting checking.

Maps are currently editable in a few areas, probably selected for the lack of existing map features, so if the mapping experiment fails, google can delete the mapping info and be back to where they started.

The areas editable right now are: Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Cyprus, Grenada, Iceland, Jamaica, Netherlands Antilles, Pakistan, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Vietnam.

Even changes which are approved take a little while to be rendered and appear on the maps - this is especially true for some large features.

This website lists recursively strange Islands and Lakes. To be honest, I began to lose track as I was nearing the bottom of the list!

… why doesn’t Australia count as a big Island? Presumably, if it’s a continent it can’t be an island!

I’ve updated my visted countries maps, and they look like this (with Germany and Austria being only fleeting):

I’ve visited the counties in yellow. Which counties have you visited? made by marnanel map reproduced from Ordnance Survey map data by permission of the Ordnance Survey. © Crown copyright 2001.

On the UK map, much is to be taken with a pinch of salt, it’s very easy to go between UK counties! I’ve only been to Scotland once, and that was fleeting. I’ve been to most counties in Wales (if not all), but am making best guess, and I really can’t recall the southwest of Wales, the rest is on a ‘best guess’ basis. The nearer to London, the more sure I can be of the counties actually visited. I tried to tick only for actually setting for in the counties, rather than setting wheel - so I can’t be sure of Rutland, and can’t recall going to Norfolk at all (though I think I was taken to the Broads once, I have no memory of it).

create your personalized map of europe

create your own visited states map

create your own visited countries map

Yesterday I acquired a GPS from Amazon, and I decided to go into London. I wanted to see the Michelangelo exhibition, and test the GPS at the same time.

I walked around home a bit to check all was well, and then I headed off for the train. Unfortunately there is no way to get the GPS signals in the train, and so as soon as I left Waterloo station I switched the thing on and found my satellites.

I started to walk.

It’s rather magical really, a moving display of where you are. My GPS is quite a basic unit (I don’t want, or need, the full screen maps as I’m moving - it’s a supplement, not a replacement - and besides, that would have made it much more expensive!). On the resulting tracklog there are a few places where the signal was lost and so when plotting the software made approximations, so there is the odd corner cut off and so forth (I was walking in London, remember - tall buildings everywhere, it’s amazing, I think, that the log is so good!)

I walked up to the London Eye, and then to Trafalgar square, and on up Charing Cross Road to the British Museum.

I tend to go to the British Museum a few times each year, and so I decided today to become a friend of the museum, and I joined them.

I got a Michelangelo exhibition for just before 5pm.

During the day I went around the museum and did some sketching - some reasonable, some not - none what one might see as ‘good’ on an objective scale, but I enjoy it. I drew Parvati, the consort of Shiva, a drew one of the Parthenon sculptures, ‘a blind contour’ drawing of a Cypriot chappy, and a ’straight’ drawing of him. These should appear on flickr when I get a round tuit. I also did a bit of peoplewatching - I’m not as happy with the sketches that resulted as I was last time I did this, everybody kept moving - it was a conspiracy!

The Michelangelo exhibition was pretty good - some of the drawings are incredible, they’re so detailed and he makes them look so effortless. I found that even close up, when you can see the individual pencil marks, each one was just right. The place was absolutely packed though - the British museum do a timed entry system to minimise the crowding, but it’s still quite busy. I’d guess a very early ticket would be best.

On the way back, I walked down Shaftesbury avenue, Haymarket and across Westminster Bridge.

This data was put onto a map using OziExplorer, which also outputs data in a Google Earth friendly manner.