I’m still having a great time with the recent major release of Google Street View images for the United Kingdom. It’s like somebody opened a new playground with so many different places for me to travel vicariously. It also offered an opportunity to go back to some of my earlier articles and see if I can find any on-the-ground imagine for topics I reported previously.
Lowest Elevation in England
Holme Fen, Cambridgeshire registers England’s lowest elevation. It’s three metres below sea level. Man’s tinkering over the last couple of centuries caused the underlying water table to fall and the peaty earth began to sink. However, this didn’t happen without notice or concern. Scientists pounded cast-iron posts into the surface level in 1852 as a means to measure the drop. The posts remain in place today but they now extend several metres above the surrounding terrain.
Look closely towards the back of the lawn. Notice the green post standing next to a marker at the back of the lawn.
From Britain to Iceland by Automobile
It is possible to travel by automobile from Britain to Iceland using various ferry routes. Until recently, one could leave the dock here in Scrabster, Scotland and take the Smyril Line to the Faroe Islands, and then change ships for an onward voyage directly to Iceland.
Unfortunately Smyril discontinued the line in 2009 due to the economy. Now a traveler would need to sail from Harwich, England and take a much longer route using the DFDS Ferry to Esbjerg, Denmark before heading to the Faroe Islands and finally on to Iceland.
England’s Desert
Some refer to this spot at Dungeness, a headland on the east coast of Kent, as England’s only desert. In fact it’s not really a desert in the traditional sense because it gets plenty of rainfall. Rather it’s a desert in the sense that it’s practically deserted.
Winnie the Pooh
The beloved Winnie the Pooh character is based on a real bear named Winnipeg that lived for many years at the London Zoo. A statue exists there in commemoration. Unfortunately this is the closest I could get with Street View because the statue is on the other side of this wall. But it’s in there!
Northernmost England
This might be the best Street View image of the set. A pullout has been provided where the A1 crosses between England and Scotland. This isn’t the northernmost location in England but it’s close. Follow the line of site straight out from the border wall in the foreground to the sea, and that would be the magical spot.
I can also report that the Most Remote Town in Mainland Britain does not have Street View coverage. Yet.
UPDATE: The Google Lat Long Blog has also added a bunch of Street View image thumbnails of sites they’ve found in the UK.
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