Iced Coffee Town
// May 27th, 2008 // No Comments » // Map Stuff
A great piece of zoomorphic cartography.
Via Strangemaps
Archive for Map Stuff
GPS Art – The Biggest Drawing in the World
// May 26th, 2008 // No Comments » // Map Stuff
This was created by shipping a package via DHL with a special GPS embedded, the artist aparently gave the pilots some extra instrcutions to do loop-de-loops in the Caribbean.
Intuitive Error Message
// May 12th, 2008 // 1 Comment » // Map Stuff, Work
What is that supposed to mean? I love the emotive “having difficulties”, like old Illustrator is saying “I can’t be bothered working this hard”, or “your file is to firggin big”, or “you cheapskate buy some more memory”.
High Country Field Checking Trip
// November 15th, 2007 // No Comments » // Map Stuff, Travel, Work
After the Melbourne 4×4 Show, Paul and I headed for to Alpine Victoria for a field-checking trip in the Hema Map Patrol.
Chromite Mine Track Bush Camping
Our trip started at the Heyfield Bakery to check out their pies (after trying many pies along our travels we became expert pie tasters, and the best pie we ate is listed at the bottom of this entry). We then headed off to Licola, a small remote town on the edge of the Alpine National Park. Licola is a tiny town served by a general store, which also serves as a petrol station, bank, campsite, and even offers toboggan hire in winter. Natural disasters such as fires, mud slips, equine flu and floods have caused a big downturn in tourism, and the owner of the general store is considering shutting up shop, which will be a big loss to this tiny community.
Scenery in the Tamboritha Road area
We entered the Alpine National Park via the Stockman’s Track, and our first night was spent at a bush camp near the Chromite Mine. The devastation of the fires was evident everywhere, and the charcoal black trees were striking against the blue sky and the fresh green undergrowth of the forest.
Billy Goat Bluff Track
The Billy Goat Bluff Track was a real highlight of the trip, the track carefully follows a ridgeline, towering over valleys on either side, offering amazing views of the alpine ranges below and we luckily had clear skies (which did not last for the rest of the trip). The grade of the track was great due to the dry weather, we climbed 1200 vertical metres in just 7 kilometres, and the view of The Pinnacles was fantastic.
Black Snake Creek Campsite
That night camped at Black Snake Creek, a remote campsite overlooking the Wonnangatta River with good facilities, including toilets, fireplaces, and flat sandy campsites with great views of the river.
Old Dargo high plains Road
The next day we discovered some good country hospitality from Dargo, the walnut capital of Australia. The well-stocked general store had great friendly who were happy to help, and recommended the comfortable Dargo River Inn. The day was spent checking the roads in the area and checking out the local campsites, with the Melbourne cup weekend coming up the campsites were all starting to fill out. We ended the day by field checking the Old Dargo High Plains Road, which was a real highlight of the whole trip. At times the visibility due to cloud cover was les than 5 metres, and the eerie clouds and that stark black charred Snow Gums created a spooky but beautiful atmosphere. The track was not well maintained, and we had a clear several trees blocking our path with an axe, which left us wishing was had packed a chainsaw.
Suggan Buggan
After Dargo we headed to The Great Alpine Highway (B500) and Omeo through the Alpine National Park along the very well maintained Dargo High Plains Road. Omeo is an adorable alpine village with quaint shops, cafe’s and the main street is lined with flower boxes, even the High Country Laundry was decorated tastefully to match the rest of the village. After trying several fully booked caravan parks we managed to find a room at a historic cottage called ‘Sung as a Bug‘ where we experienced more alpine hospitality. The next day was spent field checking roads in the region, and around Suggan Buggan and Hanging Rock.
Camping on the Snowy River
After checking out the pretty Basin Creek Falls, and with dusk looming we were battling to find a campground. After trying the Bally Hooley Campground, which was not suitable for the Map Patrol, we headed towards Jacksons Creek Campsite. We headed down the valley towards the Snowy River, and due to the amount of rain the track was in very poor condition, and the lower we got the more muddier it got. We eventually Reach Jacksons Crossing on the Snowy river, but decided to not attempt the crossing until morning. That was a sleepless night worrying about how we would get out of the valley- either back up the muddy track that would take all day, or across the swollen snowy river. Daybreak brought some welcomed sunshine, and as it was Paul’s birthday we had a camp breakfast of bacon and eggs on the edge of the Snowy River with its banks lined with wild flowers. By daylight the crossing of the river was not nearly as daunting as we expected, and was another highlight of the trip. Jacksons Crossing involves grossing the river in 2 parts, the first is a short crossing over some gentle rapids onto an island which you drive along and then cross the second part of the river over another set of rapids.
Scenery on the banks of the Snowy River 
Jacksons Crossing
Me, at the Six Mile Creek Rest Area
The top highlights of our trip were:
- Best Pie – Braidwood Bakery
- Best Burger – Cann River Hotel
- Best Bush Campsite – Jacksons Crossing
- Best Serviced Campsite – Six Mile Creek Rest Area, outside Bega
- Best Accommodation – Dargo River Inn
- Best Track – Old Dargo High Plains Road
- Second Best Track – Slipping around in the mud on the Jacksons Crossing Track
- Best Village - Omeo
- Best General Store – Dargo General Store
- Best Laundromat – High Country laundry, Omeo
Hema Map on AussieBum TV
// October 5th, 2007 // No Comments » // Map Stuff
What happens when you take chiseled Aussie men and place them in the Outback for a photo shoot? Pure hotness from aussieBum! And how cool that they have used Hema’s Outback Australia map.
Also check out other hot videos at ausBum.tv.
Major Map Aquisitions
// October 2nd, 2007 // No Comments » // Map Stuff
Yesterday afternoon I hard that the BBC has acquired a 75% share of Lonely Planet for and estimated $100m $200m. This is great news for the Melbourne based publisher who publish 500 titles, and it is going to be very interesting to see how this is going to play out. Lonely Planet has always been a leader in the travel book market, but is increasingly making headway in electronic markets too. With the cashed up BBC behind them will Lonely Planet take over the Planet?
Nokia has acquired Navetq for US$8.1bn. Navteq is the worlds leading supplier of Navigation Software and Geographic data, they have seamless databases that cover hundreds of countries. Nokia if the worlds largest handset manufacturer, and technically the worlds largest camera manufacturer. Will Nokia now become the world’s largest GPS manufacturer? I have an N95 that came with Nokia Maps, which includes Navteq and Tele Atlas’ worldwide maps which can be accessed for free on the handset. This is a first generation phone, and mobiles and GPS are really starting to converge, the future in the space is very exciting. Will Nokia keep supplying Navteq data to Google? What does Garmin think about the acquisition, they are also a Navteq customer. TomTom just bought Tele Atlas in a similar deal, and it is rumoured that they are looking to start producing handsets too? Will Nokia use Google’s advertising expertise to integrate location based advertising into their mobiles?
The future of the mapping industry is exciting… I am looking forward to it.
Waiting
// August 22nd, 2007 // 2 Comments » // Map Stuff, Work
It is 9.30 pm, and I am at work which kinda sux, but I am at the very end stretch of a couple of cool books that are going to the printers very soon. So I sit here chewing on PEZ waiting for progress bars and pouring over maps looking for mistakes, and wasting time blogging.
I have found a few intereting places that I would love to know more about:
Mt Misery is about 20km south of springfield, but I wonder if it was named because of it’s height of 666m? I doubt it, in the day it was named it would have been 2185ft (FYI- New Zealand started metrication in 1969 with the establishment of the Metric Advisory Board (MAB) and completed metrication on 14 December 1976)
And then there is Mt Gay, just outside of Fairlie
Bridge to Brisbane
// August 6th, 2007 // No Comments » // Map Stuff, Work
Get a Map or Get lost team 
Gavin and Ed, the two runners of the team
Paul and Marjanne 
Rob at the top of the Gateway Bridge
Marjanne 
Sky Lettering
Yesterday a contingent from Hema Maps entered the Bridge to Brisbane fun run in a team called “Get a Map or Get Lost”. The 12km route started at the Gateway Bridge toll plaza, traversed the Brisbane River across the Gateway Bridge and followed the river to New Farm Park. There was also a 4.5km option that started at Breakfast Creek and also finished at New Farm Park, this was the option that Al, Shelly & the Little Mappers did. The team member with the best time was Gavin who finished the 12km run in a little over an hour.
I recorded the 12km route as a KML file on my Nokia N95 using Nokia Sports Tracker which can be downloaded here and viewed in Google Earth.
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