Category: Terrain
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Three Peaks
A long time ago Twelve Mile Circle featured the Highpoints of the Crown Dependencies, specifically Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. At the time I figured I’d quickly move to the island of Great Britain itself and the highest points of elevation of its three countries, England, Scotland and Wales. Several years passed and…
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Mr. Walker’s Island Adventure
It didn’t take much to get me started on another obsessive-compulsive exercise. Longtime reader Rhodent commented on my observations about a stalker on St. Martin’s Island (map) in Bangladesh. That made me even more curious about the underlying situation. So I needed to check every single image in painstaking detail to see if I could…
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Ends of Canada
My Ends of the Earth wandering reminded me of an earlier Google Street View quest. A long time ago, way back in 2010, Twelve Mile Circle included an article I called The Shack at the End of the Road. This marked the northernmost extreme of Street View coverage in Canada at that time. I wondered…
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Wildlife Corridors
Wildlife corridors do exactly what they imply. They provide safe passage for animals. Devices like these became increasingly important as pristine wilderness succumbed to development or urbanization. Without them animal populations became isolated even if protected within parks. This impacted genetic diversity and the overall health of local species. Further problems occurred when animals tried…
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Great Scott
It occurred to me that a great general like Winfield Scott probably influenced place names beyond the recently-featured Scott’s Addition in Richmond, Virginia. Citizens considered him a national hero during his lifetime even if we don’t hear much about him today. This period also coincided with a rapid expansion of population and migration. They needed…
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Misplaced Romans
The Geographic Names Information System listed 94 populated places in the United States called Rome. I figured maybe some should exist in other nations that created a bunch of new places around that same time period. Alas, I didn’t find any such places in Canada, South Africa, Australia or New Zealand. Why Rome seemed so…
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Directional West Virginia
I spent the last several articles talking about West Virginia so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to add one more. The introductory post mentioned the oddly named West Virginia Northern Community College. Could I find places in West Virginia that represented each of the four cardinal directions? I guess I could have picked a different…
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What the Dell?
My annual long relaxing August weekend in Wisconsin came to an end. I can’t think of any place I’d rather pass the time for a few days than Wisconsin — in the summer. Many people who come to this part of the country end up in Wisconsin Dells. I never thought much about the definition…
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Weird Place Names Kept Coming
I found myself in familiar territory once again, with an overflowing backlog of article ideas. That signaled time for another round of house cleaning. In the past I’d featured weird place names that I’d encountered while I searched for other topics. Then I focused on More Weird Place Names and finally Even More Weird Place…
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Michigan, Part 6 (Parting Shots)
I wrote several articles about my Michigan trip and I still had a pile of ideas I hadn’t touched yet. They didn’t fall into common themes so I lumped all those leftover scraps together to finish the series. I hope everyone enjoyed — or at least tolerated — my ramblings from the latest journey. We’ll…