Posting links to Google Earth or similar sites on this forum

[whole diary]

[JayMac]

Street View gives a magnificent view of it, thanks BNM. (Google Earth / Maps Morlais Brittany)

I think you meant to thank FTN, but I'll gladly accept it on his behalf.  

Some images of the truly stunning Morlaix Viaduct:

http://coatamourmorlaix.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/the-viaduct-in-morlaix.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/b3pvr9y

And how it looks up close on Google Street View:

http://goo.gl/maps/hJaiK

[TonyK]

At the risk of further thread drift, I think I see where the inspiration came from:
http://www.fond-ecran-image.com/galerie-membre/aqueduc/pont-du-gard-cote-est.jpg

The Pont du Gard, another place I have spent happy times, was built by the Romans to take water from Nimes to Arles (or the other way, can't remember). I read "La Gloire De Mon P^re" by Marcel Pagnol some time ago, and was delighted to read his account of days there in the early 1900s. Do we need a new bridge in Evergreen 3?

[swrural]

Apols to FTN!  Can BNM or anyone show me how to translate a GE or SV page location into a web ref as BNM has just done (see above from BNM).  Most grateful to learn.

[JayMac]

On Google Maps you should see an icon to the left of the map/Street View pane that looks like a couple of chain links. Once you have the Street View or map image as you wish it to be, click on the aforementioned icon and you will get a pop up with a URL (wep page address) Tick the box asking 'Short URL' and then right click on said URL and copy the address. Then simply paste that address into the body of a post on this or any other forum.

[TonyK]

Apols to FTN! 

De rien, Sud Ouest Rural!

[swrural]

Many thanks, actually I did know all that already, but my problem is with Google Earth, which is a separate package and not accessed within the browser, as GM is.  I use GE because you can ask for the 'highlight the railways' option, just as you can for the roads (which you get automatically in GM).  Recently they have helpfully broadened the black line from a previously spindly spidery one, which, although it covers the track layouts unless you zoom in, it reveals the lines beautifully.  GM does not do that, or at least I have not discovered that in GM.

So my query was this, if within GE, you want to give a straightforward link to a GE location, be it the satellite view, or within that, a Street View, is that posssible, as it is with GM?  The idea is that someone would click something and it would open Gogle Earth (if you had installed it) and take you straight there.  If it is not possible, then I suppose one can always open Google Maps, go to the same stage of look up and then post that link.

If anyone wants to know where the railway lines facility is, you look in the Layers group and then open the 'More' then open the 'transportation and then within that. I opt just for transportation at that level and then you get all the different forms of facility highlighted.  Once you have selected such, you don't have to do this every time as it remembers what you selected.

[TonyK]

I think I have cracked this one. The key to Google Earth links is that you need a Google account, and have to be signed in before you can share. It is free to set up, and gives you a gmail address as well. So you find your scene, sign in, and a "Share" button appears. Choose share by email, then copy the url that appears. It's a bit unwieldy.

I like Morlaix, and hope to return there by Eurostar and SNCF^▸ (Societe Nationale des Chemins de fer Francais - French National Railways). There is some terrific food to be had, with cr^pes, galettes, and fruits de mer on every menu. Oysters^▸ (Smartcard system used by passengers on Transport for London services) proliferate, and it is true what they say about them. The Bretons are big in black pudding and sausage, all of which can be washed down with the local cider, with a Calvados finale.

There is another way to get there. Just north of the town, you see an airfield, which is Morlaix Ploujean, owned by the local Chamber of Commerce. It has 3 runways (6 if you want to be pedantic) the largest of which is over 1800 metres long. I spent time on holiday nearby, and watched a couple of Bombardier turboprops land there, doing what I later learned to be an overhead join into the circuit. I got as far as preparing a flight plan from Filton, routing over the Isle of Wight to minimise the time spent over water, then down the Cherbourg peninsula, as much to get me a view of that viaduct as anything else. It fascinated me - it has the basic look of that Roman aqueduct, and was built before the Clifton suspension bridge. I never did it, as I stopped flying, and can't do it now as Filton is being desecrated. It would have been a challenge - the international language of aviation is English, I speak reasonable French, but would have had to rely on an air traffic controller's English. There is a problem with smaller airports abroad, where local traffic uses the home language. Accidents have happened because English pilots have not known what French pilots are doing.

There is a story of an impatient German pilot at Berlin Tempelhof being told to speak English. He asked "I am a German pilot flying a German aircraft from a German airport to another German airport. Why should I have to speak English?" The pilot of another unidentified aircraft answered "Because we won the bloody war, old chap!" The truth is fairly close to that. It is strange, though, because so many aircraft terms come from French - fuselage, empennage, olio, aileron etc. Even the distress calls Pan Pan Pan (from French "en panne", or broken down) and Mayday (or "m'aidez" -help me) have their roots in French, mainly because Louis Bleriot beat us to it.

[swrural]

Don't forget 'hangar'.  A chance to say publicly thanks for the GE tip..  Most grateful, signed SWR^» (South Western Railway - about).