Whether using binoculars, a small telescope or the naked-eye, the Heavens-Above
website can help you to find your way around the night-time sky. In addition to detailed
sky charts, their website will help you find planets, asteriods, comets, satellites and their tracks across the sky.
To give accurate results, Heavens-Above requires the latitude and longitude of your location. As a starting point, when we link to Heavens-Above,
we pass this GPS location for Situk:
59.448684, -139.577367
Once you're on the Heavens-Above website, you can improve its accuracy by giving a more precise longitude and latitude as your actual position.
We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers & Almanacs that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Situk to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance<1> beginning in Situk and extending to:
Juneau, which is the State Capital of Alaska, lies 200 miles [321.9 km]<1> to the east southeast (ESE). If you could drive a straight line from Situk to Juneau, with an average speed<2>of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, it would take a little over three hours to make the trip. A comfortable walk of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour would take 12 days. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take 8 days.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 3,016 miles [4,853.8 km] to the east (E). Driving would take 6 days, a buggy would take 118 days and walking would take 172 days.
The shortest distance<3> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,122 miles [9,852.4 km] and it lies to the north (N).<4>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 6,844 miles [11,014.4 km] and it lies to the north (N).<5>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 5,251 miles [8,450.7 km] and it lies to the north northeast (NNE).<6>
Footnotes ...
<1>
Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Situk) to Point B.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Situk. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 59.4487, Longitude: -139.5774
<2>
While we have tried to pick reasonable speeds, the rate of travel is very theoretical - obstacles like fences, hills, lakes, river crossings and rest stops have been ignored. When we say 'Days' of travel, we're assuming 8 hours of travel per day.
<3>
The shortest line can be visualized by stretching a string on a Globe from Point A to Point B - this is known as a Great Circle Route. Where you might expect the shortest route from Situk to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.
<4>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 355.591 degrees.
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 359.438 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 338.92 degrees.