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 McCreanor:
34.783424, -91.795136
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.
Open the Heavens-Above website centered on McCreanor
Bird Watching ...
We enjoy finding new spots for bird watching and we use the eBird website for local sighting reports and to help identify hotspots.
The eBird website is organized on a county-by-county basis. We have selected Lonoke County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
As we travel, we always see a community with a name that gives pause. While there are names which are interesting or familiar, some catch our attention or strike our fancy. We always wonder about such a name. If time permits and the community is not too far, we'll usually try to make a side-trip.
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 McCreanor to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance<1> beginning in McCreanor and extending to:
Little Rock, which is the State Capital of Arkansas, lies 26 miles [41.8 km]<1> to the west (W). If you could walk a straight line from McCreanor to Little Rock, with an average speed<2> of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour, it would take just about two full days to make the trip. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take just over a day.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 862 miles [1,387.3 km] to the east northeast (ENE). Driving, with an average speed of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, would take most of two days, a buggy would take 34 days and walking would take 49 days.
The shortest distance<3> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,690 miles [10,766.5 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<4>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 7,417 miles [11,936.5 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<5>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 5,294 miles [8,519.9 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<6>'
Footnotes ...
<1>
Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- McCreanor) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<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 McCreanor to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in McCreanor. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 34.7834, Longitude: -91.7951 In this case, the coordinates for McCreanor have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<4>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 316.875 degrees.
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 313.166 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 312.153 degrees.