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 Merrifield:
38.278681, -85.640239
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 Merrifield
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 Jefferson County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
We found six communities that are also named Merrifield.
Within Kentucky, the name Merrifield is unique.
Beyond Kentucky, we know of six communities that are located in the United States.
Communities Elsewhere In North America ...
Florida
Saint Johns County
We found mention of this community, but have little information.<1> For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Florida community of Merrifield [Saint Johns County].
Minnesota
Crow Wing County
This Merrifield is located in Crow Wing County and lies 712 miles [1,145.9 km]<2> to the northwest of the Merrifield that is located in Jefferson County.
For more information, please visit our profile page for the Crow Wing County community of Merrifield.
New York
Cayuga County
This Merrifield is located in Cayuga County and lies 567 miles [912.5 km]<2> to the northeast of the Merrifield that is located in Jefferson County.
For more information, please visit our profile page for the Cayuga County community of Merrifield.
North Dakota
Grand Forks County
This Merrifield is located in Grand Forks County and lies 876 miles [1,409.8 km]<2> to the northwest of the Merrifield that is located in Jefferson County.
For more information, please visit our profile page for the Grand Forks County community of Merrifield.
Virginia
Fairfax County
This Merrifield is located in Fairfax County and lies 455 miles [732.3 km]<2> to the east of the Merrifield that is located in Jefferson County.
For more information, please visit our profile page for the Fairfax County community of Merrifield.
Portsmouth City
This Merrifield is located in Portsmouth City and lies 515 miles [828.8 km] to the east of the Merrifield that is located in Jefferson County.
For more information, please visit our profile page for the Portsmouth City community of Merrifield.
Curious and Interesting Names Near Merrifield ...
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.
Cherrywood Village (Less than 2 miles to the southwest)
We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers, Almanacs & Directories that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Merrifield to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance beginning in Merrifield and extending to:
Frankfort, which is the State Capital of Kentucky, lies 41 miles [66 km]<2> to the east (E). If you could walk a straight line from Merrifield to Frankfort, with an average speed<3> of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour, it would take about three full days to make the trip. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take just about two full days.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 466 miles [750 km] to the east (E). Driving, with an average speed of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, would take most of a day, a buggy would take 19 days and walking would take 27 days.
The shortest distance<4> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,278 miles [10,103.5 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<5>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 7,002 miles [11,268.6 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<6>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 4,877 miles [7,848.8 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<7>'
Footnotes ...
<1>
If we encounter the name of what might be a community, our methodology is to add that name to our Gazetteer as a placeholder. As we find more information about that community, it will be added to our Gazetteer.
Just as a reminder: Our definition of a community is rather broad and includes those places (or areas) where several families lived and had a name which identified that place. For example, you might hear somebody say that they are going over to Rock Creek to see Pete ... Rock Creek is just a gas station and a couple of homes at the crossroads. While it might not be on the map, everybody in the area knows it by that name.
Places of interest include buildings at a crossroad, several families clustered in a hollow or maybe the location of a way station. It also includes places like mines, lumber camps, ferry crossings, etc. The community might still exist, is now gone or only existed for just a short period of time.
Also keep in mind that Merrifield could have been on the original document by mistake, misspelled, the original/alternate name of a community that we've listed elsewhere or was placed in the wrong county. Sometimes a post office or train station would have a different name than the community where it's located, so two names might be referring to the same community - we're working to straighten it all out.
<2>
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 from Point A (ie- Merrifield) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<3>
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.
<4>
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 Merrifield 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 Merrifield. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 38.2787, Longitude: -85.6402 In this case, the coordinates for Merrifield have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 313.137 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 309.334 degrees.
<7>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 308.645 degrees.