RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of New York >> Franklin County >> Westville Center >> Tidbits & TriviaIndex...

Outdoor Activities ...

As we travel, we like to pursue some of our interests (such as astronomy and bird watching).

When in Westville Center, we use the following websites to find information relevant to Westville Center and the surrounding area.

  • Weather ...
  • Astronomy & Satellites ...
    • 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 Westville Center:
    • 44.943886, -74.395378
    • 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 Westville Center
  • 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 Franklin County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Franklin County
    • Since Westville Center is near Saint Lawrence County and also Clinton County, we have provided a link to their eBird sighting reports:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Saint Lawrence County
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Clinton County
  • Waymarking ...
    • Looking for somewhere out of the ordinary? Find a unique place and want to share it with others? Then it's time to visit Waymarking.com:
    • Open the Waymark.com report for Westville Center

Curious and Interesting Names Near Westville Center ...

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.

How Far From Westville Center to ...

We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Westville Center to various places of note, such as the White House.

With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance<2> beginning in Westville Center and extending to:

  • Malone, which is the Seat of Franklin County, lies just to the Southeast.
  • Albany, which is the State Capital of New York, lies 161 miles [259.1 km]<2> to the south (S). If you could drive a straight line from Westville Center to Albany, with an average speed<3>of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, it would take less than three hours to make the trip. A comfortable walk of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour would take 10 days. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take 7 days.
  • The White House (Washington, DC) is 438 miles [704.9 km] to the south southwest (SSW). Driving would take most of a day, a buggy would take 18 days and walking would take 25 days.
  • The shortest distance<4> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 5,539 miles [8,914.2 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<5>
  • The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 6,263 miles [10,079.3 km] and it lies to the east northeast (ENE).<6>
  • The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 4,139 miles [6,661.1 km] and it lies to the east northeast (ENE).<7>'

Footnotes ...

<1>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<2>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Westville Center) 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 Westville Center 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 Westville Center. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 44.9439, Longitude: -74.3954       In this case, the coordinates for Westville Center have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 305.66 degrees.
<6>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 301.894 degrees.
<7>The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 300.845 degrees.