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 Topsham:
44.128119, -72.255096
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.
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 Topsham to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance<1> beginning in Topsham and extending to:
Chelsea, which is the Seat of Orange County, lies 13 miles [20.9 km]<1> to the southwest. If you could walk a straight line from Topsham to Chelsea, with an average speed<2> of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour, it would take 6 hours to make the trip. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take four to five hours.
Montpelier, which is the State Capital of Vermont, lies 18 miles [29 km] to the west northwest (WNW). The buggy would take five to six hours and walking would take just over a day.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 437 miles [703.3 km] to the southwest (SW). Driving, with an average speed of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, would take most of a day, a buggy would take 17 days and walking would take 25 days.
The shortest distance<3> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 5,485 miles [8,827.3 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<4>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 6,202 miles [9,981.2 km] and it lies to the east northeast (ENE).<5>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 4,077 miles [6,561.3 km] and it lies to the east northeast (ENE).<6>'
Footnotes ...
<1>
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 drawn from Point A (ie- Topsham) 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 Topsham 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 Topsham. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 44.1281, Longitude: -72.2551 In this case, the coordinates for Topsham have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<4>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 304.435 degrees.
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 300.386 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 300.214 degrees.