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 Sifton:
45.672618, -122.531206
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 found one communities that are also named Sifton.
Within Washington, the name Sifton is unique.
Beyond Washington, there is another community also named Sifton in Canada.
Communities Elsewhere In North America ...
Manitoba
This Sifton lies 1,091 miles [1,755.8 km]<1> to the east northeast of the Sifton that is located in Clark County.
Curious and Interesting Names Near Sifton ...
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 Sifton to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance beginning in Sifton and extending to:
Olympia, which is the State Capital of Washington, lies 95 miles [152.9 km]<1> to the north (N). If you could drive a straight line from Sifton to Olympia, with an average speed<3>of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, it would take less than two hours to make the trip. A comfortable walk of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour would take 6 days. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take three full days.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 2,338 miles [3,762.6 km] to the east (E). Driving would take 5 days, a buggy would take 92 days and walking would take 133 days.
The shortest distance<4> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,902 miles [11,107.7 km] and it lies to the north northeast (NNE).<5>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 7,665 miles [12,335.6 km] and it lies to the north northeast (NNE).<6>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 5,777 miles [9,297.2 km] and it lies to the north northeast (NNE).<7>'
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- Sifton) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<2>
While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<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 Sifton 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 Sifton. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 45.6726, Longitude: -122.5312 In this case, the coordinates for Sifton have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 340.938 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 342.408 degrees.
<7>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 328.018 degrees.