Just trying out the new Google Maps for Android. It now includes floor plans of many airports, malls and department stores. No turn-by-turn navigation yet, however, so making my way through the maze that is Ikea will, for now, continue to drive me to the brink of madness. Read about it on TechCrunch

The podcast/iPod/Pad/Phone version of our “Tracks in the Desert,” slide show
(Depending on connection speed, it may take awhile to download)

The original story on The Connected Traveler.

Augmented Reality has been around for a couple of years but it is finally showing some sign of growth. I am playing around with Layar for Android.

Check Out This Video Demo

Sometimes I feel like a little kid on weekend: “Mom, I’m bored, what can I do?” Often my wife and I pore over the broadsheets or dive into our dogeared hiking guides. Sometimes we sail off into the uncharted bitstreams of Google, clicking through page after page of irrelevant links. Point is, we sometimes waste so much time looking for something to do that it becomes too late to do it.

Goby is not so much a search engine as a “do” engine. It works on the forehead-slapping premise that people often go to the net to make decisions not just to access a pile of poorly-sorted data. With Goby, you simply type in what you want to do, where and when. I keyed in “hike” and my location and immediately got eleven pages of nearby treks, complete with maps.

Too nice a day to be at a computer. I’m outta here. http://www.goby.com

One of the worlds most insightful and sensitive travel writers comments on his encounter with Barack Obama.

From Time Magazine