I have found some wonderful sites on the Internet that can provide hours of entertainment that are sponsored by National Geographic.

One provides travel directions, and that is certainly impressive. It can guide you, street by street, from your home to your chosen destination.

But more than that, National Geo can provide enlarged photos of the earth's surface! You can visit famous places or a childhood home. The range is in yards, not miles.

BIRD'S EYE VIEW
Since I don't know where you would like to go, I'll take you to my childhood home to show you how it's done. To find my island home in New Hampshire, copy the following into your browser destination bar: http://maps.nationalgeographic.com/map-machine#s=b&c=43.065057725292725,%20-70.7571247856827&z=12. This takes you to Portsmouth.

Along Route 1A, find South Cemetery. In the bay just northeast is an unlabeled island — that's Belle Isle. Enlarge until the island fills the window. Click on Bird's Eye View, and there it is.

The 14-acre island has many structures: the mansion, boathouse, caretaker's house, garage, workshop, barn and other residence cottages along with a stone-and-girder bridge.

Belle Isle is located with other islands in the mouth of the Piscataqua River. Newcastle Island is between Belle Isle and the ocean, protecting it from the surf. Just clean, cold ocean water that fills the basin twice a day.

MAGIC CARPET
By moving the insert within the window, you can investigate the surrounding area. Click on the corkscrews and you'll see it from different angles.

National Geographic must have taken millions of still photos and filed them in a program that allows users to access them. It's not operating Web cam, so there is no action.

Look up your ancestry along the Italian coast or glide up a fjord — all from the comfort of your office chair.

Other Nat Geo sites contain historic information and games.

The map machine provides a magic carpet that can carry us over the planet, revealing the beauty of the changing terrains.

Set aside a large chunk of time to try it. You won't want to stop orbiting the earth.



Lorraine Lilja is a retired Press-Republican reporter. A collection of her columns, "Lilja's World," is for sale at local bookstores. Lilja can be reached at llilja17@hotmail.com.