Last weekend we were in Las Vegas and drove the extra couple of hours out to Death Valley. I use my phone for everything now. It is a pretty essential tool. We decided to drive down under Death Valley first, passing through Topeka. Several times we were the only people on the road and didn't have a phone signal. It is kind of scary. However twenty years ago people drove all over the world without having a phone in their pocket and somehow survived.
We also struck an Apple Maps problem. It could not find the hotel we stayed at on the Las Vegas strip. It kept sending us to the convention center instead. Fortunately the hotel we were staying at was 60-something stories high, with a huge banner on its upper floors and is in a prominent place on the strip so we could ignore Apple Maps.
We couldn't ignore it so much when we were down past Topeka. My wife still has the previous version iPhone which does not have Apple Maps and instead still uses Google Maps. Not only is it superior software, it is more accurate. A couple of times when we had a connection Apple Maps gave bung travelling advice. Not fun we you are around Death Valley.
It is not the first time either. We were up in Wickenburg recently and Apple Maps was as equally as clueless. The problem is loss of confidence. I don't trust Apple Maps anymore. Apparently it is so bad that the Australian Government is
sending out warnings about Mildura. Apple makes sexy hardware but their software is pretty crappy as a rule. Maybe Apple Maps will improve but iTunes has been around a long time and it is still pretty poor software in my opinion.
The north side of Death Valley is well sign posted and there is more traffic into the national park. Which makes things safer when mapping software and phone connections are spotty. There are some beautiful natural structures despite there being a long way between things. The photo above is in Badwater Basin which is several hundred feet below sea level. Pretty cool.
Update: Almost immediately after I posted this google came out with their
new iphone google maps app. Phew!
Phoenix Eats Out is the restaurant review site for
Phoenix,
Scottsdale and
Old Town Scottsdale which lists the modernist and contemporary restaurants, taverns and bars in the greater Phoenix area.
This is the list of the most popular restaurants pages from phoenixeatsout.com that have been viewed the most;
My personal favourite restaurants in Phoenix are
AZ88,
Postinos,
Bomberos with
Grazie,
Humble Pie,
Orange Table,
The Vig,
Fez and others coming close behind. View the complete list with the photo-journalistic style images on
phoenixeatsout.com
Arizona is an outdoor state and has lots of hiking in the city and around the state. Phoenix is unusual for most cities in having several large mountains in the center of the city with great hiking. Anyone who comes to Phoenix has to do the
Echo Canyon trail on Camelback and the
Summit Hike on Squaw Peak or Piesta Peak. The views of the city, suburbs and surrounding mountains are wonderful from Camelback and Piesta Peak.
For more experienced hikers there is the McDowell Mountains in North Scottsdale that has several difficult and strenuous hikes in
Tom's Thumb and
Bell Pass. Alternatively, you can hike the highest mountain in Arizona. At 12,600 feet
Humphrey's Peak is a long and difficult hike.
Between 2004 and 2009 this site,
southsearepublic.org, was a constitutional blog based on scoop which focused on Australian and global constitutional issues.
One of the strongest aspects of it was the development of constitutions by those involved in the blog. These constitutions are the outcome:
The constitutions were built using principles from Montesquieu's separation of powers, the enlightnment's universal political rights and the ancient Athenian technology of sortition and choice by lot.
South Sea Republic started in 2004 as an Australian constitutional blog in 2004 based on scoop software. It was an immigrative outgrowth of Kuro5hin. The archives for each year since then;
The articles are ordered by views.
I am an Australian living in the United States as a permanent resident.
I am a software developer by trade and mostly work in Java and jump between middleware and front end.
I originally worked in the New York area of the United States in telecommunications before moving to Washington DC and
working in a mix of telecommunications, energy and ITS. I started my own software company before heading out to
Arizona and working with Shutterfly. Since then I have joined a startup in the Phoenix area and am thoroughly enjoying myself.
I do a lot of photography which I post on this website, but also on flickr. I have a photo-journalistic website which lists
the modernist and contemporary restaurants in phoenix. I have a site on the
Australian Flying Corps [AFC] which has been around since the 1990s and which I unfortunately
lost the .org URL to during a life event; however, it is under the
www.australianflyingcorps.com URL now.
The AFC website has gone through several iterations since the 90s and the two most recent are
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2004-2002) and
Australian Flying Corps Archives(2002-1999) which are good places to start.
