Where we've been and where we're going.

A couple weeks ago, the crew got to talking about the UN's list of World Heritage Sites. Our who's-been-where scores weren't so good (suspicious how many of those sites are on the other side of an ocean), but I noticed that most countries have even more sites on their Tentative List.

I suggested we get a big wall map and some push-pins to keep track of interesting places we've each been, and places we want to visit some day. Once you get it up on the wall, then anytime you're just sitting at home doing nothing, the map is looking down at you, disappointed.

Well, finally, last night I was reminded of the Rasterbator and realized what a nice, cheap solution it was to our huge wall map needs. It lets you create large murals with a desktop printer and regular 8.5"x11" paper.

A few minutes later, I had a PDF file ready to print. Printing took a while because I went overkill on the dot size, resulting in an 18 page print job that weighed in at 1.15GB. The printer didn't like that, but eventually I got it done. On to trimming the margins (by hand, with scissors. If I was an elementary school teacher I'd have a paper cutter and be done already. They get all the good equipment.)

Well, after 2 cups of coffee, 3 reprinted pages due to operator error, and a short break to google Johnny Cash's German recordings - focus, people - here's what we have:


Now to mount it on the wall, and get to pinning.

We'll have to add a Baja California supplement and better Alaska maps later, of course.