The Souter Family, Killiney, Co Dublin /
souterfamily@eircom.net / October 2002
I had heard of these websites before, and was reminded of them again in our weekend newspaper's magazine. Under the heading 'Castles in the Air', they commented: 'There is something slightly unnerving about knowing that your house has been photographed from a height and put on the web, but it can be quite handy if you're looking for property. There are several sites where you can find fairly comprehensive coverage of Ireland from space.' They mentioned two sites - Ireland.com and Ireland On-Line (www.iol.ie) which is where I found these images under a section called 'Mapping'. There are a combination of maps and photographs and I saved some of them to put on my own site. I have'nt looked for any other country, but assume that similar images must be available on other local sites.
Our house is the top one of the two with pinkish coloured roofs that look identical. Across the road on the left is a monestary / retirement home. From time to time we see 'real' monks in brown habits coming in and out the gate! Higher up to the left is a girl's high school.
Between us and the beach is a beautiful mansion that looks like a castle. The tennis court belongs to them. They also have a helicopter and at work they teased me and said it puts a new meaning on the phrase 'your vehicle is blocking my drive'. There is a pedestrian lane to the beach that borders our property. We have a gate to it from our garden, but from the air it is difficult to see those kind of details. It goes under a subway where it seems to disappear before continuing again in front of the tennis court.
Big Brother really is watching you! The closer I tried to zoom in the more out of focus the images became. Still quite amazing considering these pictures were taken from space.
