The earth as a sandwich, burrowing to Australia and the iphone

Mar 30, 2010

Polar opposite is a very simple iphone app that does one thing but it does it quite well. It tells you what is exactly opposite you on the globe!

When I was a child I was told that if I were to dig a tunnel straight through the earth I’d end up in a place called Australia and that I would be upsidedown and surrounded by odd creatures known as kangaroos!

This caught my imagination and set me reading Joules Vernes ‘Journey to the center of the earth’ and eventually as an adult I would visit Australia itself (unfortunatly on a plane and not directly through the earths crust)!

Now however I know that this simply isn’t true and I would not end up in Australia after my journey through the earth but would no doubt drown as directly opposite my home town (Bradford, UK) is the ocean!

Features:

* Instant access to any antipode on earth

(Antipode [an-ti-pohd] = place diametrically opposite each other on the globe, direct or opposite point, polar opposite.) For more information on antipodes see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antipodes

* Choose starting point from either manual entry or your address book!

* Toggle between viewing modes by zooming into the start point, end point, overview, or by manually zooming into any point on the map

* Full Google map integration

This app would have come in very useful for the team that created the earths biggest sandwich – by using the earth as it’s filling – placing bread at opposite ends of the earth!

I heard however that they used a bagette rather than sliced bread and thus had no way of knowing which way the bread was facing and therefore lost their title! Dont believe it?  Here’s the national treasure that is Steven Fry explaining it on the UK TV show QI

The guys who came up with this crazy stunt have a web site HERE

I did like this app and im sure you will too but it is a one trick pony but then it does exactly what it says and I now know that I’ll need to pack my scuba gear as well as a spade when I’ve finished that hole in my garden!

Get the app at the developers web site HERE or directly from itunes HERE