Gallery: Maps of What's Across the Horizon From the World's Beaches

  • Image may contain Map Diagram Nature Atlas Plot Outdoors and Land
    Andy Woodruff
    01

    north-america2-01.jpg

    Andy Woodruff created a series of maps that visualize what landmass is directly across from any given beach.
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    Andy Woodruff
    02

    africa2-01.jpg

    Woodruff, a cartographer, was interested to see what that might look like once he took the coastline's direction and Earth's curve into account.
  • This image may contain Nature Ocean Outdoors Water Sea and Land
    Andy Woodruff
    03

    asia2-01.jpg

    Each map, which uses the Robinson projection, is organized by destination.
  • Image may contain Nature Mountain Outdoors Plot Map and Diagram
    Andy Woodruff
    04

    oceania2-01.jpg

    The bright spots on the map show the origin.
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    Andy Woodruff
    05

    south-america2-01.jpg

    And those origin lines lead to the most direct landmass on any given continent.
  • Image may contain Diagram Map Plot and Atlas
    Andy Woodruff
    06

    europe2-01.jpg

    The resulting visualizations show how the most direct route from one beach to the next is sometimes half a world away.
  • Image may contain Nature Outdoors Ice Art Painting Ocean Sea and Water
    Andy Woodruff
    07

    antarctica2-01.jpg

    Woodruff's data shows 1,846 direct routes to Antarctica.
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