Being a passionate traveler, I love exploring lesser-known places, writing reviews about them and encouraging my friends to visit these. More often than not, the desire to be a pioneer puts me in an era of pre-Google Maps, because the places I visit are simply documented well enough on Maps, yet.
Recently, I planned a weekend getaway with a few friends to a place called Ujire, located close to Mangalore, India. I had heard some locals raving about the magnificent waterfalls that this place offers, and I convinced my friends to visit this place. With very few resources available, we found the contact of a forest officer in that region, who promised to help us out once we got there.
We landed at Ujire, with no plan and went to meet the forest officer. He drew out something like this-
This was the route map he had drawn out for us to follow. He did not know about Google Maps, but his knowledge of every road and every turn in that area left us amazed!
We followed the route map he had drawn for us, but it was quite a task for us to follow it without the “In 200 meters, turn right” instructions.
The forest officer had estimated that it would take us about an hour to get to our destination, but we lost our way multiple times and finally made it after 2 hours of hiking.
In the end, it was totally worth it!
After playing in the water here for some time, we proceeded to the second destination on the ‘map’, Ermayi falls! This was easier to get to, than the first one.
Through this trip, I realized how Google Maps every local guide’s superpower! I also realized that not only must I contribute what I know to this amazing community, but I must also empower and educate others around me to do the same.
Locals from any region have a vast repository of knowledge about that region. If empowered in the right way, this information can be made available for the rest of the world to use. That is the true essence of this program.
I told the forest officer about Google Maps and how he could guide people using this effective tool. He did not have to draw maps on paper anymore. Once we added the roads, all he needed to do was send the directions of those places to people.
I hope the diverse community of Google Local Guides becomes so inclusive and expansive that no one would ever have to live through a pre-Maps era again.