There's a road in Estonia that pass through of Russian territory. The territory it pass, is called saatse boot. Because the border's line reminds the shape of a boot in map... Saatse is probably the name of place, but I don't know for sure.
No one knows exactly, why that boot is drawn to there. But it is. And there is a gravel road from Estonian side that pass through of that boot. There is a agreement between Estonia and Russia that local cars are allowed to freely pass through in there, but they are not allowed to stop, and I think, that also by foot it's not allowed to walk that road... probably. So it's not like a real trespassing, because there is permission, but it's still somewhat.. weird.
This spring The google street view boarded Estonia. And most of Estonian roads and streets are now nicely in Streetview. But seems, like their cars missed some geographical coordinates in there with that road, and photographed up also some parts of Russia, along that road.. while missing some part of Estonia...(from other side of that booth)
Here's the link to the location of that trespassable border on google map. U can practice the virtual trespassing in there... But don't get caught borderguards. LOL http://goo.gl/maps/ohK3 I hope google wont fix it, so that everyone can experience trespassing in there for ever. :P
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Hello, Rosenmaiden. ^_^
Thank you for the story. Thank you for liking this blog. Thank you for coming by. Thank you for the comment. ;)
Well, I didn't had anything else in my mind, so I just thanked a lot. Hope it's not too weird. ^_^
Thanks, Hardi, for the ref. ^_^ So pity!
Hello, Hardi!
Thank you very much for your blog! It's interesting for me! :-)
Many years ago in my area there was a funny story. One villager took his cow on the field. The cow went away and lost. A man went looking for her and ended up in another village. It was too late. All the people were asleep. He didn't find his cow, but in the same courtyard, he saw a wagon wheel.
The man was an economic and a little drunk. He took the wheel and went home. But suddenly the Polish border guards detained him. :-) It turned out that he had accidentally crossed the Soviet-Polish border! :-)
Thank you for the comment. ^_^
Well Kalingrad doesn't have street view yet. Just only regular satellite map. http://goo.gl/maps/rs9V
^_^
You can behold some people in the bushes. From now on I'm going to be very careful. ;)
I tried to find Kaliningrad by changing the part of your ref., but found myself in the USA.
Thank you for the nice post. ^_^
interesting info.. make me want to check m'sia border..
@Tara. Yes it's probably pretty mysterious. Maybe I should lift the cover a little more.. but then maybe it's not so interesting anymore?
Well, This border line was drawn after soviet union collapse. The new borders were mainly drawn by logics, following the landscape features and by the border set up after the world war.. and when possible then also village borders and etc. But for some reason, they drew such boot-like-thing in there. I've heard some different explanations that people are been able to think up. Like, Maybe the negotiator from Russian-side had to show some results and prove him self.. Or smth.
I've also heard some rumor say that there was some ruins of old soviet military base in that corner of forest... like some tiny Soviet version of are51 that Russia wanted to conceal. lol But it's just all a fantasy and nonsense. Actually it might be that in reality, Who ever the guys were, who drew the border, had just a terrible hang over and could not draw a straight line to map.. . lol
Why the google map, is not very accurate at that point? ...Is also explainable with military strategies. It's a strategy of some countries to not publish too exact maps about their territory and especially about areas near to border lines. They have to confuse smugglers with that. It probably would not work against other countries, but keeping all civilians maps distorted in acceptable range, can prevent pretty much smugglers to do their jobs in there. Not sure if Estonia uses this strategy, But I'm pretty sure that Russia does. Russia should have experience and know how for doing it from soviet age.
Actually I believe that in Russia, accurate maps that are under 1:50 000 are national secret and not allowed to sell to public.. I read somewhere that some map drawing company that was selling very accurate Russian maps over Internet to foreigners got into trouble.. got blamed in espionage, or smth. Thus, I think if Russia asked google very nicely, or if google got their data of maps and geographical coordinates of Russia, from their Russian partners. It's totally normal, that the map being greatly distorted in acceptable range.. Or maybe the google map isn't too accurate in anywhere on earth. I'm not sure. I haven't checked all countries. ^_^
Hi Zakiah Ulfah. That's actually normal. You are not supposed to see them. It's important that they see you, not opposite around :P
Very mysterious!