TRAVEL BRIEFS
The Associated Press
听
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil 鈥� Rio de Janeiro is mixing technology with tradition to provide tourists information about the city by embedding bar codes into the black-and-white mosaic sidewalks that are a symbol of the city.
The first two-dimensional bar codes, or QR codes, as they鈥檙e known, were installed Friday at Arpoador, a massive boulder that rises at the end of Ipanema beach. The image was built into the sidewalk with the same black and white stones that decorate sidewalks around town with mosaics of waves, fish and abstract images.
The launch attracted onlookers, who downloaded an application to their smartphones or tablets and photographed the icon. The app read the code and they were then taken to a website that gave them information in Portuguese, Spanish or English, and a map of the area.
They learned, for example, that Arpoador gets big waves, making it a hot spot for surfing and giving the 500-metre beach nearby the name of 鈥淧raia do Diabo,鈥� or Devil鈥檚 Beach. They could also find out that the rock is called Arpoador because fishermen once harpooned whales off the shore.
The city plans to install 30 of these QR codes at beaches, vistas and historic sites, so Rio鈥檚 approximately two million foreign visitors can learn about the city as they walk around.
听
Grand Canyon eyesextension to trail
听
FREDONIA, Arizona 鈥� A popular mountain-biking trail that overlooks the North Rim of the Grand Canyon is being extended.
The 29-kilometre Rainbow Rim trail on the Kaibab National Forest is a single-track trail that passes through ponderosa pines and drops into steep-sided canyons with aspen groves and small meadows.
Work to extend the trail by up to 12.8 kilometres to create a loop is set to begin in June, if funding is available. The Rainbow Rim trail was constructed in the 1980s. 鈥� AP
听
Google posts images of trails
听
GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Arizona 鈥� Google is giving people a way to virtually hike the Grand Canyon.
The search giant released images Thursday that map the most popular trails at the park鈥檚 South Rim and other walkways.
The Mountain View, California,-based company used a rosette of cameras mounted for the first time on a backpack to gather thousands of panoramic images last year. 鈥� AP
