El Camino Real to Mission Santa Maria best space images yet: Bing vs. Google Earth

I was helping some Mexican amigos get ready to follow my hike from near Gonzaga Bay up to Mission Santa Maria, on the post 1769 Camino Real. My son and I ran out of daylight before reaching the mission valley as we were trying to find the trail when it disappeared on us (back in 2003). I was shown some Bing satellite images that were far better than Google Earth/Maps and newer too! The bridge by Papa Fernandez' is on the Bing satellite image... built less than 2 years ago.

I thought it might be interesting to show some images between the two.

LAS PALMITAS OASIS (located on the Camino Real a couple of miles southeast of the Santa Maria canyon entrance:

Google Earth:



The blue line is the Camino Real route coming to Las Palmitas from Calamajue/Loreto.

Bing:



Amazing, right?



The Camino Real from near the canyon entrance to the end of my 2003 hike... None of the road can be clearly seen when zoomed in on GE:




On Bing, nearly all of the trail can be seen, at a close in zoom (note 50 ft. scale bar), 2 samples:







Google Earth gets a bit clearer as you near the mission valley, here is the same area as the above Bing image:





Mission Santa Maria on Bing:




Mission Santa Maria on Google Earth:





Anyway, for those interested in finding the old mission road, Indian trails, or other newer satellite images, try Bing Maps: http://www.bing.com/maps/?FORM=Z9LH4

Click on 'Bird's Eye', then click the down arrow and click 'Aerial' for the best view... or compare the two. I am new to Bing, so I haven't figured out all the features or date of images.

Happy exploring!