In the world of high-end real estate, nothing says “I’m richer than you” like your very own private island. In the Florida Keys, an archipelago made up of more than 1,700 islands, it is relatively easy to find your own personal tropical retreat for sale or rent… provided you can afford it!

First we have Melody Key, former home of 311 vocalist Nick Hexum¹. This 5.5 acre key can be yours for the low price of 3.8 million dollars and includes a fully furnished home with 2 boats, as well as a mainland dock for launching island expeditions.

The future owner of Coupon Key will inherit a 9 bedroom house with separate caretaker’s quarters as well as 14.6 acres of island to explore. Plenty of room to pretend you’re a pirate, or even roam around without any clothes on… if you’re into that sort of thing.

Finding yourself a bit strapped for cash? Fear not, there is a luxury island for everyone!² Though not quite a key or an island, sprawling 0.5 acre East Sister Rock is available for rent on a weekly basis. With its very own dock, pool, and helicopter pad, East Sister Rock is a perfect choice for the millionaire on a budget.

Though the Florida Keys tend to have beautiful weather during the spring and summer months, it would be wise to exercise caution when visiting East Sister Rock during hurricane season as the island’s house sits only 5 metres above mean sea level.

Thanks to Eric.

Unbelievable, but today is the 4th anniversary of the launch of Google Sightseeing! We shan’t bore you with a potted history - instead we’re revisiting a couple of sights from this day in 2005 to see how things have changed.

Back in 2005, Google Maps’ satellite imagery was barely 24 hours old, and restricted to North America, when we linked to our very first sight - this Mickey Mouse-shaped lake at Disney World, Florida. Interestingly, other than a change in the projection of the images¹ (which stopped everything looking squished), the imagery here hasn’t been updated since then.

In a poor reflection on our imaginations back in 2005, the second sight we posted was even more stereotypically “American”. We think we’ve come a long way since we posted The Hollywood sign, as the entire post simply consisted of the words:

Only just legible, but very cool, the Hollywood sign. Now I don’t need to go there to see it.

The imagery may have been updated since then² (and we’ve gotten a lot more wordy), but the sign never really changes much. However, thanks to Google Street View, we can now get an even better view from the ground.³

Google Sightseeing has come a long way since 2005, and we’re very much looking forward to improving and expanding the site even further in the future. Later this week we’ll be announcing the results of our recruitment drive from a few weeks ago, so there’s going to be lots of new Google Sightseeing to be done over the next four years.

Thanks for reading.

The Futuro House is a round, prefabricated house that was designed by Finnish architect Matti Suuronen in 1968. About 100 of the kits were erected around the world, and you’d know if you saw one - because they look exactly like perfect little flying saucers from some 50s B-movie.

Royse City Fututo, one of three surviving in Texas

Built from fibreglass-reinforced polyester-plastic, Futuros are around 4 metres high by 8 metres across, and have super-cool airplane-style hatch entrances.

Waterside Futuro in Berlin, Germany

Suuronen’s aim was actually to design a ski-cabin¹, one that would be “quick to heat and easy to construct in rough terrain”, and in this respect he succeeded - a Futuro House can be placed on virtually any terrain, requiring only four concrete supports, and thanks to the integrated polyurethane insulation and electric heating system, even in the most extreme conditions it only takes around thirty minutes to achieve a comfortable temperature inside.

Futuro as part of the Canberra Space Dome & Observatory, Australia

Despite the obvious awesomeness of these UFO-shaped homes, by the mid 70s they had been withdrawn from sale - although this was mainly due to the 1973 oil crisis, which had sent the price of plastic skyrocketing.

Front and back of the Pensacola Beach Futuro House, Florida²

Around sixty of the original Futuros have been accounted for over the years, but there are still many that remain undiscovered. The most complete archive is at futuro-house.net (there’s another with an embedded map at archinform.net), but it seems to have been left to stagnate for a number of years - perhaps Google Earth will provide the means for all of the missing Futuros to be rediscovered?

Double Futuro House, Franklin, Ohio

It should also be pointed out that the moulds for making Futuros apparently still exist… about time for a revival don’t you think?

Futuro in Covington, Kentucky

Here’s an article that includes a floor plan, some images of a Futuro being helicoptered into position, as well as some great shots of people inside.

With this week’s launch of Street View for New Zealand we thought it was time for a quick roundup of the best Street View sights we’ve posted on our Twitter page over the past week. We’ve found several things to see in New Zealand so far:

• The world’s largest Kiwi fruit is in New Zealand of course.

• Middle Earth’s Mount Doom (aka New Zealand’s Mount Ngauruhoe)

• Could this be the world’s largest dog and sheep?

• Looking into the crater of Mt Eden, Auckland.
• From our previous post on Zorbing in NZ, here’s some zorbuses on top of the hill:

Whilst elsewhere in the world we’ve seen:

• The Castlemaine XXXX Factory from the label is now on street view
• It’s alright mate, nobody’s watching you painting that wall
• Jimi Hendrix rocks Seattle
• After a slow morning taking pictures of Florida, the Google Driver skives off
• A caged Polar Bear on the streets of France
• The World’s largest baseball bat outside the Louisville Slugger Museum
• And finally, have you ever wondered what happens when the Street View car gets rained on? Well now you know!

If you’d like more sights like this, then subscribe to our twitter feed!

It’s been a whole year since Google first launched their controversial Street View service, and we posted our first Street View sight. Since then we’ve seen the rate of discovery of the most bizarre and unusual finds increase as Google has added more and more US cities to the roster.

With the service due to launch soon in Canada, Italy, Spain, Australia and Japan, we thought we’d mark the one year anniversary with a roundup of the best 10 Street View discoveries that we haven’t already posted to the site.

10) Google camera gets stuck in tree

Yes, this driver forgot he had a giant camera stuck to the top of his car, and drove it into a low-hanging tree.

9) The giant finger of doom

Arrgh! The giant finger of doom! Actually, if you pan round you can see that this is actually an image of a normal-sized man with the world’s biggest hand.

8) Working girls, working

Well, not actually in flagrante, but rather hanging around waiting to possibly um… service some customers?

7) Scuba diver on city street

Well he isn’t a Scuba diver unless he’s in the water. Walking along the road like this just makes him a bit of an idiot.

6) Segway convoy

Rubby ducky rubber ducky, come in, this is ageing geek! We got ourselves a convoy!

5) Usin publik transport: ur doin it rong

Is this the cab’s driver, or a passenger in need of some assistance? Perhaps this person has been subjected to a particularly lethal LOLcat attack?

4) Having to explain the enormously suspicious camera on the top of your car to a police officer

“Yes officer that’s right, taking photos to put on the internet!” *Click*.

3) Man with giant head stomps all over Street View car

A relative of the man with the world’s biggest hand, this man must surely have the largest head on the planet.

2) Post-it attack!

A couple of teenage girls take brilliantly surreal revenge upon somebody, and don’t blink as a car passes recording their actions forever…

1) How not to get IN a car

We’re stunned, we have absolutely no idea what the hell is going on here. Brilliantly bizarre and a worthy winner of the top spot!