GRAND RAPIDS -- Two women do a double take as a young Californian walks by carrying a backpack with distinct coloring. Did they just see that? And did he just take their photo?
Wearing a San Fransisco Giants hat, a gray t-shirt and khakis, Ernest Carreras walked down Monroe Avenue Thursday, June 8, wearing a Google Street View camera backpack or "Trekker," as the company calls it. Carreras is in the middle of a cross-country trip to capture images of pedestrian walkways that their cars cannot access for Google Street View.
On his hit list for Grand Rapids was the Blue Bridge, Gillett Bridge and some other small walkways in the area. He is in Michigan for the weekend, then headed south to Indianapolis. After that he continue on through the East Coast.
Before getting the job with Google, he had never left California. How did he score the job?
"I just went to Google.com and they had this job title called Special Collects Operator and that's what I do," Carreras said.
The camera backpack itself weighs about 40 pounds and has 15 cameras mounted to it to provide the 360-degree view. The backpack has 1.8 terabytes, or 1800 gigabytes, of storage available for the photos it takes.
This isn't the first time Google Street View cameras have trekked through Michigan. Pictured Rocks and Sleeping Bear Dunes have been photographed recently by Google mappers like Carreras.