Random Wiki Locations: Explainer & Chad

I am an unashamed map and geography nerd who likes nothing better than to go from source to mouth, or power station to substation. Or alternatives thereof.

A regular pleasure is browsing Google Maps or Google Earth looking for interesting things.

A means of finding locations exists by using Wikipedia.

There is, in the top right dropdown link menu, a link that takes you to a random page (you can also <alt+shift+x> to a random page from any Wikipedia page if you are tired of the page you are on).

If you do it enough times you will end up on a wiki page with a location link: usually on the right hand side above the summary boxes. If you <ctrl+right-click> on the link it will open a Geohack page (seemingly broken at the time writing) in a new tab, and from there follow the Google Satellite link, or whichever flavour of map piques your interest.

Google Maps/Satellite link is normally the most useful as, if the link relates to a region or other non-point feature, it will usually show the extents of the feature on the map.

Due to the demographics of Wikipedia it is likely that there are more location-linked pages in Europe and the USA, but that shouldn’t discourage you.

When testing the links for this post I ended up on a page for the sub-prefecture of Tissi, Chad. However, that page doesn’t have a location link yet and Google Maps doesn’t recognise it as a location 😒. Normally, and according to my rules, I should have rolled again, but because I ended up off the beaten track in Central Africa I thought it was worthy of further digging.

The Wiki page refers to “Sila,” an initial search for which ends up in some dusty fields adjacent to intersecting tracks and a small rural settlement:

In the interests of delivering a result reasonably true to the spirit of the original page-roll we will settle for the Dar Sila regional page and the regional capital of Goz Beïda for our final location map:

There doesn’t seem to be much happening in Goz Beïda. It is a victim of the conflict in neighbouring Darfur, and notes that Irish Army troops were shot at in the town during 2008. Not the first time the Irish Army have been under fire in Africa, either – that’s a story closer to my current place of work and will feature in a future post.

To summarise:

1. Go to Wikipedia, or direct to Wikipedia for your locale.
2. If there is an interesting location link on the main page check it out, if not follow the random article link from the dropdown links top-left, or simply press <alt+shift+x> – both options work on every Wikipedia page except the top level landing page.
3. If the page is interesting read it anyway.
4. Repeat until you land on a page with a location link.
5. Read the page and <ctrl+right-click>the location link in whichever order you prefer.
6. Choose the flavour of map you want and follow the link to it.
7. Amble around the digital world and see what you find.

Let me know where your random paging takes you in the comments.