Google cameras map popular trails of Grand Canyon

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. -- Google and its street-view cameras have taken users to narrow cobblestone alleys in Spain using a tricycle, inside the Smithsonian with a push cart and to British Columbia's snow-covered slopes by snowmobile.

The search giant now has brought its all-seeing eyes -- mounted for the first time on a backpack -- into the Grand Canyon, showcasing the attraction's most popular hiking trails on the South Rim and other walkways.

It's the latest evolution in mapping technology for the Mountain View, Calif., company, which has used a rosette of cameras to photograph thousands of cities and towns in dozens of countries for its Street View feature.

"Any of these sort of iconic, cultural, historical locations that are not accessible by road is where we want to go," said Ryan Falor, product manager at Google.

Google announced the trekker earlier this year but made its first official collection of data this week at the Grand Canyon.

The backpacks aren't ready for volunteer use, but Google has said it wants to deploy them at national forests, to the narrow streets of Venice, Mount Everest and to ancient ruins and castles.

The move to capture the Grand Canyon comes after Apple chose to drop Google Maps from its mobile operating systems and opted to use its own mapping program that was derided for, among other things, poor directions and missing towns.

Steve Silverman, operations manager for Google didn't directly address the competition in saying: "Just trying to document a trail, it's going to be hard to beat this."

Google launched its Street View feature in 2007 and has expanded from five U.S. cities to more than 3,000 in 43 countries.

The so-called trekker captures images every 2.5 seconds with 15 cameras that are 5 megapixels each.

The GPS data is limited, so Google must compensate with sensors that record temperature, vibrations and the orientation of the device as it changes, before it stitches the images together.