Didn't get picked for Mars One? A new web app from NASA called Mars Trek could help ease your red planet blues.
Essentially a Martian version of Google Earth, the app is the next best thing to actually visiting Mars yourself. Rather than taking an extremely lengthy and dangerous interplanetary trip, you can explore Mars in 2D or even 3D from the comfort of your own home or your favorite coffee shop or wherever you can get a good Internet connection.
The interactive map is a composite of images captured on several missions. You can only zoom in to a resolution of about a dozen kilometers per centimeter before the map gets blurry, but that's enough to explore many craters, canyons and other features of the red planet's landscape. Clicking on the names of the features you come across on your virtual hike across Mars brings up geographical information about the formation as well as insights on the names themselves — many of which will delight geeks.
If you don't know where to start your exploration, the "Bookmarks" tool highlights historically significant locations such as the Spirit rover's landing site, shown below.
Once you've identified your favorite spots, you can use the "Layers" tool to layer images captured by the various orbiters onto the landscape. If that isn't enough Mars exploration for you, many of the bookmarked locations also have links to download STL files for printing your own 3D model of those spots. It may not give you the adrenaline rush of blasting off into space, but Mars Trek is definitely a more convenient way to explore our planetary neighbor.
