Google has pretty much taken over the Earth (as in its Keyhole service). Now it’s raising its sights. It wants the Moon, as well. Yes, it’s true: its online mapping service now covers the Moon!

Well, to be honest, it doesn’t exactly COVER the Moon, but it has a good start and I hope it keeps it up. What Google did was ‘pour’ NASA Moon photos into its Keyhole interface to produce an easy-to-navigate ‘aerial’ map of the area surrounding the sites of our Apollo landers.

It’s not as good as space travel in person, but it’s a lot safer (and a LOT cheaper)!

[Welcome to Google Moon]

In honor of the first manned Moon landing, which took place on July 20, 1969, we’ve added some NASA imagery to the Google Maps interface to help you pay your own visit to our celestial neighbor. Happy lunar surfing.