h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

They're both rather easy to miss if you blink slowly.

Is there anything remarkable about either besides their names?

Not particularly.

That's the way the small towns with unusual names are up here.

Hypatia, thank you for that it really made me laugh

The rest of the thread is fascinating too. GB has some very strange names dating back centuries, I just wish I had time to dig them out!

Watched a TV series on the Mississippi the past few weeks and loved it. You live in such a lovely place, though parts of the UK are looking like the Mississippi flood plain at the moment, yet we are in Drought!!

It's a truly Mad World, was it always so or am I just getting

Websailor

Speaking of flood plains, there's a little town not far from here (just a few dozen miles from Galveston) called Alta Loma. Alta loma means high ground in Spanish. I seriously doubt any of it is more than 25 - 30 above sea level, and that's being generous.

Websailor, there are parts of Missouri that are really beautiful, especially in the Ozark Plateau region. My home town is in the Ozark foothills. If I drive 40 minutes south I'm in the mountains. 40 minutes north or west is prairie.

BG, I have been to Alta Loma. And I agree about the altitude. At least it is above sea level.

Maybe Alta Loma was named ironically?

There's a town a couple of miles away called Apex. (I usually call it 'Acme' when I make mock.) Elevation 550 feet. I asked someone, and they said it was the highest point on the old railroad line.

Most of the village names in Ireland are from the Irish, so they are not very interesting. Inch, for example, means either "marshy place" or "island".

But some are in English and are somewhat better, like Hackball's Cross.

A good one. There was also Camp, but I don't know if that was Irish or English.

I don't think I've been to Boring (a bit north of my usual stomping grounds) but we used to drive through Drain, Oregon all the time. There's also a town in California called Likely.

So whatever was in the newspaper was 'a Likely story'?

Good one, Dmitri.

I've been to a town in Essex called Ugley and a town in Kent called Loose.

It's not known at this time whether either of them has a branch of the Womens Institute

I've always wanted to buy some land and start my own town. I'll name it The Middle of Nowhere.

I don't live in the Middle of Nowhere, but I can see it from my balcony.

We need to name our houses the way the English do. Then I could buy a farm, call it Nowhere, build a house right in the center and name the house Middle of Nowhere. Much easier than building a town.