Travel is expensive these days. If you want to take a trip so see some tech meccas, such as Akihabara in Tokyo or Cape Canaveral in Florida, it's going to cost you. Unless you travel virtually, that is.

With the Google Maps Street View car having traveled all over the world by this point, it's easier than ever to scope out some of the coolest tech-related sites without getting up out of your chair. Hit the jump for street-level shots of some of the most high-tech places on Earth. No alien flyovers, please.

View Larger Map
Cape Canaveral — This is NASA's Shuttle Landing Facility, the "airport" where space shuttles touch down once they return from space. That big building in the distance is the Vehicle Assembly Building, otherwise known as the place where spaceships are built.

View Larger Map
Stanford Linear Accelerator — You're looking at just one section of the huge Stanford Linear Accelerator, otherwise known as the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. Built in 1962, this research center focuses on experimental and theoretical elementary particle physics research using electron beams. And all sorts of other stuff you couldn't begin to understand.

View Larger Map
Laguna Seca — The Laguna Seca Raceway in Monterey, California is one of the most famous racetracks in the world. And normally, tiny underpowered cars aren't allowed on it. But they were nice enough to make an exception for the Google Street View car.

View Larger Map
Pixar — Yes, this is where so many of your favorite movies were made. If only Street View allowed us access inside! But I guess we'll just have to be content seeing the gates that those geniuses drive through every morning.

View Larger Map
MIT Draper Robotics Lab — This unassuming complex houses some of the brightest minds in robotics and engineering, and there's a good chance that whatever they're working on in there right now will be making our breakfasts for us in 10 years. There's a reason this is situated on "Technology Square."

View Larger Map
Akihabara, Tokyo — This neighborhood in Tokyo is a mecca for geeks everywhere. Completely stuffed with electronics stores, robotics shops, maid cafes and manga emporiums, people flock from far and wide to bask in the glow of one of the densest collections of pure nerdery in the world.

View Larger Map
Apple Campus — Yep, here it is: Infinite Loop, the road that runs through the Apple Campus. This is as close as you'll ever get to it unless you work for Apple or are a corporate spy with a death wish.

View Larger Map
Microsoft Campus — Like the other tech headquarters on this list, Microsoft's campus doesn't look too much different than any other industrial park in America. The only difference is that at this one, they make the operating system that the vast majority of computers run. No bigs.