Google Earth is an awesome tool to use it shows every road and tiny town you could possibly imagine, you can see all the thousands of old locations all across North TX/LA I think all shalers should have it. Download it ASAP. It will be really neat when they get around to updating our area.
Google earth is amazing. Some other neat map sites include microsoft maps and zmaps. Microsoft maps has a birdseye view that really gives a great view of a piece of property. I used it a lot when I was looking for some timberland to buy. Zmaps has a lot of tools to go along with google maps such as a tool to measure acres, distance, and elevation.
The image where I live is over 6 years old, I wish they would hurry up and get on the ball. I wish it had an elevation feature. I was looking at some killer estates on Grand Bahama Island, we can always dream right?
The company I work for actually uses Google Earth as a simplistic GIS. It loads quick and almost any client is able to accept our data to view. This is just a quick screen shot of a recently constructed pipeline. This isn't the final build but one of the proposed areas along the way. What you are looking at here is the assessor's data, proposed easements, and proposed pipeline.
The downsides; it isn't very managable for large projects, it takes a "maintanence" to keep it updated (it doesn't update automatically), it isn't easy to query anything unless you build it into it, etc etc. We really use this to supplement our actual GIS database.
Also, in the professional version you are able to load updated aerial photography (provided you have it already), including elevations (they call it terrain). It may be something to look into if you are able to use it in your line of work. I deleted some data that may be personal even though it is public domain.
I was truly amazed when I saw the capabilities of Google Earth.
Another thing you can do. Need to know the measurements of your property? Click on the ruler. Then set the scale to feet. Click on a beginning spot on your property and then drag to a stop point. You'll see the exact distance.