Map-printing challenge

This item appears on page 48 of the August 2014 issue.

Chuck Lynn of Overland Park, Kansas, wrote (Feb. ’14, pg. 15), “For every place my wife and I plan to visit, I always want a printed map. Most tourist bureaus offer PDF maps to download, but I find they are not of much use because my printer prints only sheets measuring 8½"x11" or 8½"x14", and I don’t want to tape a bunch of sheets together. My local FedEx print shop can print a large PDF map, but the cost (is high). Do any of my fellow readers of ITN have a suggestion?”

A few readers sent responses, which are printed below.

 

Here’s a source I’ve used many times: Wide World of Maps, Inc.

We in the Phoenix area are fortunate to be able to shop in their stores, but they have an online store as well (www.maps4u.com). 

Their selection is amazingly complete — a place I love to shop!

MARGO WILSON

Scottsdale, AZ

 

We have a wonderful map store in Minneapolis: Latitudes Map & Travel Store (3113 Lynn Ave. South, Ste. 100, St. Louis Park, MN 55416; 952/927-9061). 

You can go to their website or call them if you don’t live in the area.

BONNIE CONDIT

St. Louis Park, MN

 

I’m a travel agent and always enjoy providing my clients with advance-planning maps, but they are the type you just print out, yourself. The best source I’ve found is the website www.worldatlas.com. Maps for anywhere in the world can be found there.*

By the way, this site provides far more than just maps on each country. It includes geographical statistics, current weather reports, travel information and interesting facts.

Another great site I use for building custom maps that show my clients’ routings is www.stepmap.com**. Here you can register for free and design your own map. This one takes a bit of time to learn, but what a great resource!

PAUL HUTTON

Issaquah, WA

*At www.worldatlas.com, as an example, on the map titled “Countries That Border the Mediterranean Sea,” you can right-click a country on the map to see a more detailed map of that region, along with links to related maps. Once you find the map you want, you can print it out by clicking “Print this map” below the map’s image.

**The map design function on stepmap.com may not work properly on older web browsers. 

 

There are a couple ways to get maps in advance of a trip.

1. Order maps published by the usual suspects in Europe. 

For Germany, Austria, Switzerland and some adjacent regions, sources would include Hallwag Kümmerly+Frey (www.swisstravelcenter.ch/index), Höfer Verlag (available from several online sources, including www.hoeferverlag.de/englisch and [in German only] www.polenkarten.de), Michelin, Aral (available from multiple sources, including www.amazon.de/Aral-Kartensatz-2013-Deutschland-Europa/dp/3897643561), Mayrverlag (in German only, www.karten-mayrverlag.at), Borch and Berndtson. Other brands can be found by visiting www.mairdumont.com/en and clicking on “MAPS.”

Some sell direct, while others sell maps via Amazon and www.land kartenshop.de (in German only).

You can purchase ADAC maps of Germany by going to www.amazon.de (in German) and doing a word search for “ADAC.” You can also find an atlas of road maps, with a table of contents and explanations of symbols, at Amazon.de or use the shortcut http://tinyurl.com/nbympib. 

The array of maps online is bewildering. The secret is to search for them with the right words in the local language. For road maps in Germany, Switzerland and Austria, it is “Landkarte” or “Strassenkerte.” Enter any of the brand names into a search engine with the word “Landkarte” and you’ll get results. Mayrverlag publishes Wanderkarten (hiking maps), Strassenkarten (road maps), Stadtplane (city maps) and more. 

In French, you would search for the term “carte routiere” for road maps or “plan de ville” for city maps.

2. A second way to get maps in advance of a trip is to get an iPad or similar tablet and either load it up with maps before you go or access mapping websites like Google Maps, ViaMichelin.com and Falk while en route.

Resize the maps on the screen as needed, for either the big picture or the small details.

I completed a month-long road trip through France in June ’14, and wherever/whenever I had access to WiFi, I went online with my iPad mini, took screen grabs of mapping websites (from Google and — much better, I learned — from www.viamichelin.com) with point-to-point itineraries, saved them on the iPad and looked them up whenever our GPS was misleading or the big Michelin maps (1cm = 2km) weren’t detailed enough.

We never once used the toll road (by choice). We got lost a few times and used the compass and our instincts when the GPS was simply wrong. We always had fun finding our way… eventually.

LORENZ RYCHNER

Denver, CO

Other maps can be found by going to Amazon.com and searching for brand-name maps or maps of particular regions. Additionally, you can visit country-specific Amazon websites (such as, for France, Amazon.fr) and doing word searches for brand names or that country’s terms for “maps.”