Road map uk

[sunbeam]

Could anyone tell please what is the best road map for the uk for touring purposes .I know everyone is into apps etc but I like a good road map in book form to study my next day's run and to see what the lay of the land is like and any interesting places Thanks Edd

[colin]

I use a Phillips Navigator (as well as satnav), last time I got one there where various versions such as 'camper' and 'trucker'.

[sunbeam]

Thanks Colin I will check it out thanks again Edd

[Grumblewagon]

I use a Phillips road map when I'm touring. I use Google maps and Streetview sometimes, but I prefer a good paper map to spread out and see the big picture. Not so easy when you're driving :-D

[malc d]

sunbeam - 2018-04-12 8:10 PM

 

Could anyone tell please what is the best road map for the uk for touring purposes .I know everyone is into apps etc but I like a good road map in book form to study my next day's run and to see what the lay of the land is like and any interesting places Thanks Edd

 

 

We find the AA Large Scale Road Atlas very easy to follow.

 

3 miles to the inch.

 

The price printed on the cover is ten pounds but we got ours for about three quid in "Works " book shop in a garden centre

 

( Have never needed a sat-nav as I have an excellent navigator ).

 

;-)

[Geeco]

I have both Phillips & AA in large scale for my trips to UK. They are both a few years old now but still great for overall review & route planning. I combine hard copy with a Tom Tom gps.I have found the gps makes negotiating cities with complicated one way systems easy. The combination work for me. Cheers, 

[Brock]

For route mapping, I use an AZ 4 miles to an in inch road atlas. The scale makes it easy to plot over longer distances,the colour gives me an idea of the terrain, and it is not heavy. It has always been my first preference.

 

For actual navigation, my wife - who will do any map reading necessary, prefers the detail of a large scale map even though she finds them heavy [current one is an AA map which does the job] . If people stopped buying me road atlases, I'd return to using a large scale Truckers Atlas to support the AZ.

 

I doubt there is a bad road atlas nowadays. Pick one that intuitively feels right for you.

[mel wood]

I use the AA Supreme Scale Atlas of Britain. The scale is two and a half miles to the inch. I have the 2017 edition. The 2018 version is available on Amazon for £8.95 inc p&p.

 

I also have an even better one with a scale of one and a half miles to the inch but that is quite old and there doesn't seem to be a newer version.

[Tracker]

Many pubs and most tourist attractions (and sites if you use them) have racks of leaflets to browse through and help yourself as do Tourist Information Offices.

 

You can generally park for free at pubs and attractions whereas TIOs often take a bit of finding and parking in a town is not always easy.

 

A Google search online at say 'best things to see and do in ........................." also throws up lots of options often with reviews.

 

As for an Atlas - whatever is £1.99 in the supermarket, even last year's, will suffice!

[747]

I buy the AA 4 miles per inch Atlas when Aldi have them in and they are as cheap as chips. I copy my notations over to the new one each year (wildcamping spots, LPG sources etc). I usually buy 2 at a time and have one at home for planning trips and the other is kept in the van.

[Derek Uzzell]

I believe the largest-scale UK road atlas is Philip’s “Navigator Britain” at 1.5 miles to 1 inch (England/Wales). Example advert here

 

https://www.waterstones.com/book/philips-2019-essential-navigator-britain-flexi/philips-maps/9781849074766

 

I have a spiral-bound A4-size 3 miles to 1 inch AA road atlas for the UK and an A4 similar-scale Michelin atlas for France. I’d prefer A3-size atlases (as would my wife) but A4-size atlases will fit conveniently into my Ducato’s central storage ‘bin’ and A3 maps will not.

[Tracker]

The trouble with A4 is that you are forever disappearing down the page join and very often because the A4 is usually a bound book you can't open the map out to see where you've gone wheras an A3 tends to be softback and less pages so is easier to open wide to cross page joins.

[Derek Uzzell]

It should be be evident from on-line adverts that there is no general rule that A3-format road atlases tend to be ‘softback’ bound, whereas A4 equivalents will tend to be spiral bound, but it’s certainly the case that spiral-bound atlases are less user-friendly when trying to follow a route that crosses from one page to another across the centre join. Obviously how much of a nuisance this proves to be will depend on the map’s scale, as the larger the scale the more of an irritant the join-crossing will be.

 

With my Ford Transit-based Hobby motorhome I made a ’newspaper rack’ thingie that was bolted to the side of the driver’s seat and could accommodate A3 atlases. However, this approach is not practicable with my Ducato-based Rapido as it would prevent the driver’s seat being swivelled (I’d removed the Hobby’s seat-swivel) so I’m stuck with A4-size atlases.