which road atlas?

[Steel Icarus]

Loved long car journeys as a kid when parents knew where they were going or there was an old map in the back that had yet to be thrown away. All the roads and names of places and sights I'd never seen and never would, it was like magic or myth.

 

[brogdale]

Have to say, after driving a great deal en France using the excellent 'Michelin' Road Atlases, those available in the UK have usually disappointed.

 

[Pickman's model]

Have to say, after driving a great deal en France using the excellent 'Michelin' Road Atlases, those available in the UK have usually disappointed.

shitty road atlases to go along with our shitty government

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

I have an excellent road map of France left over from my raving days. But as I have a photographic memory for maps I neglected to bring it with me as I drove from London to Marseille, was an interesting trip, coming up against the Swiss border was particularly exciting...

 

[Steel Icarus]

I have an excellent road map of France left over from my raving days. But as I have a photographic memory for maps I neglected to bring it with me as I drove from London to Marseille, was an interesting trip, coming up against the Swiss border was particularly exciting...

Can you have a photographic memory for maps? I mean are you terrible or merely ordinary with, say, fruit or faces?

 

[brogdale]

Can you have a photographic memory for maps? I mean are you terrible or merely ordinary with, say, fruit or faces?

Have to confess that i do have a photographic memory of quite a few IGN maps...largely because, balking at their extortionate price in French supermarkets, I just took a snap of the bits I needed with my phone.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Can you have a photographic memory for maps? I mean are you terrible or merely ordinary with, say, fruit or faces?

I am bad at faces, pretty good with things I’ve read and generally excellent with maps, but we all have off days I guess...

I go on >20+ mile off road bike rides having committed to memory the various bridle paths and so on and rarely go far wrong.

 

[Steel Icarus]

Only downside to poring over roadmaps on long journeys as a kid was watching my mum and stepdad getting exasperated at her inability to read them very well when I knew which junction was best

 

[brogdale]

Only downside to poring over roadmaps on long journeys as a kid was watching my mum and stepdad getting exasperated at her inability to read them very well when I knew which junction was best

It's always the lack of orientating the paper map/atlas that causes the problems...have to confess that I just can't use maps on my phone because I just can't seem ever to orientate them how I want to.

 

[weltweit]

I suspect the majority of today's young adults wouldn't know how to read or navigate by map at all, being used to Google Maps TomTom or Garmins instead. I have a UK road atlas in the car for those times I want to plan something or in case the Garmin gives up the ghost. It is quite out of date, but so is the Garmin, we manage.

 

[Dogsauce]

When I used to hitch quite a lot in the 90s I had a little pocket-sized Bartholemew road atlas that I used to carry with me, for those days when someone would take you part of the way on an obscure A-road rather then the motorway and you’d need to orient yourself and choose a route back towards civilisation. Unfortunately being a 1977 edition I eventually got caught out on some freshly built bypass in Warwickshire or somewhere like that which didn’t officially exist on my map, not even as a dashed ‘under construction’ line.

 

[Dogsauce]

Anyway, did anyone ever buy the big AA road atlas at the full price of £7 or whatever when last year‘s one was forever for sale in booksale type shops for 99p?

 

[salem]

I had a load of A-Zs when I was a kid. Would sit for hours going on imaginary journeys to places that what were probably far duller then I appreciated. I now like to drop the streetview pin down in random cities and wander around (or do the same in real life when I'm on holiday).

Get with the times.

That's not aged well

I'm not long driving and got myself a new phone with a big screen to use as a sat nav. It is the absolute nuts, got a jazzy bluetooth adaptor for the car and a great dash mount, all in cost me fuck all and I now have an all singing all dancing voice activated, music streaming, autosyncing infotainment system that outclasses all but the very top end cars.

I'm well able to read a map but I can't imagine ever doing a long driving journey on my own relying on one.

 

[A380]

....I go on >20+ mile off road bike rides having committed to memory the various bridle paths and so on and rarely go far wrong.

Later