to find OS maps utterly wonderful?

[Ormirian]

I know it's a little bit tragic for a grown woman to love maps sooo much but I do.

I have just ordered one for our holiday so I can plot walks for us to do - we won't do them because no-one else much likes walking and I won't do them alone because I'd feel guilty going off on my own all day. So the map is entirely theoretical really. A hangover from the days when I was child-free and could go where I wanted or even persuade DH to come with me.

But even now Buying The Map is an essential part for our holiday and if I didn't do it I'd feel lost. The DC had learnt now and whenever we arrive for the start of our holiday they all chorus 'Mum! Map shop!' when they see a likely looking place.

Eventually I will have the entire British Isles in maps and one day will lay them all out in one big super map!

YANBU

I am a map fiend. I have hundreds. I just love getting them out and planning imaginary (and real) trips - walks, cycles and runs. They're just fab

Linerunner

1:2500 is probably a bit geeky though !!

I still like 1:63,330 - have several

"FWIW I go off walking by myself loads on holiday."

I have been running on holidays before now but I never feel I can be gone that long. Perhaps I should just go and say sod it!

I should add that collectors of cigarette cards have hijacked cartophile. Bastards. Cigarette cards are useless on a walk in Dorset.

And they have sharp corners too!

No, no, no to those map holders round the neck. They are for ramblers. Walkers keep their maps in their pockets.

Ormirian - Yes just plan a day (or more) of your holiday which is a day when you get up, pack your backpack and go off for the day alone - well, you and your map

Love maps and am building up my own OS collection as we holiday in various parts of the country. My dad almost has a full set. Some very old. He gave us one to consult when we visited recently, and he had to show us where the M1 was, as the map pre-dated it.

My name is Chaz and I collect antiquarian maps some of which are more than 200 years old. I love charting the change in the landscape and culture like the development of the railways etc. I could sit and look at an OS map for ages even when I am not travelling to that place.

no those new expensive really flexible map covers are great, fold them up and inside your jacket. You need waterproof covers for Scotland.

Out of date maps are a right pain though

Ooh walking :) It was my first day off after DS was born - spending the day when DS was exactly six months' old, scrambling up via the chimney to Scafell Pike with my dad. My boobs were leaking by the end of it but it was sooooo worth it. Sorry, slightly off topic but I got a bit misty-eyed there.

Aaaanyway - I am going to join with the cartographical geekery. I have OS maps of everywhere I walk regularly but I really miss being a member of Shoe Lane library in the City where you can take out any number of maps and they have them all!

I expect some of you will like this blog too.

I love maps too, always have, and am very pleased that DD is quite interested in all that stuff as well. Which is useful in this house as quite honestly I'm pleasantly surprised if DH manages to find his way home from work unassisted.
Usually we get into the car to go somewhere, after about 5 minutes I say "you don't know where you're going do you?" and he sadly shakes his head.

I think my fascination stems from my dad being a lorry driver. I used to travel around with him in the holidays and navigate (it was the 70s and health and safety hadn't really been invented). I have a huge collection of maps, mostly of places I've never been, but I can look and dream.
Google Earth can keep me going for ages - "just look at this street in Shanghai, wouldya"

I have maps from 1880's and then the 1930's of the town and area where I live. I have spent hours looking at them and working out what has changed, whats the same. Love it, Love it.

I was at a war museum recently and in a display case there was a captured luftwaffe map showing the intended bombing run....and there on the map just on the edge...was my house.
That was a spooky map moment for me.

Info on trails and right of way in Ireland There are guides available specifically for ramblers/hillwalkers. Recent legislation has enabled landowners to remove access to a right of way under certain circumstances.

I love maps. I don't feel at home anywhere until I've seen the lie of the land. When I first moved to the US I was completely lost. Maps really are pants there.

the map that DH bought me was a Russian target map of Southampton with all the areas and streets labelled in Russian and the "military targets" highlighted.
Its on the wall next to my stairs so I can look at it every day.

And if you have just worked out EXACTLY who I am - come round for a drink but please don't out me on here !!

I can waste HOURS on Google earth - the huge building in the middle of Pyongyang is a corker

My dad once told me that the US Air Force compiled incredibly detailed maps of the area around Shannon immediately after WW2.

A Russian Target map? Wow, that is cool!

Oh - by the way, that blog is nothing to do with me! A friend of mine sent me the link, it's called 'Strange Maps' :o

And I thought I was the only one with a map fetish
Trouble is I'm finding the print is too small and I don't want to have to take reading glasses on a walk. Does anyone else have this problem?

I have a compass with a magnifying glass on the other end (it's a rectangular shape). I think I got it in Stanfords but I'm sure you can get them in most outdoor shops

Oh is that what it is, I've got one of those . Thanks Christine

nannynick I found a box full of old OS maps when I went to the tip last year, they weren't yours were they? Obviously I rescued them. DH wants me to get rid but I love having them. They're random places I have never been as well which is fun.

YANBU - I've always loved maps especially railway ones, but I loved planning Duke of Edinburgh award expeditions with the maps and plotting routes (doing them was OK but not as much fun!)

Satnavs are still no substitute for a good map - as my boyfriend and I discovered a while back in France, where all four roads from where we were said 'cars forbidden' - I ended up using the paper map to navigate down a ski trail!

I also look up all transport routes and useful facilities near where we're going on holiday, using GoogleEarth. Luckily MrNC indulges me in my plans - he asks for a holiday with some castles and pretty views in X country, and I organise everything. :)

I love maps. I can sit and look at them for hours plotting walks, or just finding out what the name of that big hill is etc.

I was thinking about OS maps t'other day. It's quite hilly where we live and I was just a bit curious to see how close together the contours would be on some of the hills I have to walk up. (Am I boring?)