How about Quality of UK & Ireland Topo Light OR: Which map for the UK?

[+SwissCacheTeam]

Hello all,

 

As quiet readers of the forums for long times, we always could draw out many useful hints. But now time has come to post a very first question as we could not find something reliable on this matter.

 

We are planning to travel to the UK this summer holidays to spend some days out in the Cotswolds and South England as well as in London afterwards.

 

We want to do a lots of caching in the beautiful countryside, hike some nice trails and just enjoy country and people over there, as we always had a warm welcome and great contacts when visiting the UK.

 

Recently, we bought a new GPSMAP64st in addition to our older Oregon 650. They both have the pre-installed Recreation Map Europe.

 

I think, especially for hiking and caching, it would be useful to have more precise, detailed maps on the main device, the GPSMAP64st. Now the decision is really hard, as we could read a lots of discussions about the OS Discoverer maps and we struggle in making a proper decision.

 

Could anyone kindly give us an advice, which map to buy for our purpose? It should (if possible) come on a microSD card and not blur out too much when zooming in as this makes our eyes hurt... ;-) We take the following maps into our considerations:

 

- OS Discoverer All GB 1:50k

- OS Discoverer Premium All GB 1:25k

- UK & Ireland TOPO LIght

- and the outdated UK TOPO v3 on SD-card (ref. no. PN0407)

 

Please let us know about why we should take the one or the other, about your experience when using one or the other and what you like most about your featured map.

 

Thank you very much in advance for your kind replies and advice, we really much appreciate your answers!

 

Greetings from Switzerland and

Best regards,

 

Julian

SwissCacheTeam

[+speakers-corner]

Have a look at this site. The maps are very good. I have used them myself.

 

http://talkytoaster.co.uk/maps

 

Hier ist eine deutsche Seite. Die sind auch gut.

 

http://www.wanderreitkarte.de/

[+Bear and Ragged]

Another talkytoaster suggestion!

[+SwissCacheTeam]

Hello and thank you for your kind answers. I am currently downloading the Talkytoaster maps and will try them.

 

As I understood from several other threads, the OSM like Talkytoaster are very good or even better for built areas like London (we also will do that in our vacancies). But my main problem is, that we do not want to get lost when traveling the countryside (Forest of Dean, Cotswolds, Dartmoor, Exmoor, Welsh/English boarder and so on). Are the OSM really that good like the maps from the OS or brand topographic maps?

 

The main difference between the OS and Garmin Topographic maps would be that the OS maps are raster maps (like the Explorer paper maps, right?) and the Topo is vector. So the blurring at high zoom levels would occur with the OS maps and not with the Topo, am I right?

 

I think we mandatory need each footpath and bridlepath in the maps as we also will do hiking along some nice routes... I would be able to spend some good pounds for proper maps, so don't worry if you recommend free or paid maps, anyway...

 

Thank you very much for your considerations and further input, as I really struggle if we will be safe and have good map coverage out in the "wilderness" of the UK :-)

 

Have a great day and

 

Kindest regards,

Julian.

[+SwissCacheTeam]

Hi @sussamb,

 

Thank you for your detailed considerations. I really much appreciate it. I just installed the Talkytoaster and bought the UK Topo Light, which will for sure serve our needs. You are right for sure, the OS maps also don't bring the extreme details as well, and your combination is really good!

 

I am happy to have such a good advice from you and I wish you a pleasant day! Greetings from Switzerland and

 

All the best,

Julian.