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'Get-a-Map' for France


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As Moote says, use Geoportail. It defaults to satellite view (High Definition for the whole of France - much better than GE) On the Left click on Maps and then tick IGN. Using the Opacity sliders you can change between the Sat, view and the IGN map. I find the best way to print is by using a screen capture with something like PaintShop-Pro. You can also read coords off the map, down at the bottom of the map frame

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If you want the standard 1:25000 walking map of an area, you can pick it up at almost any hypermarché or sports shop (Decathlon, Sport 2000, InterSport) in the general area of the map in question. You'll find those hidden away in the ugly bit at the end of town where the French put capitalism while they get on with pretending to have a bucolic pre-mechanisation existence for the benefit of the tourists. :anitongue:

 

Otherwise, I believe that there is a custom map service available, probably via ign.fr, but I don't know any details. You could maybe contact The Mars Bars who I believe used this when they visited France a year or two back.

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If you want electronic mapping (with an option to print), by far the best option is the new Memory Map facility called "Digital Map Shop". If you don't have Memory Map already, you might need to spend some money buying the software, but it's a good investment (but don't get the OS edition if you want to download French maps!). Then you buy "top-up vouchers", which allow you to download maps for areas of France you choose yourself. Basically, these just give you a credit to your account for a certain number of km squares (quite a lot).

 

You define the areas, so if you know you'll be unlikely to move more than (for example) 20km from a particular town, you just draw a rough circle on the base map to enclose the area of interest. Then the software downloads the relevant map portions, and your voucher is debitted by the number of squares purchased. It's an efficient way of obtaining the detailed maps you want without having to buy loads of mapping that you'll never use. If you go to a different area next year you can dowload a bit more. You can choose to download 1:100000 or 1:25000 depending on your needs (but I think that you have to decide on the scale before buying the voucher), and the IGN maps aren't bad (although nowhere near as good as OS: but what is?).

 

I have to say that the web site is awkward and obscure, and deliberately keeps the costs hidden, but after you've done it the first time it's an easy job. Be careful not to accidentally download too much though! I've only used a small amount of my credit so far and have dowloaded quite a large area.

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