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Posted by Bill S on March 23, 2008 at 5:36:01 pm EDT
In reply to GPS or Map and Compass posted by m0rpheu5111 on February 18, 2008 at 3:53:29 pm EST

rexim,
I like to collect maps, as well, plus books about maps and mapping. Unfortunately, between the maps, books on mapping, and navigational and survey devices, I am running out of space for the climbing, camping, ski, and bicycling gear. It appears that, between the 30 min, 15 min, and 7.5 min quads, special maps, topo maps from 4 EU countries and Australia, Chile, Mexico, Canada, Tanzania, and Antarctica (that includes a couple iterations of Damien Gildea's mapping project in the Sentinel Range, which is where Mt. Vinson is located), I have something over 1000 paper topo maps (I finally decided to put them in storage boxes, rather than stacked on what at one time was supposed to be a dining table). Some of the historical books on mapping are really fascinating - one I have uses a particular place in Europe plus North America to illustrate the progress made in mapping techniques and mapping knowledge - did you know that California was once a very elongated island, just off the coast of North America (or so the Spanish maps showed it for almost 100 years)? And I'm sure you have seen the Medieval maps of "the World" that are drawn "oriented" with Jerusalem at the top of the map (origin of the term "orienting" a map). In sorting things out, I found a book on "perspective mapping", done by the brother of a couple men who were in the university climbing club Barb and I belonged to, all 3 of the brothers having rather unusual names (a story for another time and place) - Tau Rho Alpha (he works out of the Menlo Park USGS office, just up the road from us - http://jclahr.com/alaska/aeic/taurho/index.html), whose brothers are Sigma Alpha and Kappa Alpha (the names are real, just that their father had a rather strange sense of humor, deriving from some peculiar family history)

Maps are really fascinating. And the ones you mark up during a trek make great souvenirs of the hike. Try that on your GPS receiver.

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