HI All
My family and I are off to France driving down to Cognac at the beginning of august. We will be camping on the way down. Can anyone recommend a god road atlas? we have never driven through france before so intend on using the motorways but obviously campsites will be on more minor roADS. Any advice or suggestions gladly received.
Cheers
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The Michelin road atlas is excellent and very detailed. It comes in two sized versions A4 and larger.I bought the larger version last year but after two trips it is getting a bit dog- eared. It is a bit cumbersome in the car if you want a quick look then throw it on the back seat and too large to keep on the navigator's lap. Next time I'll go for the A4 version.
------------- Mother Nature always wins in the end.
Another fan of the Michelin Road Atlas. I prefer the large format but as Suzac say it can get dog eared very qickly. I usually replace them every couple of years.
I have a question: if it is now illegal to have a sat nav with speed camera detection, is it also illegal to carry a road atlas with safety cameras marked?
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No its not illegal to carry an Atlas with the road cameras marked - not as yet anyway!!!!! And I agree about the Michelin atlas.
You'll need a good campsite guide to find out of the way sites - the Le Guide Officiel de Camping Caravanning is a good one, with all 10,500 French campsites, or Caravan Europe by the Caravan Club has a more limited selection, but of a good range of sites.
Quote: Originally posted by lidds0 on 16/7/2012
I have a question: if it is now illegal to have a sat nav with speed camera detection, is it also illegal to carry a road atlas with safety cameras marked?
I think the new law is about the exact position of speed cameras and from an atlas the scale of the Michelin it would be difficult to pin point the exact position. It is still allowed to have the general vicinity of a speed camera on a sat nav which they now call danger areas so similar to a map.
I use AA France 3 miles to the inch. It is very similar to Michelin but I just find the colour is a bit easier on the eye. It's just what you get used to really.
Also look at www.viamichelin.co.uk and it will help you plan a route.
Don't think it's a must to use autoroutes. I am presuming you are starting at Calais. The A10 to near Cognac is a very expensive one to use. You can actually do the whole route relatively toll free. Calais, Rouen, Evereux, Dreux, Chartres. You then pick up the N10 from Chatres ringroad and follow it all the way to Angouleme which is only about 25 miles east of Cognac. Just use the A10 to by-pass Tours and rejoin the N10 at junc 23
There you are you don't need to buy a map now.
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We updated ours this year and have the Michelin France 2012 - A3 spiral version. The colours of the maps are easier to read than our 2005 copy but the paper they've used is much thinner. I know it will drop to bits at some stage over the next few weeks but having said that it was £8.47 from Amazon and about £14 in town. They obviously want us to replace them more often.
WE have the A4 michelin one - I preferred the A3 because somehow with the A4 all the places I need are on the spiral but it actually lasted a whole summer without incident which is better than the A3 maps.
We also bought a laminated map of France - the same sort of size as an OS map with half of France on each side. Makes overall route planning a bit easier.
------------- pork
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We used the AA spiral bound A4 atlas this year and found it very good. We particularly liked that toll motorways and free motorways are marked in different colours so easy to spot.
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Topic: French Road Atlas
