looking for large scale road atlas

[luberhill]

I belong to AAA and I thought they used to have large scale road atlas' but don't see them on their site...State Farm used to give them away....
I have a GPS but like the atlas too...any ideas

[Spearfisherman7]

Get a trucker atlas from a major truck stop. It has all the highways approved for trucks highlighted in orange. That makes it easy to tell if your god may be taking you down some sketchy roads not suitable for an rv.

[dewey02]

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[dewey02]

Gdetrailer wrote:
"AAA" maps are not "free" by any means, you PAID the membership dues in order to have the "privilege" of being to be able to get them which makes them extremely expensive if that is you main reason to have the membership..

I USED to have AAA membership, out of 25 yrs of membership I only used their towing "service" (if you can call it that) ONCE. Got a handful of Trip books which were pretty dated and a few maps which really did not have a lot of detail for full sized maps..

Once they boosted to basic member price to $70 for first driver and $50 for additional driver per yr we dropped it..

Walmart Rand Mcnally Atlas hands down beats any of the AAA maps and is one heck of a lot less expense than a AAA membership.

Please don't presume to tell me what memberships I should have or pay for. Perhaps you might be silly enough to join AAA just for their maps, don't assume that I do. It sounds like you have a particular grudge against AAA. That's fine. If you don't like them or don't feel they provide value to you, you have every right to not subscribe to their services.

We do a lot of travelling, and have used and needed their services several times, from towing long distances, tire changes, no crank on below zero mornings, etc. I have three ladies in my family who don't want to be crawling on the ground changing tires when it is -40 degrees F and I don't either for that matter. It can be miles between towns where we live and travel. We have always received excellent service from them. Their travel agents have planned some of our bigger (non-RV) trips and given us a lot of good information about entertainment facilities.

We also do a lot of hotel stays in our travels (we don't always travel with the RV). Combining AAA with their Best Western partnership, we get good rates, room upgrades, and frequent complimentary nights.

I suppose all 56 million members of AAA must be idiots just because you don't like them and you have a vehicle that never breaks down.

[pnichols]

If you have a Windows 10 laptop you have pretty good free map software already in it. Just use Microsoft's built-in "Maps" app.

You can download maps of the entire U.S and Canada and other countries into it's database that resides right in your laptop. It keeps itself current automatically whenever you're on the Internet, but you DO NOT need Internet access to use it. The passenger in the RV can have the laptop in their lap to plan, plot, and watch the route as you drive. You can zoom in and out on and move around on the map as desired.

It's almost as good as Google Earth, but this Maps app may actually be superior to Google Earth in that it resides entirely in your laptop if you don't need it's streetside view. For streetside you have to be logged onto the Internet.

I have tested it by looking for places out in the middle of nowhere and deep in the middle of San Francisco back streets .... and the Maps app shows it all.

We sometimes travel and boondock camp in areas with no cell tower access, so we use this free Microsoft Maps app, our satellite based Garmin navigator unit, and Benchmark atlas books for directions and trip planning in these places ... and everywhere else, too.

[afidel]

Lol, I used AAA towing twice in one night once. It was newyears, one friend pulled into the neighbors driveway, realized what they had done when they saw all the vehicles in our driveway and decided to go offroading, stuck in the mud. The second friend wasn't paying enough attention and our driveway has an ~15 degree curve to it, missed the exit to the road by about 2' which put his driverside rear tire into the ditch, no damage but it wasn't coming out without a tow.

Over the last 20 years of having AAA I've probably used the tow services a dozen times or more and use the maps services on an annual basis (we take at least one long road trip a year). Now that I have offline maps available on two phones I've thought of moving to Coachnet for better RV towing service but it won't save me any real money and losing the paper backups would bother me so I haven't actually taken the plunge.

[Gdetrailer]

Veebyes wrote:
This is why so many of us lament the loss of MS Streets & Trips. Detail mapping right down to campground layout all without carrying literally tons in paper to have the same info.

Yeah, that is never gonna be resurrected..

Let it go, bury it (play taps) and move on.

There are plenty of Online Mapping systems which can give you considerably good trip planning along with maps with plenty of detail.

MAPQUEST is a very good "replacement" that gives you not only maps but turn by turn directions with landmarks..

Sure, you will need to have some Internet connection to setup your trip, but now days that is not hard to find some Internet access.

Once you have a trip mapped you can do things like I do.. I copy and paste the directions into a Word doc along with the maps..

You can even ZOOM into the maps and copy and paste the detailed zoom maps for help..

This way I have the trip and it is saved so I can copy the file to a tablet to use on the trip..

Speaking of tablet, I have also scanned many of the maps from my WM Atlas into PDF files that I save onto a SD card for my tablet..

The advantage there is you can ZOOM into the scanned maps if your eyes are not as good as they used to be!

Most citys/county seats have tourism boards, call a few of the cities of interest and ask for detailed city/county road maps, many have them and are typically free..

[bobsallyh]

Just saw the 2018 Rand McNally at the Yuma, AZ. Foothills Wal Mart. They were beside the door at the entrance and exit to the tire shop.

[Gdetrailer]

CavemanCharlie wrote:

Gdetrailer wrote:

dewey02 wrote:
We are AAA members and always request the free maps and books for the states we plan to travel in. We also received a free AAA atlas from them this year. We use that for quick reference, but use the paper maps for more detailed info. We also have a Garmin 760LMT, but I am one of those folks that needs a big picture of where I'm headed, rather than just following commands.

The one (minor) complaint I have about AAA's atlas is that they have a listing of cities in each state on the same page as the map. This makes them shrink the map down in size so there is room for the cities list. For states that have many cities, this can make the map quite small. We had an older atlas that had this city information at the very back of the atlas, so if you were looking for the location of a specific city (we don't often do this) you simply look it up in the back, get the coordinates and then go to the map and find it. This allowed for the state map to take up the full page (or across a 2 page spread), which I prefer.

"AAA" maps are not "free" by any means, you PAID the membership dues in order to have the "privilege" of being to be able to get them which makes them extremely expensive if that is you main reason to have the membership..

I USED to have AAA membership, out of 25 yrs of membership I only used their towing "service" (if you can call it that) ONCE. Got a handful of Trip books which were pretty dated and a few maps which really did not have a lot of detail for full sized maps..

Once they boosted to basic member price to $70 for first driver and $50 for additional driver per yr we dropped it..

Walmart Rand Mcnally Atlas hands down beats any of the AAA maps and is one heck of a lot less expense than a AAA membership.

Perhaps. But, around here just towing your car 10 miles is going to cost you 400 bucks or more. I can't imagine how much it would cost to move a RV of any kinds. You don't have to use them often for it to pay off. I have older rigs that break down more frequently.

I have used there lock service once too. (I had a spare set of keys hidden under the car but, they had been there for some many years that the magnetic case they were in broke and the keys got lost.)

OOOOOKAY....

Just how many times do you plan to break down or need a tow?

AAA has three "tiers" of membership plus addon of two tiers of RV stuff..

Basic,

4 roadside calls/yr

TOWING 3 miles (YES THREE MILES)

Cost $75/yr primary, addon driver $40 EACH per yr

Plus,

4 roadside calls per yr

TOWING up to 100 miles

$104 per yr addon driver $60 per yr

Premier,

4 roadside calls per yr

TOWING 100 miles + 1 other tow up to 200 miles

$140 per yr and addon each driver $60 per yr

NONE of the above include RV towing coverage, for that you need to buy up to RV packages which those prices are secret and only available to members..

at basic plus one driver that is $110 per yr..

25 yrs that is $2750!!!!

I have only needed ONE tow in the last 35 yrs of driving..

I think I can easily afford to pay a $400 tow bill..

Not to mention, found out that AAA only covered the HOOK UP.. my insurance company covered the rest.

On edit,

forgot to mention the "RV coverage" requires at least a tier above basic or even Premier tier..

Throw some more math in there at Premier for me that would be $200 per yr or for 25 yrs that would be $5000!!! :E :S

So far, we have been well over ten yrs since we dropped AAA, don't miss it and the money we would have spent on it is money saved.. That saved money sits in the bank for just such oops moments in life..

As far as all those supposed AAA member savings "benefits", never found a campground that would accept AAA for discounts, only found ONE (yeah ONE) "amusement park" that would accept AAA discount..

I tried and tried but simply cannot justify the cost of being a "member"..

I don't miss getting tons of junk mail from AAA trying to sell me pet insurance, life insurance and pretty much any "Ronco" as seen on TV add on junk that they could think of to pitch to members weekly if not daily..

Although to this day I still get those stupid want you back packages with our membership cards preprinted all for a tidy sum of $115 :R ..

Those go straight to the shredder..

Yeah, they are the king of junk mail.

[Veebyes]

This is why so many of us lament the loss of MS Streets & Trips. Detail mapping right down to campground layout all without carrying literally tons in paper to have the same info.

[Ron3rd]

old guy wrote:
walmart used to have them too

Don't know if they still do, but I bought one at Wang-Mart about 13 years ago out of a bargain bin in the auto section. They were blowing out the RM atlases for $2.00 so I picked one up. The cover's gone (worn off) but still use it all the time.

[jdb7566]

If you're interested, CW has available a large scale road atlas tailored to RV use. At about $25.00, it might be worth a look.

[jdb7566]

old guy wrote:
walmart used to have them too

X2

[CavemanCharlie]

Gdetrailer wrote:

dewey02 wrote:
We are AAA members and always request the free maps and books for the states we plan to travel in. We also received a free AAA atlas from them this year. We use that for quick reference, but use the paper maps for more detailed info. We also have a Garmin 760LMT, but I am one of those folks that needs a big picture of where I'm headed, rather than just following commands.

The one (minor) complaint I have about AAA's atlas is that they have a listing of cities in each state on the same page as the map. This makes them shrink the map down in size so there is room for the cities list. For states that have many cities, this can make the map quite small. We had an older atlas that had this city information at the very back of the atlas, so if you were looking for the location of a specific city (we don't often do this) you simply look it up in the back, get the coordinates and then go to the map and find it. This allowed for the state map to take up the full page (or across a 2 page spread), which I prefer.

"AAA" maps are not "free" by any means, you PAID the membership dues in order to have the "privilege" of being to be able to get them which makes them extremely expensive if that is you main reason to have the membership..

I USED to have AAA membership, out of 25 yrs of membership I only used their towing "service" (if you can call it that) ONCE. Got a handful of Trip books which were pretty dated and a few maps which really did not have a lot of detail for full sized maps..

Once they boosted to basic member price to $70 for first driver and $50 for additional driver per yr we dropped it..

Walmart Rand Mcnally Atlas hands down beats any of the AAA maps and is one heck of a lot less expense than a AAA membership.

Perhaps. But, around here just towing your car 10 miles is going to cost you 400 bucks or more. I can't imagine how much it would cost to move a RV of any kinds. You don't have to use them often for it to pay off. I have older rigs that break down more frequently.

I have used there lock service once too. (I had a spare set of keys hidden under the car but, they had been there for some many years that the magnetic case they were in broke and the keys got lost.)

[CavemanCharlie]

darsben1 wrote:
Kind of expensive way to do it but I have the Delorme Atlas for most states I am interested in.
It shows everything and is an invaluable tool to find things you might otherwise miss

I heard that Delorme was bought out by Garmin. I wonder how long they will continue to make paper maps ? I bought a couple for the states near me just in case.