Hi,
I will be renting a car and drivng from Stratford upon Avon to Bristol to Poole , then Midhurst and finally Gatwick. Touring the Cotswolds, Stonehenge Old Sarum, etc. Can anyone reccomend where I can get a good road map that details "off the beaten path"? Can I pick one up in London somewhere. Thanks

My navigator used a Michelan spiral bound map and got us everywhere during a 3 week trip thru England. Can't remember the exact name but she found it easy to read. I'm sure she got it in a local bookstore. I think more detailed than the usual large maps.

I agree. I finally trashed my old Michelan large and very detailed spiral book. Now I'll need a new one. The best place for maps in London is Stanford's (or is it Sanford's) on Longacre just east of Leicester Square, or just west of Covent Garden tube station.

By the way, are you a member of AAA? You can contact the AA in England and for free they will provide you with the most detailed driving descriptions you have ever seen if you know the places you want to go. Their planning puts the US AAA to shape. It reads something like this, "Leave the alley behind Smith Hotel and turn right. Go 3.2 miles and turn left at the Little Chef located just beyond the red brick church with the tall steeple. Go 4.5 miles, and bear left where the road divides next to the farm house with the large red barn." Our route was some of the most entertaining but exact reading I've ever seen.

There are a number of publishers that make such maps. I used an A-Z Street Atlas in Kent and a Philip's Ordinance Survey book in East Sussex. Both were good but the A-Z I had was larger and much easier to read. Both mapped every road there was and were indispensable.

Find a good mapshop or bookstore and look at what they have. That's really the only way to know what works best for you.

I have ordered directly from the Ordance Survey at http://www.ordsvy.gov.uk/.
They accept VISAs and you should receive the map(s) in about a week.

For detailed maps at this site go to 'Map Shop', click 'Product Range' on the left. The Explorer Maps are high detailed maps which show minor roads, plus trails and bike paths.

I ordered an Explorer map for £6.99 + £2.50 shipping for a total of £9.49 (~$15 US).

Nobody has mentioned map scale, which I believe to be pretty important once you get to a store where you will have hundred options from which to choose. Do not choose a map or atlas with a scale coarser than 3 miles to the inch (aka 1:200,000). The Michelin 404, for example, at 6.3 miles to the inch (1:400,000), covers the area you will be travelling in. It is great for the numbered highways, but will be of little help once you get onto unclassified roads.

If you are truly exploring off the beaten path, you may want to go finer. I have a 1:110,000 map of the Cotswolds, which is starting to show individual buildings and is perfect for getting lost on the byways.

Finer than that, at 1:50,000 and 1:25,000 are for walkers and really no help to drivers.