TXgalinGA

My mom and I will be renting a car in Koln, Germany. We will drive to Cochem, Rothenburg, Fussen, Salzburg, and will drop off our car in Munich (downtown). Normally I travel with my husband, who is a master navagator. Unfortunately, he will not be joining us on this trip. All hotels are booked (so we know the addresses). I was advised to buy a good map of Germany once I arrived. My plan is to get on a website such as mappy.com and plug in addresses from point A to point B and print them out to take with us. I also thought about emailing the hotels and requesting directions from them (they might be able to provide landmarks and such....) Anything else I need to do? My mom will be doing all the driving and I'm doing the navagating. I'd like to make this as smooth as possible.
Thanks!

Intrepid1

You might also try www.viamichelin.com AND use Google as well..their mapping and trip routing functions seem to work pretty well and having the satellite view of locations can be very helpful as well.

Robespierre

I use GPS on both my laptop (on the road) and PocketPC (on foot). The application is called Microsoft AutoRoute, and it will compute routes, calculate time and cost, all that great stuff. It also presents detailed turn-by-turn directions and voice prompts. Click on "See a 90-second overview..." at

http://www.microsoft.com/uk/homepc/a.../default.mspx#

indytravel

The secret for me is buying good Michelin maps of the regions before I leave home. I study them thoroughly. I look at the towns along the route. I become familiar with it.

This helps when driving in Europe because entrances to autobahns and highways don't say "East" or "West" like an interstate in the US. The signs are always pointing to another city. The city may be near or far; it may be big or little.

For example you may come upon an autobahn entrance with a sign pointing to Leipzig one way and Dessau the other way. Which way do you go? (If it showed the larger cities of Berlin one way, Munich the other you could probably make a quick, correct decision.) By the time you scramble with an unfamiliar map to find Dessau and Leipzig you've either missed your exit or had to pull off the road to take the time to find it.

Once I started my study-ahead plan, driving became much easier for me in Europe. Even on little Sardinia back in October it was handy to know on what part of the island Alghero, Cagliari, Olbia, Oristano, etc were located.

Underhill

I use my Michelin maps and a yellow marker to outline all the major routes, then use viamichelin.com for close-in directions.

TXgalinGA

Thanks for the ideas- 20 more days and counting!

ira

Hi TX,

I use the Michelin maps for the areas I will be visiting.

I highlight the route on the map.

In addition, I go to www.viamichelin.com and follow my route at high resolution. This allows me to find places where the road branches, traffic circles and other possible points where it would be difficult to navigate just with the map.

I then print out these enlarged maps, and make a booklet of them.

You can also use the enlarged maps to navigate to your hotel.

I find that these charts are easier for me to follow and to orient myself than just driving directions.

smeyer418

Germany is an easy country to navigate and the towns your visiting you should be fine with a map alone. In a more comlicated area like Provence it would be worth renting a GPS system - there are many ways to rent them, including directly from many rental agencies. We had one in our car when we got upgraded last year and it was fabuous, even if there was an unexpected detour it just recalibrated and started from the place it was.

tcreath

I agree with Indy; we always buy my maps ahead of time and study the routes that we want to take thoroughly before we leave. I use the maps in conjuction with the viamichelin directions and hotel directions that I have printed out.

Tracy