Maps for driving in Ireland on vacation
 

Perhaps this is a silly question -- but been wondering...we are still planning our itnerary to Ireland - doing a two week tour, driving on our own. in the tour books, finding only very general maps...what is the best source for clear directions? Not sure if Rental Car will come with GPS or not, but still a good map is handy. do you get these from the rental car place? Before we go, we will have a plan, but want to keep options open and leave room for interesting detours. Your help is appreciated.

We mapped routes online using viamichelin.com (add 50% to the times!). I also got a Michelin map before we left. It was really helpful traveling between towns, but didn't have insets for all the towns. We got lost in Tralee, but believe it or not, the "hand-drawn" map in our Rick Steves book was what got us where we needed to go!

Ireland has an extraordinarily dense network of roads. Though the freebies many hire companies give you show the strategic ones adequately, it's really worth just getting yourself lost for the fun.

Buy a €5-€10 road atlas at any petrol station.

The AR answer - Ordnance maps. You can get them per area, and they are extremely detailed. I'm less AR so I get by with a regular road atlas, which doesn't have the little roads. I augment that with my GPS, and have done fine. The GPS is really just so we can get lost on purpose with impunity, and always know how to get back :)

We ordered the Rough Guide Map of Ireland from Amazon.com for around $9.00 and used it while we were planning our driving trip to Ireland a couple years ago. It's got lots of detail on the roads and also has points of interests(such as ring forts, old abbeys, etc.) that you might want to make a stop to see. The map has a plastic coating so it's quite durable and you won't tear it with constant folding. We used it a lot both planning our trip and on the trip itself and it's still in such great shape that I'm using it again for our upcoming trip in May.

The OS Atlas is the best user friendly book map and the Michelin 712 the best sheet map. GPS has the problem that older versions don't recognise the new roads and some newer versions were programmed by village egits.

http://www.osi.ie/en/alist/official-...s-ireland.aspx
http://www.amazon.com/Michelin-Map-I.../dp/2067122967

We've always used the map that comes with the rental car, supplemented with driving directions from AA or ViaMichelin. Its Ireland, so of course we have gotten lost, which often is a good thing there. We've had some of our most interesting times while we were lost. The bad side, we've missed historical or obscure sites that may be nearby. These are not usually marked on the rental car map.

We've always said that 'next time' we would get the Ordnance maps, but have not. I'm afraid my head would be buried in the map and I would miss just looking out the window and enjoying the passing scenery.

It may depend on how fixed your itenerary will be. If you are cramming in a lot of places, I would think you would have less time to detour to see some ancient relic. On the other hand, if you are spending more time in an area, you would have more time for exploring.

Since you want to leave room for interesting detours, one of the more detailed maps described by others may be a good option for you.

I would caution about using older maps though. It seems there is always road construction in Ireland,so older maps might not always be accurate.

Whatever you decide, have a wonderful trip in my favorite country.

We rented from Dan Dooley at the Shannon airport, and I'm pretty sure we didn't get a map (maybe there was one at the rental counter that I missed). In any event, we had ordered the Michelin map from Amazon.com before leaving. I was able to review the map before leaving, in order to get a better understanding of what to expect. The map was very helpful. One thing to consider - study Irish road signs in advance. If you're coming from the States, Irish road signs are quite a bit different that ours, and trying the figure them out while driving isn't the best plan ;) Also, if you are used to miles and miles per hour, familiarize yourself with kilometers and kph. Knowing that 100 kph roughly equals 60 mph can really help you gauge your speed.

We bought a very detailed road map in one of the stores in the Shannon airport. I think it might have been an ordnance map. We had some general maps before we left home and I'm not sure we even used the detailed maps but I was glad to have them to get a clearer picture of the area and road network. We mostly took what pass for major highways. :)

Just make sure you have a map with placenames in Gaelic. All the maps may have them now but I had to scramble for one that was packed in bags in the back seat when we were in an area with the signs in Gaelic.

Also, keep in mind where you are headed. If you are going to Kilkenny via the N9, the sign might not say N9 or Kilkenny - it may say some city on the route TO Kilkenny via the N9. Or a city beyond it on the same route. It can be confusing!

thanks for all the help. we got the rough guide map - really impressed by its details, weather and tear proof!