Maps for Ireland - Recommendations Please

I’m assuming you must be renting a car. Our car had Sat Nav built into it. I can’t imagine not having it. Only looked at my paper map once. See if you can get a car with it, it lets you know about traffic problems and road construction too, which we ran into. We just got back from Ireland 3 days ago.

I like maps. We drove around Ireland for almost a month, mid May to mid June. Bought a large road atlas type book in Ireland. Think it was called “Collins “ and it was very detailed. We had plenty of time and tried to avoid driving on major highways. I enjoyed exploring the tiny one lane roads and countryside. We did get lost sometimes because the wee country roads don’t always have signs to let you know what it is, but we always found our way again. No accidents or scratches on the rental car.

It's not an "either or" thing.

The Collins maps are good. Michelin is also excellent. You can't go wrong with either. Whichever you choose, get a map with the highest scale (most details) you can find - lots of tiny lanes in Ireland that are not much bigger than a walking path - you'll want to be able to see what you're getting yourself into before committing to any route handed to you by a device.

Important: You should always, ALWAYS have a good paper map along with you. While driving, it should be out and available to view. And you should have at least a general idea of where you are, where you're going, and how you intend to get there. Always, anywhere, no matter what electronic gizmo(s) you may also want to have along and use. Unless, of course, you simply don't really care about being able to find your way reliably and you're OK with just casting your fate to the winds and being a passive passenger along for the ride.

GPS, phones or tablets with current maps/databases, connectivity (and power)? They're great. I use them, too - I typically have all of those - and a good map - when driving in Europe. I love my gizmos as much as anyone else. But any device can fail, can be lost or stolen, can run out of power, or lose something critical that renders it as useless as a stone. All of those things have happened to me at some point (and some of them surely will happen to you eventually). Those things happen to millions of people every day, and could easily happen to you right when you need it most. OTOH, maps are cheap, light, and do not fail for any of the reasons that electronic devices do (unless you simply lose it - but at least pickpockets won't go for your Michelin map; they will gleefully steal your phone).

IMHO only a fool would rely 100% on a single electronic device for critical navigation tasks. I have learned and re-learned that lesson enough times. Your trip, your choice, but for me, I'll always have a good map right there and I use it to sanity-check what my device is telling me to do (like, drive through a stone wall and across an open field, or into a river - which devices have instructed me to do on more than one occasion).

Before our first trip to Ireland several years ago, I did a search on this Forum for the same question. I was about to buy the Ordnance map, but I saw a comment from another poster who recommended the AA Road Atlas of Ireland as being easier to read because of the colors used. I followed that advice and was pleased with it. We drove all around the island in 2 weeks and I was only "lost" once despite the many rural roads we were on. Or maybe not - the "lost" adventure was a very narrow farm road, but then so many of the roads there are just that. We did get to where we were going. It was the 5th Edition AA Road Atlas and claimed to be based on the Ordnance map. It contained a mileage chart, a map of Counties, small maps of some of the bigger cities, a "motorway" map ( like a US Interstate map that is compressed to show exits & interchanges between various points), an index of towns and villages, and even a guide to freshwater fishing. I think it was about $12-$13. We were happy with it. It's been back to Ireland twice more with no complaints. Have a grand trip, Ireland is splendid.

The Michelin map (#712) with a scale of 1:400,000 is ideal. Lots of detail, including every main and back road - and even a couple of drivable dirt paths (Goat's Path in Co. Cork comes to mind) - in the country. We've used it for years on bicycle trips, for which such details are important.

hey a decent website for my driving preplanning in Ireland and Scotland was www.theaa.ie give it a look...we used my US garmin (drive60) with the Ireland map loaded to it, worked great. I bought the Ireland mini disk on ebay for 17 bucks, it was very useful because it showed smaller roads that were not on the OSI Road Atlas I bought for the trip. The road OS atlas is magazine size and took a bit to get used to because of the way it is laid out to allow for the small 8 X 11 size. If you buy one be sure to look it over before hitting the road over there. If you don't like having a huge map to open and close you might try the OSI road atlas.

Thank you very much to each of you for taking the time to reply and for your input...I appreciate it!

We have a Garmin with international maps and used it in Ireland last October. It worked perfectly and we never got lost. It made traveling by car through Ireland much easier. It's a bit more expensive with international maps but it was worth the investment. We used it all through Germany and Austria and it worked very well, too.

Joyce,
Thank you for your input. One more question. I am taking my Garmin(s) along with a map or two, but does the car charger for the Garmin plug right in without any adapters? When we went to Italy we had no problem but I just want to make certain before we get over there. Thank you!

Standard cigarette lighter plug ... if that's what your asking.
Will probably have UHB plugs in the newer cars.

We just used the car charger that came with the Garmin that plugs into the cigarette lighter. The car also had USB slots so we could charge our phones at the same time.