Topo Maps

[LMBSGV]

For the last few years, most of my maps are created from downloaded 7.5 USGS maps. I prefer the USGS maps to the National Geographic topo maps for when I hike since I’m used to how they look after so many years - I’m comfortable with the contours and colors. I’ll combine various maps to conform to my route by putting them together in Photoshop. I play with the contrast and other values to get them looking as sharp and clear as I can. I print them on an Epson photo printer on 11x17 stiff matte paper, using both sides. I print two copies since, as WD said, the colors may run if they get wet.

When hiking on trails, I leave them in a zip-loc bag in my pack. For cross-country, I fold it up and put it in my front left shorts pocket or have it out in my hand - it depends whether or not I think I need to refer to it.

Before I switched camera bags from a Lowepro Photorunner to a Think Tank, I sometimes stuck the map on the top of the camera bag under a strap. The problem was the map would sometimes slip out. When I was on the approach below Harrison Pass going over a short stretch of big flat talus blocks, the map slipped out and fell into one of the cracks between blocks. I couldn’t see where it landed. So I took off my pack and spent about twenty-thirty minutes trying to find the map. I even got out my flashlight to peer into the cracks. I finally gave up and so went over Harrison Pass and exploring the Upper Kern without a map and relying on memory. In certain respects, it was a lot of fun to explore without a map and following where the landscape led me. Three days later, a couple of guys came up from the lake below to the lake where I was camped while I was packing up (the first people I’d seen in 5 days). At first, they were rather incredulous when I went up to them and asked if I could look at their map. Why would I want to see their map? It took several minutes of explanation to convince them I wasn’t this nut case they’d run into at this remote off-trail lake. The look at their map helped confirm where to go the next two days before I hiked out over Kearsarge Pass. Since then, I’ve always appreciated wandering around off-trail and only referring to a map when it becomes absolutely necessary. There’s a sense of truly being alone in the High Sierra that is spiritually exhilarating and liberating.