Printing Maps! ARGH!

[Hetchy]

Okay, when I began Hiking in the Sierra a simple Park Service Map of Yosemite was all I had. As I grew bolder and went further in, I carried USGS Topo's and finally began to print my own when all this techno stuff appeared.
I am currently printing a complete set of maps that will cover the Continental Divide from Mexico to Canada some 3100 miles worth.
Crikey the printing has been going day and night.
I feed it paper and ink once in a while..
It jams and I lovingly attend to it till it works again.. filling the room with a crude sort of electronic cricket sound as the carriage slips to and fro and magical images appear.
First Cyan, then Magenta, finally Yellow, all added dot by dot.
I am 3/4 through Montana.. only 200 pages to go!
I shall think hiking all of it in one season will be the easy part of this bargain tonight as I fall alseep to the resultant sound of electrons directing microscopic jets of ink by the billion 5 feet from my head.
Thankyou for your support!

[gdurkee]

That's one of those mighty Quest things sung about in low ceilinged halls covered with mud and filled with smoke and drunken Vikings.

What size paper? What scale? Too bad you couldn't use a continuous roll a' la Jack Kerouac's On The Road manuscript (110 feet long).

Good luck!

g.

[Bad Man From Bodie]

Thank God for our GIS drafters at work....Need Maps, I may be able to have them make something up then I could stick it in the mail for ya????

[rlown]

What size paper? What scale? Too bad you couldn't use a continuous roll a' la Jack Kerouac's On The Road manuscript (110 feet long).
g.

I could see where an UL thru-hiker might want to section off the trip with only the maps necessary between resupply points, instead of carrying the majestic scroll of guiding.

[Hetchy]

George Durkee, I am printing the maps on 8.5 X 11 photo papaer. It soes not smear as easy when it gets wet than plain paper. The scale is 1:24,000 for the detail topos and 1:100,000 for the Overview maps. It took 72 maps to cover the CDT in Montana alone! Wyoming will need 45 maps. Colorado will take 46 maps, and New Mexico 43. On the PCT many of us just cut up the Schaeffer guide books and included relevant sections in resupply packages. Due to the distances involved I will most likely "bounce" my maps to myself from the trail. Basically a 5 gallon bucket with a snap on lid sent general delivery to townstops with Post Offices along the trail. That way I will only need to carry a pound of maps for a section.. not 10lbs! I know the bucket idea sounds nuts but it worked for a lot of folks on the PCT. Socks had a small tackle box with a tiny lock that she bounced up the trail!
Anyhow the most crucial maps for the success of my hike will most likely be those of the trail through the South San Juan Mountains in Colorado. I will reach them in early june and they will very likely be snowbound. I can do this. The Sierra has taught me well over the years and I intend to use those lessons fully.
Snowbound or not I am going through!
I love maps!
These are so high quality I am planning on saving them if possible and mailing them home from townstops. I am thinking of handing them off to a prospective CDT hiker next year thereby recyling them. (I donated my Tom Harrison JMT maps when I reached Tuolumne Meadows last year) I just don't know how well they will hold up. On the PCT sweat destroyed many of my plain paper maps so I went with photo paper.
They are works of art!
Anyhow it is the best information I can provide myself to assist my safety and success. It is going to end up costing me 250 bucks to print them all.
Did I mention I love maps?