Is it my imagination or am I making it to hard to find maps. I cant go into a local store in my area and buy topo maps. And when I try to order them off the web it seems to me to be a very difficult process. So Ive ben looking at software and came across the National Geographic Top Explorer product. Is it worth it? Why is it I am finding this process so difficult. Any help for a old flatlander is appreciated.

As I always say..........it depends. I've been a satisfied Topo! customer for many years. I paid $100.00
(minus REI dividend) for it initially and another $20 or so for an upgrade a few years later. I've printed many maps over the years, used it to find places, and just have fun browsing. Was it worth it for me? Yes. But others may disagree.

The truth is, you really won't know the answer to that question until actually you buy it and use it.

I'll second Trailrunner's opinion on NG's "TOPO" software. I purchased both the Missouri and Arkansas map packages and I use it a lot to scout for places to go, print maps to bring with me, and upload tracks to review where I went, so for me it's been worth it.

It could be better though. It crashes more than most of the software I use, and outputs pretty big PDF files for maps you want to share with others.

But it runs on my Mac and there aren't a lot of choices out there for the Mac.

Bill

A solution you might try is www.mytopo.com I've used it for a trip before and was very happy with the product. It has all kinds of options for scale, has a UTM grid option, and choice of papers it's printed on. For the trip I used it on I found the price to be reasonable, and by playing around with the website you can get a map that's customized to the area you'll be in.

I do not have any experience with the explorer program which seem to be an online program but I have used several of the state programs. They work well for exploring an area. On many of the common trails it is easy to get GPS points and make your own map. It solves the problem of having your area right at the corner of four topo maps. I usually print out rather small scale maps on 8 1/2 x 11 and then print out a larger scale map of the overall area. On a hike I did this spring got the GPS points from the internet then I printed out the maps and laminated them back to back so I could stick them in my pocket and they did not disintegrate in the rain. Rule #1 it always rains when I hike no matter what the weatherman says.

The state series Topo software is pretty good, less buggy than it used to be (though if you have a smartphone or pda type of GPS, their pockettopo product works but is still quite buggy).
Note that you can find their stuff online at a better price if you look around, I seem to recall $60 per state.

An alternative that I'm about to try is memory-map.com, which uses GeoTiff and other open formats. From Topo you have to buy the maps from them. memory-map.com sells maps too, but you can also download them for free (with some effort ...) from libremap.org or seamless.usgs.gov, and if you travel overseas there are some options to get maps elsewhere in this fashion. There are other third-party sources you can buy maps from too, such as http://www.edigitalmaps.com. Since I'm just starting down this route, I don't know how much harder/easier or better/worse it is.

You're definitely not imagining it, IMO it *is* a lot harder than it should be. Going with NG Topo is perhaps one of the *easiest* routes, though I think their shift to the whole Topo Explorer approach, while still also selling stuff that uses the old approach, is confusing, and I fear is ultimately not in the best interests of the consumer (how often does the government update the underlying data? Not often at all!). I'm pretty unhappy at the way the dropped their mapxchange process and sort of locked it away inside a process that now requires a person to install and run their explorer product. Maybe I make too big a deal of this, but it sure seems like a step backwards from this customer perspective --- I don't want any of the new stuff they're touting, and I don't like having the previous customer-created content wrapped up in that model. This is part of why I'm trying out a competitor.

The biggest advantage that I *think* Topo has, apart from exposure on a lot of store shelves, is that old mapxchange community where users would upload trail plots of a host of places for others to download and use. NG folks tell me that's still there if I install their explorer product and navigate through that; I've not managed to grit my teeth and do that yet. But it can be quite handy to get someone elses trace of a trail you plan to walk on.

I also use the TOPO series for trip planning. I happen to have a nice collection of USGS topo maps. When a local survey store went out of business in 1995 I bought every map for the Sierra! There is no quality like a real hard copy USGS printed 7.5-minute topo map. When I purchased most of my topo maps they were 1.50 - 2.50 a map - now they are up to 9.00 per map. Have you checked fishing stores? Also, some Forest Service offices have a nice selection. They are not cheap, but at least available.