by Pauline Tesorio

Created on: May 21, 2008   Last Updated: May 30, 2008

To plan any good hiking, backpacking or camping trip it is necessary to equip yourself with one of the basic tools of preservation, a topographical map. The topographical map is really not hard to find. It can be purchased from accredited outlets and are also available on-line. The difficulty isn't really in finding a map, it's finding the right one for your trip and being able to read it correctly. This guide is designed to cover how to read the topographical map and use it to your advantage.

Topographical maps are designed to show you rivers, roads and buildings, as well as land elevations and dips in a particular area. It is basically a three-dimensional picture represented on paper.

Due to the rapid change in land formations, whether by man-made efforts or weathering and erosion, it is important first and foremost, to check when the map was printed. This can be easily done by looking to the left of the scale. It is important to have a fairly recent map or revision of a map to ensure that you are not heading for a pass that no longer exists.

The start of learning to use the map is to learn how to read it. It would be beneficial to have a topographic map in front of you so that you can look at it as you go through this article.

Topographic maps contain geographic coordinates based on latitude and longitude. In order to understand latitude and longitude it is important to imagine the globe. If you look at the globe you would notice it can be cut into half horizontally and vertically. If you create parallel lines on either side of your horizontal cut, which symbolizes the Equator, you will get latitude lines. Inversely using the vertical cut, which symbolizes the Prime or Greenwich Meridian, you will get longitude lines. Take a look at your map and you will notice overlying grid squares. The horizontal lines on your map show latitude represented in degrees from the Equator. The vertical lines show longitude represented in degrees from the Prime Meridian.

The latitude lines start from the Equator. Moving upwards the lines end at the North Pole and the values range from 0 to 90. If you are at the Equator your location would be 0 and at the North Pole 90 N. The only difference when you go towards the South Pole is that you would replace N with S to indicate South. The same idea applies for the Prime Meridian where you start at 0 and end 180E or 180W to indicate East and West.

Due to the size of the degree unit decimal points are also used to signify location, though

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