Be aware that the 25k Qld topos only have good coverage in the SE corner of the state, the rest of Qld is very,very patchy. Also some of the 25k maps are just image-maps e.g. aerial photos with contours overlain; very naughty and difficult to read. There are, however, good 50k printed maps available for most of the state beside the SW, but not in digital.
If you need digital maps for regions outside the 25k coverage area the only commercially available option is the freely downloadable 250k topos from Geosciences Australia.
.....of course some of us have the discontinued 100k series and may be persuaded to share
Digital maps are awesome if you can use them!
There are a bunch of free GIS programs around that will read digital topos and allow you to overlay map layers such as GPS tracks.
I print out my area of interest on one side of an A3 or A4 paper and track notes or insert maps on the other and then laminate and... VOILA! - a bombproof, weatherproof map that dispenses with the need for map sleeves. Beats watching a perfectly decent paper map crumble into uselessness during an extended or wet walk. Punch a hole in the corner and hang it on a carabiner or a string around your neck. Use it as a fan to beat the Qld heat. Wade through rivers without hesitation! Shield yourself from spider-webs and flick-back vegetation. Use them to kill aerial pests. Print really big ones and use them to fold origami pack-rafts!
If you need a program that can handle all your mapping issues you can even buy ESRI ArcInfo now for $100 which is a $20,000 geospatial mapping and analysis program that could allow you to not only display map data but utilise infra-red satellite data and do a supervised classification to determine land cover types and then..........*ahh*..
......................................umm.......................
....................*ahem*…...................................sorry, sometimes my inner mapping geek just takes over...........
OK I'm done.
Steve
