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USGS Topo MapsThe United States Geological Survey publishes standard topographic maps of the entire United States. These maps have long been one of the best tools available for navigating the country's wild and urban terrain. However, they are often used only as a base layer for other map products which are updated more frequently and this is where you will usually find the most use for them. The maps show contour lines (lines of equal elevation) which depict natural features of the land, as well as streams, some roads, trails, forest types, buildings, and other natural and man-made features. The 7 1/2 minute quadrangle maps are published at a scale of 1:24,000.
Links are included to USGS topo maps of each listed trail, where possible, on topozone.com. This excellent web site was the first to provide free, seamless, scanned images of raw USGS paper topo maps, which usually sell at 6 to 8 bucks apiece. The USGS topo maps are also used as a base layer for maps drawn specifically for this site, and as an overlay option on Google maps mashups as well.
Keep these things in mind when viewing the maps on topozone.com:
These maps are technical in nature. You should be familiar with reading a topographic map and the symbols used on them in order to make the best and safest use of them. If you don't know the maps' and your limitations, you can easily get yourself lost in the woods.
The maps are usually quite old, sometimes 20 and up to 40 years since the last editing. The USGS only updates maps frequently in areas where change is occurring rapidly (urban and developed areas). This means that what you see on the map isn't necessarily what you will find on the ground. Many trails, roads, buildings, clearcuts, etc. that are shown will have long since faded, and many that exist on the land may have come about long after the map was made. Maps drawn for this site, Google map mashups, and most other commercial map products will have updated trail information drawn on top of the USGS map base. Learn how to distinguish between the overlay and the base map.
When you link to a TopoZone map from a trail, it may take some detective work to find the trail you are looking for. TopoZone shows only the raw USGS maps, with no updated information as an overlay. A trail may not even be mapped, or it may have changed its route; also trails may be shown on the map that aren't actually on the ground. Trails usually aren't labeled on the map and none of the trails are numbered. This doesn't make the maps useless, but it means you do need to know what you are doing in order to use them.
You can usually spot a trail by looking for a land feature that it follows or is named after. For example, take a look at the map of the Fletcher Creek trail. Though the trail itself isn't actually labeled it is shown on the map, and it can be found by locating Fletcher Creek (the stream), which is labeled. The trail follows the creek. On the same map linked above, you can also locate the Spencer Branch and Middle Fork trails by finding the trails that follow the respectively named streams.
When creating the links, I tried to center the map on the trail and make the map a size that includes most of the trail's length. Sometimes, however, the trail is impossible to center and it may extend off the edges of the map. You may have to scroll around or enlarge the map view to include all of it; topozone.com makes it very easy to do this. You can be confident, however, that the map you see will show at least a part of the trail you're looking for - I have taken great care to make sure of this.
For an excellent map that takes care of almost all of the above problems with the USGS maps, check into National Geographic's Trails Illustrated series of maps here. These maps, which use USGS maps as a base (so they are extremely accurate), are updated constantly and show all trails in the mapped area. They even show which trails are for mountain biking, hiking, and horseback riding! Though inot free, they are worth the cost (around $10), and the maps are highly recommended for any extended stays in the area.
In summary, the maps on TopoZone are a tool that can be of great value when you know what you're doing, and they can save you large amounts of time and money since you don't have to go out and purchase the printed versions. However, any use of the maps is done at your own risk--neither I nor TopoZone claim any responsibility for what you do with them!
