National Geographic Topo provides seamless state-wide USGS topographic map coverage for an entire state at five different zoom levels. With it you can annotate the maps and display the topography in a variety of ways. It also has GPS waypoint, route and track management features. With National Geographic Topo you can upload/download waypoints, routes and tracks between your GPS and your personal computer, creating, storing, editing and plotting them atop of the maps.

National Geographic Topo Only $69.95

Important Features of National Geographic Topo

• 1:24,000 and 1:100,000 scale USGS topographic maps with seamless coverage for one state


• Zoom in and out for more or less detail


• Navigate and scroll through the entire map area without borders


• Create custom text, symbols, and map overlays


• Create instant elevation profiles


• Photo quality resolution for printing


• Print on "Adventure Paper" (available at checkout) for an extremely durable map


• Works with all color and black & white printers supported by Windows


• Draw freehand routes and upload to a GPS


• Download field data from your GPS to display on your computer


• Reference thousands of preloaded GPS waypoints


• Add UTM or Lat/Long grids for field work with GPS


• Supports most popular handheld GPS units manufactured by Garmin, Eagle, Lowrance, and Magellan - see list below


• System Requirements: Microsoft Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000, NT, XP; 32 MB of memory; double speed CD-ROM drive; 256-color monitor; 486 DX/66MHz PC or higher.

NOTE: If you are looking for maps that display in the window of your GPS unit then you need Garmin Mapsource, Magellan Mapsend, or a comparable product from other GPS makers.

National Geographic Topo Only $69.95

Here's a sample of what I did with my National Geographic Topo. I was going cross-country skiing and when I got into my car at home I turned on my Garmin eTrex GPS unit and placed it on the dashboard.  As I drove the eTrex recorded a tracklog.  When I got back home I downloaded the tracklog into my computer using TOPOs! import feature.  The software automatically plotted the tracklog onto a 1:100,000 scale USGS topo map.  Here's a section of that map showing my tracklog as a yellow line.

When I parked my car I recorded a waypoint on my GPS, labeled it as "PARKING" and skiied down the railtrail, stopping at three of the trail's landmarks to record and label waypoints.  These were also downloaded from the eTrex into my computer using the TOPO! software.  You can see the waypoints and the labels that I gave them in the field plotted on the map below.  TOPO! automatically plotted them atop of a USGS 1:24,000 topo map.