Best Road Map
France
For Confident Exploring

My best road map France expert is Gildas (my French/American husband). He has the best sense of direction of anyone I know and he really knows how to read a map and wouldn’t travel without one.

You’ll have a good map for years so it’s worth getting the right one.

1- First you’ll need a road map of the entire country.
We use BNP La France Routiere ET Touristique that we purchased in France. The scale is 1:1,000,000 and is a good overall road map of the country and passes the Gildas test.

Recommended maps with scale 1:1,000,000:

  • Rough Guide Map, France

Best Road Map France for Detail

2- Next you’ll need a road map for the particular region you’ll be touring in.
Gildas says it's the level of detail that's important.
When you get a regional map, get it to this scale: 1:250,000 1cm = 2.5 km or 1:275,000 1cm = 2.75 km

For your adventures in the regions:

  • Michelin Orange Regional maps, scale 1:275,000

At this level of detail it lists all the roads in the region and is suitable for touring and exploring the sights.

If you are going to Brittany you definitely need a map of Brittany because it’s more remote than the other regions. Which makes it all the more fun.

More detail
If you want to have all the small village names on your regional road map of you'll need a more detail. The ones below would be a good choice. Scale 1:200,000 (1cm = 2km)

  • Berlitz Regional Motoring Maps scale, 1:200,000
  • Rough Guide
  • AA Touring Map France, Scale 1:180,000 (IGN map made for AA)

Even more detail.
If you really want more detail because you will be hiking or camping this regional road map of France should do the job.
Scale 1:180,000 (1cm = 1.8km)

  • AA Road Map France
  • Michelin yellow local maps, scale 1:150,000 or 1:175,000

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