I’m always on the lookout to good maps of the Yucatan peninsula. Rough Guides actually publishes a good one, but I know that it hasn’t gotten a really solid updating in a few years, and because there’s so much growth all over the peninsula, even a few years makes a difference.
But today the good people at MapsGoneTomorrow.com sent me a copy of a Yucatan map from German carto company Borch. The scale is 1:1,000,000, so not crazy-detailed, but it has everything you need on it. It cuts off just west of Villahermosa, so it covers pretty much everything that’s in The Rough Guide to the Yucatan.
More important, though, it’s current: recently improved roads are actually shown properly (I’m thinking of the one north from Xpuhil), all the biosphere reserves are on there, and the bypass around Muna is actually drawn in. I haven’t seen this on any Yucatan map. It also very clearly distinguishes between super-highways and toll highways. Oh, and there are even small maps of Merida, Cancun, Campeche and Cozumel, plus several of the big archeological sites.
I’m not a big fan of the big icons to mark ruins and the like, because the placement is so imprecise. (In fact, the map does repeat one error I see on a lot of maps: Comalcalco ruins are on the east side of the road, not the west.) But it’s still very legible.
And it’s laminated and water-repellent.
Best of all, it’s reasonably priced: US$10.95, or 7.90 euros. In fact, it’s even more reasonably priced for Rough Guides readers, who are entitled to a 10 percent discount at MapsGoneTomorrow.com–email me (see link in sidebar) for the details.
