I've done scores of tours where I just picked up AAA maps of the region and headed for the finest lines on the maps. Fortunately, I've never met a hill too high or steep to give me pleasure and I'm always prepared for unpaved roads. I like hills but hate traffic. Lucky me, road planners design the high-capacity roads to take the flattest routes.

I did have one map fiasco thirty years ago. I picked up a bike map in Baltimore. We were only planning on moseying down to DC the next day before heading off to Atlanta, and it was a good thing. That map had roads listed that didn't exist, showed roads as nonexistent that were there and was generally some sort of cruel joke. Add in the eight or so flats that one companion had that day and we could have walked the distance faster, but we did get some good laughs.