If you want to find out the distance between counties or cities then your best bet is a specialist website.The site www.distance-calculator.co.uk is pretty comprehensive.
You just need to select the countries that you are interested in, then the cities in those countries and it will do the rest. Although the fastest way of measuring distances it is unclear how precise the figures are.
A good old fashioned map is another option. You need to use official maps for the greatest accuracy though; ones from the country’s official mapping agency.
In the UK, this would be Ordnance Survey. Once you have got the map you need to use the scale information to calculate distances.
Map scales may be expressed in words, as a ratio or as a fraction. So you will see it expressed on the map like this: 'one centimetre to one hundred metres'
or 1:10,000
or 1/10,000
To use this scale, measure the distance between two points with a ruler then make the appropriate calculation.So, if ‘point A’ is 10cm from ‘point B’, the distance using the scale above would be 1,000m. With a map, always remember you are measuring the most direct route between the two points. Roads and paths between two points have to navigate boundaries in the landscape so will be longer.
To measure the distance between two points if you are travelling on foot, use a surveyor’s wheel. It’s a wheel that you roll along and it clicks every time is rotates a full 360 degrees.
The wheels come in different sizes but, by way of example, a 1m wheel will click every time it rotates fully. If you hear 50 clicks when you walk between two points, the distance you have travelled is 50m. Clearly this is only a rough form of measurement.
You just need to select the countries that you are interested in, then the cities in those countries and it will do the rest. Although the fastest way of measuring distances it is unclear how precise the figures are.
A good old fashioned map is another option. You need to use official maps for the greatest accuracy though; ones from the country’s official mapping agency.
In the UK, this would be Ordnance Survey. Once you have got the map you need to use the scale information to calculate distances.
Map scales may be expressed in words, as a ratio or as a fraction. So you will see it expressed on the map like this: 'one centimetre to one hundred metres'
or 1:10,000
or 1/10,000
To use this scale, measure the distance between two points with a ruler then make the appropriate calculation.So, if ‘point A’ is 10cm from ‘point B’, the distance using the scale above would be 1,000m. With a map, always remember you are measuring the most direct route between the two points. Roads and paths between two points have to navigate boundaries in the landscape so will be longer.
To measure the distance between two points if you are travelling on foot, use a surveyor’s wheel. It’s a wheel that you roll along and it clicks every time is rotates a full 360 degrees.
The wheels come in different sizes but, by way of example, a 1m wheel will click every time it rotates fully. If you hear 50 clicks when you walk between two points, the distance you have travelled is 50m. Clearly this is only a rough form of measurement.
