Offside Undo.(navigational systems and computer-aided maps)(Brief Article)

I am a map guy. Loved 'em since childhood. Read 'em for fun. Have used maps to get from European ghettos to high froufrou manses and out from under overindulgent relatives. I love maps.

Please don't lump me with guys who shy from asking directions, either. So anal about being on time-that is to say two hours early everywhere-if pressed I'd ask the president of PETA the way to a luau.

So when an invitation to drive a Holland & Holland Range Rover crossed my desk, I began to think how to get from Detroit to White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia. That left a bit less than five weeks to plan.

Normally, I'd go to the Triple A to arm my quiver: map, TripTiks, guide books, freeway construction updates. Yet for this journey I decided to listen to the electronic gods-the Internet and the Range Dog's own navigational system, dubbed JAMES-to guide my way. (Leave it to the Brits to have a nav acronym like JAMES: Journey Assistance Mapping Exploration System. It's our guess they couldn't come up with an even more British name like True Reconnaissance Exploration View Observation Resource...)

For web users, MapQuest is one of a few sites where you punch in your location and destination, put in parameters you'd like to follow-no toll roads, drive only freeways, highlight burger joints-and away you go. In a click, my 26-step-by-step journey was printing.

A couple of problems ...