The end product

I finally got a chance to go to the print shop, to get good copies made of the maps, and a digital copy made for future (as the original of the New Zealand map is going to my brother). The copies are on lovely, stiff 300gsm card, and it was even sunny enough today that I got to take photos of them in proper light!

So, if you're crying out for a map of New Zealand or the UK, filled with animals and filigree, here ya go!

Scotland, England, Wales, Ireland, Northern Ireland...

All those bits that make up Great Britain, the United Kingdom, Britlandshire...after many, many hours of intensive doodling to fill in the sketched outline of the country, this is the completed map, yay! Large enough to show the details of the filling.

There are 16 animals hidden in the map (or not-so-hidden: I deliberately darkened them to make them slightly easier to spot, in among the swirls and twirls):

Badger
Hare
Deer
Hedgehog
Swan
Snail
Mouse
Heron
Frog
Butterfly
Snake
Dragonfly
Fox
Squirrel
Robin
Highland Cow

And here's some closeups, also enlargeable:

Starting again

So, I tried hand drawing the UK map. After 5 hours of sketching. erasing, redrawing, erasing, and drawing again...I decided my retaining some level of mental health was more important than trying to draw a map by hand!
So, I downloaded the clearest outline of the UK that I could find, and spend another 3 hours tracing over it, first roughly in pencil....then more accurately in pencil....

...then drawing over those lines even more accurately, in ink. Beginning with Scotland:

Then, adding England and Wales:

Next...Irelandshire! Then, the fun part - filling the interior with filigree and hidden animals :D