All of the recommendations on this thread are FANTABULOUS!!! I have been looking for this ability for months now, and not having it has made me hesitant to go out on rides alone - since I wasn't able to plan a route according to distance, direction, etc. There are so many back country roads around where I am, and I am afraid I will get lost (and up riding 50 miles when I have planned to do 20) if I don't plan my route with some kind of cue sheet - directions, etc.
Only complaint is that I went to routeslip.com and created an account - and a route - and the stupid site won't let me see the route now. I sent a "bug-report" but, we'll see.
The toporoute.com site is great b/c you can have it follow the road - i don't think there are any straight roads out here, it's crazy curvy (like me ). I wish the distance showed up while you were plotting the route though, rather than it being on a separate page.
oh well. i am just really happy to learn about them. Thanks everyone!!!
cheri