Orienteering: Out on a Limb

Those kids in my Ranger Rick magazines always looked so smart and happy, running through the woods, strung with compasses and clutching maps. I wanted to go orienteering too, but no one where I grew up had ever heard of it.

So a couple decades later, I decided it was time to take some action and drag my own kids along with me. Virginia has at least two orienteering groups, Quantico Orienteering Club and James River Orienteering Club. JROC held an event at York River State Park in early March, so we drove out there one crisp, sunny Saturday morning with very little idea of what to expect. I knew that you had to find a bunch of flags without getting lost, but that's about it.

The nice thing about orienteering--especially if you're trying it for the first time and you have a 4-year-old who wants to ride on your shoulders every 15 minutes--is that you can start when you want, take as much time as you want (up to 3 hours) and find as many or as few flags as you want in any order you choose.

Sure, for some people it's a race, with points awarded for each flag, and so on. But we were there just to have fun, and we did. Even Helen, who got to jump across a little creek, read the code on a flag, and ride on mom's shoulders.

Of the 20+ flags, many seemed to be fairly close to established trails, but that doesn't mean they're easy to find or get close enough to in order to read the code you had to write on the scoresheet. (The video on Richmond Parents Monthly's main webpage shows Emily getting the code from a flag placed in the middle of a tree that fell over a gully.)
We took about an hour to find 5 flags, then called it a morning and ate a picnic lunch overlooking the York River. (The park itself has paddleboat and canoeing options, clean restrooms, a little nature center, and lots of hiking, biking and horseriding trails. Admission is $3 per vehicle.)

Unless you go orienteering alone (which you shouldn't until you gain some experience), it is a sport that absolutely requires teamwork, cooperation, planning, compromise and flexibility--mental and physical! Shawn Callahan, who heads up JROC, also does orienteering programs for business, schools and groups of young people. I can see why it would be an excellent team-building activity.

It can be a little intimidating to go to an orienteering event for the first time, but we weren't the only first-timers at York River. Both JROC and QOC have occasional events in the Richmond area that are open to anyone. At the York River meet, I picked up a flyer about a youth orienteering club in Richmond, with events right around the corner:

"Learn compass basics and the map-reading skills needed to participate in an Orienteering meet. During three 1-hour sessions, we will discuss and practice the skills necessary to finish a beginner, kid-level O-course. All kids ages 6-16 are welcome. Parents are encouraged to stay with the younger ones."
Dates: March 16, April 13 and May 18
Time: 3-4 p.m.
Cost: Clinic is free; compass fee is $12 if you need one. Expect a $5-10 entry fee for the May meet.
Where: Deep Run Park on 3/16 and 4/13--rear parking lot near soccer fields. Details about the May O-meet (Rockwood Park) will be handed out at the clinics.
RSVP: Tim Dunkum, fivedunkums@verizon.net, http://www.richmondasr.com/. (Click on the "Community" link and scroll down a bit.)

For more info about kids' orienteering in general, see this link to the US Orienteering Federation site.