Added photos from my Apr 11th hike at South Mountain (near Turtle Back Zoo).
12 PM
Orienteering race 1:18:10*** 6.44 km (12:09 / km) ahr:131 max:163 spiked:13/14c shoes: Inov8 ORoc280-B 2013-10
Green course at Batsto in NJ. Cloudy and low-mid 60s when we started around noon, with enough breeze to blow down the Finish sawhorse.
Overran 4 to left and didn't correct properly from trail. I bailed out to the bike trail once I didn't find 4, and thought I knew where I was when re-attacking, but my track shows my obvious error. If I hadn't crossed paths with Kathy Moss (again; she overshot #2) I would have wandered more and had to relocate again, losing even more time. Sheesh; I think this was at least a 6 minute error.
Okay through the rest of the course. It was nice to have the open patches of woods (there had been a fire the summer before which cleared out some of the low blueberry bushes) to run through.
Walking1:07:40 4.05 mi (16:42 / mi) +58m16:00 / mi ahr:107 max:148 shoes: 2019 Sauc Echelon7 8.5D
To the end of West Hopewell and back via the Curly Horse development. Lots of spring trees plants in bloom along the way, and grass being cut already in that development (ours just turned green within the past week).
Found a giant burr pod clump in one wet spot near the road that appears to be from a plant called bur-reed. And noticed a small evergreen growing out of a hollow spot on a (dying?) deciduous tree where a large branch used to be.
Orienteering race 1:46:11**** 7.39 km (14:22 / km) +142m13:07 / km ahr:133 max:176 spiked:8/13c shoes: Inov8 ORoc280-B 2013-10
Day 2, Long Brown, at Beaver Dam Run, mostly SW from arena.
Not my best day by a long shot. I'm estimating ~20 minutes of errors, on 1, route to 2, 4, and route to 5, plus a bit on 11. Ugh.
Off to the right to 1 on the broad spur, but saw folks to my left and went that way and found the control. Saw Allmuth Perzel on my way out, still looking for 1.
Couldn't make sense of hills/trails to 2, but eventually crossed the stream E of the bridge and made my way to it to get relocated. Okay from there, and fine to 3.
Swung west-ish to go to the left of gullies and reentrants, then turned north, hoping to spot the ride, but never saw it and lost confidence and track of where I was. Headed west to hit the fence near the edge of the map, and ended up seeing it (streamers on the fence strings) where it was in the east/west orientation, rather south of where I'd thought I was. Found my way to the fence corner and from there to the control, where I again saw Allmuth(!), and also saw George Walker. Allmuth started before, and George after me.
Didn't want Allmuth to try to follow me the rest of the way around (as she has done before), so I took off fast in an easterly direction, hoping to figure out where I was when I hit the big stream, but my head wasn't working right. Looking at the map now, I think I saw the flat wet area S of the line but couldn't place it on the map, and didn't trust my compass. Veered off too far south and east until I hit the obstacle course(!) I'd crossed on the way to 3, waaaaay south of the line. I corrected just fine from there, heading north up the trail and down the spur, crossing the creek in the non-green area SE of the control, the ran the trail until I saw the flag. That error alone cost me a good 10 minutes.
Settled down after that and had only one smallish error near 11 where I skirted the green blobs to the right instead of left and had to go back for it after I hit the ditch.
Lost my lead on Sandy and ended up third in F65 (Janet F had another decent run), winning (another) beer glass with the event logo. Congrats to Janet and Sandy! and thanks to QOC for another well-done event.