orienteering race (Virginia Hill) 1:10:53 [3] 6.0 km (11:49 / km)
shoes: Inov8 X-Talon bluegreen
A Grand Day Out
No O events in SA this weekend, and Neil's talk of mapping Bendigo's goldmining wastelands at 1:5 000 had piqued my curiosity, and I had enough frequent flyer points for a day trip to Melbourne, and enough time (just) for brunch with friends before getting a lift with Blair to orienteering.
This was a great little area (for some reason I was reminded of orienteering in Alice Springs, where the vegetation is likewise low and scrubby and the ground rocky underfoot with a bit of man-made detritus) and I enjoyed it a lot, on one of those clear but cold sunny winter's afternoons which make you glad to be outdoors and 600+ km away from work. Was feeling mentally very tired so didn't try to run hard, but still twice came unstuck in the flat swampy no-man's land to the NW, not properly realising that the features were mapped to ISSOM. Or maybe I was distracted by the amazing odour of baking fruit buns wafting through the western part of the map. Also I kept hearing the sound of horses cantering and whinnying nearby, and thought I would have a story to tell Zara about 'wild brumbies', so when I eventually saw them, was slightly disappointed that they had saddles and riders!