2010 Snowgaine: My first long Orienteering event (intentionally long, that is!) and what a great one it was... Palisades was beautiful, lots of challenging hills, fabulous downhill slides, runs and tumbles and the controls were in great locations.....
I was lucky to have Pete W. as a partner....... he's a great navigator and kept us pretty much dead on with every control... but was also willing to put up with a lot of my questions in my desire to learn and to make sure I was on the map. I am sure we lost a few (?) minutes this way over me just following him, but it really made it so interesting for me... and a great learning and fun experience.
Copied from Pete's Log....
our Snowgaine route
and the
EveryTrail View of same.
I was totally surprised that (as I was told), six hours is just not that long. How can this be? I suppose it's the constant change of terrain, keeping the brain occupied instead of thinking of sore legs, good food and lots to drink.... but still, it was a pleasant surprise to find out that
everyone was right. Why do I have to question everything all the time??
I think my favorite moments were the runs down the steep hills, which felt like downhill skiing, or maybe .....hearing Pete let out a high pitched yelp and finding out he stepped on a dead raccoon (
still has me chuckling as I write this), and the last steep slide down the very steep hill although I hear it was painful for my partner (sorry, does this make me a bad person)?. I now know why Pete is constantly pulling splinters out of every part of his body months after an event.
And, it was my also my first weekend roadtrip with MNOC crowd..... very supportive, encouraging, fun group..... great people to learn from, borrow supplies from (thanks Biz), thanks all for bits of food here and there, etc. etc.
Gee... with all these comments, I now feel like I am accepting an Acadamy Award, so I might as well keep going until I get hooked off the stage....
thanks ALSO to Andrei for driving most of the way home, when I was so tired from almost no sleep for two nights (not sure why?)
and
thanks to CAOC for putting on this great event, especially to Joe and Kathy. It was nice to have food available at the finish and along the way (nothing like running through the snow with a cookie in my hand to make me happy), great course setting, everything was smooth, fun, upbeat. And the weather cooperated, too!