Orienteering

If you combine everything about navigation in the outdoors -- reading maps, using a compass and making sure you are on the right path -- and combine a little extra exercise with it, you get a sport that many compare to a giant treasure hunt.

While geocaching has exploded in popularity during recent years thanks to GPS developments, good old fashioned orienteering is still a popular activity for many folks. All that is required for orienteering is a map and a can-do attitude.

At orienteering competitions, "controls" are stashed in the woods or along trails, and each competitor begins with a map. From there, it is part race, part adventure and part a problem-solving lesson, which all adds up to a fun time.

"Many people don't even realize the great exercise they are getting while participating in an orienteering competition because they are focused on getting from control to control," said Ed Strabel, a long-time orienteering buff who is organizing an event at Colony High School on Friday (see related story). "It is a great way to get out and exercise while having fun."

At meets, competitors race through the woods, sometimes using a trail system while other times finding their own shortcuts using a map as their guide. There are controls placed throughout the course, and at each one, competitors punch their card to prove they visited it.

Some events include a clue at the first control as to where the second control is located, and so on. The events are timed, making it a race, although many people participate just to get out and hike around in the woods.

Strabel, who leads the Jr. ROTC program at CHS, says his cadets enjoy orienteering, and it's a great way for students to learn practical life lessons.

"It is an excellent training vehicle to train students to make decisions on the fly," Strabel said. "And it is very self-correcting. If they make a wrong choice, they know it because they are far off the trail. They have to backtrack and evaluate their decisions."

Some orienteerers prefer to use a compass while on the course, but others eschew compasses for something that is more reliable -- personal intuition.

"Sometimes using a compass can be a hindrance," Strabel said. "We emphasize making sure your map is oriented correctly all the time -- that's why it's called orienteering -- and using terrain assessment."

For example, the maps used at Colony High School are very detailed, right down to individual lampposts.

Instead of relying on a compass, Strabel said it is quicker to get from control to control if you simply match up the visible terrain to the map, provided you orient the map correctly.

One of orienteering's biggest challenges to competitors is finding the quickest route, and that isn't necessarily in the shape of a straight line.

"Like at Crevasse Moraine, if you look at the map and draw a straight line to the control, you are going to be in trouble because you'll come up on huge hills, fields, and who knows what else," Strabel said. "You have to find the quickest way, and that may mean going farther on an established trail than just going straight through the brush."

In that sense, orienteering is kind of like drawing up your own road maps, based on existing road maps that have the roads going right through buildings.

In addition to next weekend's Colony event, Strabel has organized orienteering events at Crevasse Moraine in the past. The Arctic Orienteering Club is based in Anchorage, and their season is just winding down after a summer spent tracking controls at several trail systems in Anchorage. Following next Friday's Colony event, the next event for the general public is an Oct. 30 night orienteering meet at the Campbell Creek Science Center.

Naturally, there is a Halloween theme, and people are encouraged to come dressed in costume. Strabel said there will be plenty of things for people of all ages and skill levels to do during the event.

The Colony Jr. ROTC group is also competing against Anchorage Jr. ROTC groups during Field Day in November.

Last spring break, Strabel took a group of Jr. ROTC cadets to Texas for a national orienteering meet. They trained for the event by running at Crevasse Moraine, in nearly a foot of snow.

"They had a real fun time," Strabel said.