Thursday 23 May 2013

Sage Stomp - Kamloops B.C

Over the May long weekend several of the juniors from FWOC went to Kamloops, B.C for the Sage Stomp. These juniors were Emma, Bridie, Darya and Alix and below is an article they wrote about their experience. Look for it in one of the upcoming issues of the Canada Orienteering magazine!

 

 

Off to Sage Stomp We Go!!!


        During the May long weekend, we (Darya, Alix, Emma and Bridie from the junior program of FWOC) got to enjoy the excellent experience of the Sage Stomp orienteering camp. 


        We all piled into Marsha's (Emma's mom) car, bright and early friday morning and headed for the hills. After a long eight hour car ride we arrived in time for a delicious supper and a night-o. The night-o was tricky because it was a memory-o, but at each control we had a clue to the next control. We went in a group because we were scared of the dark :) We got lost a few times and wandered around in the forest. Later that night, we got set up in the grey jay hideaway cabin. 



        The next morning we got put into our groups for the morning training session with Brian May. This exercise was to focus on flowing through controls and we found it really informative and helpful. After a great lunch we set out for our next training session which focused on contours. This was lead by Louise Oram. To get to the start we had to walk up a massive hill. The view at the top was magnificent, it was worth it. Louise's explanation of contours were nothing we've ever seen before - lots of running around and hand gestures. We completed the course in a buddy system and Emma had a pretty fantastic wipeout where she face planted and slid along the grass for a couple of meters. We finished before the adults and sat by the lake trying to "mate with the birds" by making bird sounds with stalks of grass. Once we got back to the camp, Bridie and Emma went for a swim in McQueen. It was refreshing and a nice way to clean off. In the evening Brian May gave a talk about map simplification which helped us with our race the next day. 



        On Sunday we all raced up in the 17-20 age category, which was course 6. The course was 7.6km long and very challenging. At the start we saw a massive hill and told each other that if we had to go up it that we would sit down and start crying. Our 3rd control was on the top of that hill. Despite the hill, it was our best leg. The most challenging control was number 7 because you had a choice between a path and a forest navigation. Most of us went through the forest and took between 10 to 30min; however, Darya who followed the path had a much stronger leg. Bridie really struggled on the 9th leg causing her to wander and lose a lot of time. By the end we were all tired and wanted to sleep. But no, we had another training. This time it was based on relocation and our coach was Catherine, an orienteer from Belgium. She would get us lost and then we would have to relocate and head to a certain control. We also redid the 7th leg and realized how much time we could have made up. Catherine gave us some valuable advice for when we run, she said " it's not like you run with your eyes closed and get somewhere and go, oh sh*t." Later that afternoon there were awards, Emma came in dripping wet from her swim in the lake. At awards Bridie got some candy for her perseverance in her "rough race" and Darya received a flute from the draw prizes. The flute was handmade by Hunter, a newbie. At 9:00 there was a night-o, only Emma participated in it, the rest of us were tired and watched. Emma used Louise's massive head lamp and found it very useful. Upon asking Emma about the night-o she replied by saying: " it was dark." 



        On our final day we left early in the morning to head back to Calgary. Unfortunately we missed training in the morning. 



        We would like to thank everyone who made this camp happen. Thanks to our coaches Louise, Brian and Catherine and the volunteers that made this weekend possible. Also thanks to our parents and caterers for the delicious food. Special thanks to Marsha for driving us and putting up with our singing. 
 
 

Wednesday 13 March 2013

Article: Mapping Camp Last Summer!

Darya working on her legend
Teresa showing us the map that she has been working on.



On August 24-27, 2012 we took a mapping course from Sarah, at the Alberta Children's Hospital. The people that came to this amazing event were Bridie, Emma, Alix, Molly, Darya, Helene, Sunniva, Michael and Teresa. We learned how to construct an orienteering map from start to finish. We also played a lot of wonderful games. We started with a city base map and worked on it from there. Then we ended with putting it all into OCAD and made it an official standard sprint map. After a long week of creating maps we decided with would be a great idea if we go for a swim at the Foothills Aquatic  Center. We wanted to take this camp because we wanted to become more skilled at the art of creating orienteering maps. Learning about mapping will improve your orienteering skills GREATLY! It was a week that we all could create stronger relationships with our friends.




Wednesday 6 March 2013

Guest Speaker: Ellie on Glaciers

Last week we had another special guest - Ellie - come in and teach us about glaciers. We played a confusing string game at the start which only one group could figure out! Ellie brought in a lot of mini marshmallows that we used in a hands-on demonstration. We went outside and used the snow on the ground to see for ourselves how compression worked. After that we made s'mores using our demonstration marshmallows! We all learned a lot - thanks Ellie!
This group got the string game!
Trying to figure out the string game!


Wednesday 27 February 2013

Guest Speaker: Andrew on Survival Techniques

Last week Andrew joined our training night and taught us all about smart adventuring in the wilderness. We learned about the ten essentials, how to build a lean-to and how to find directions without using a compass.
We started the night off with a fun game called "Compass Twister".

Andrew taught us about the ten essentials and we had to find an example of each one hidden in the backyard.

Thank you Andrew!

Wednesday 20 February 2013

Learning to Contour

Tonight the younger kids played some contour games with Damian by using cut up rubber balls to draw around. They used these to see how hills would look in real life and on a map. Meanwhile the older kids drew out their own courses on maps of the city parks. It was a fun and informative night for both groups!
The ball we used as a hill



Wednesday 13 February 2013

Create your own terrain and map

This week we we created our own model terrains using blocks and lego




We then drew a map of our terrain with the 5 elements of a map:
-a title
-a legend
-a north arrow
-the author (us!)
-the scale & contour interval




We also had fun putting together map puzzles

Wednesday 30 January 2013

January 30th: Being Crafty

This Wednesday we showed our creative sides. Using fun paints and assorted materials, we decorated fabric for flags. Then we added wire to construct a fully functioning control!


Ingrid decorates her control flag


Complete!  We will use them in the spring for training exercises.