GAOC Extreme-O
January 20, 2003
Sweetwater State Park - Georgia
Here is info about the Georgia Orienteering Club's
Extreme-O 2003.
It was a very fun event. I have placed this on the web so that others may
learn more about GAOC's Extreme-O in the hopes that you may join in on one of
these. Thank you to Mal Harding and Chuck & Linda Ferguson, Sam
Smith(maps) and
the rest of the extreme-o crew for providing this memorable event.
My son Nick and I ran this course as a team.
Conditions:
The weather had been cold for the previous two days of orienteering.
The temperature was about 13 degrees on Saturday morning with a high of
around 30 degrees that afternoon. Sunday
started out around 23 degrees and the temperature climbed up to about 40
degrees. We woke on Monday morning with the Weather Channel
reporting a local temperature of 35 degrees at about 6:30am. Sunrise was around 7:30am there.
The good news is the sun was shining bright all weekend.
The bad news was several of the
lakes were covered with a solid sheet of ice on Saturday morning.
Monday morning was a little better.
As we drove into the park, there was only some scattered ice covering some of
the smaller lakes.
Start location:
Sweetwater State Park Group Shelter (heated and a nice fire in the fireplace) The
start for the extreme-O was the group shelter.
Nick and I reported in and waited for our 8:02am start time.
We received our punch card and a clue sheet listing 17 controls for the
short course. At the assigned start
time of 8:02am we opened the side door to the group shelter and picked up the
first map. It was the standard
Sweetwater Creek State Conservation Park map showing the park facilities with
the starting location marked and the general location of the first two controls.
1 HILLTOP
We headed from the group shelter to the NE a short distance through the woods
and down the road to the East towards where the Saturday start location had
been. After passing the lake, the
paved road turned into a dirt road and we began to look to the North for a
hilltop. A short distance later the
land began to rise off to the North of the dirt road, so we turned north and
began to climb a small hill. The
control was located at a grave on the top of the hill.
2 WATER COURSE edge
From the map, the control appeared to be located at the
bridge used to cross Sweetwater Creek on Saturday for orienteering.
We took off to the SE and quickly located the bridge.
The control was hung under the East side of bridge, but well away from
the water. Time for a new map.
We picked up a new map for the short course.
It was a black and white topo map of the area.
Pretty good detail on the contour lines but not much else in the way of
trails or any other details
MAP2 (black & white topo contours only)
Note: Map 2 had to be turned in later in the course so I do not have the exact copy. The map here is very similar to that picked up at control #2
3 HILLTOP
Based on our route to control 2, we followed the dirt road
back from the bridge to the west till we saw a hill in the general direction.
The dirt road turned to the NW and we went straight and up the hill.
Control was located there without any problem.
4 REENTRANT JUNCTION
From the hilltop at #3, we proceeded almost due South. Down
into a small reentrant, crossing a small spur.
Familiar area
.this was the location of the Saturday starting line.
Aimed a little to the west of the indistinct hilltop at the east end of
the ridge. (The saddle had been my first
control for my RED course on Sunday) Climbed to the top of
the ridge and we were looking down into the reentrant just to the east of the
reentrant with control #4. I could
see that we were still too far to the east so we headed SSW and hit the control
straight on. This was the end of
map 2. Here we picked up a 1:24,000
scale map, 20 foot contours, in color (green for forest, white for
clearings
.)
Instructions posted: You
are at 3266-8255. Proceed to the
hilltop at 329-824 west end. At
this control Nick and I met up with another person dressed in military fatigues. We managed to plot our course and get out just ahead of him.
MAP3 (1:24,000 color USGS grid map)
5 HILLTOP west end
Plotted the current location coordinates and plotted the
destination hilltop coordinates. It
looked to be about 250 meters to the SE. Took
off down into the large reentrant and up the next hill and located the control
without any problem.
Instructions posted: Proceed to
reentrant at 3277-8206
6 REENTRANT
Plotted the reentrant on the map and proceeded SSW down
into a reentrant up and over a spur and into the reentrant with the control.
Instructions posted: proceed at 254 degrees for 150 meters
7 HILLTOP
Proceeded to follow the azimuth of 254 up a hill for 150
meter until the control was found.
Instructions posted: From the road junction at 3173-8253 with an azimuth of 124 degrees and from the south tip of the island at 3314-8276 with an azimuth of 219 degrees. The fence is at the intersection of these two lines.
8 FENCE bend (not on the map)
Here is where we messed up.
I plotted a heading of about 220 degrees and we took off.
It was really 255 degrees and about 400 meters. I should have noted that we were on the edge of
a clearing (hidden by some dense vegetation) and followed the clearing.
Instead, we traveled parallel to the clearing for about 1km until the clearing turned south. This
is where we wound up. We wandered
around the south and southwest end of the clearing for about 10 minutes.
We climbed a small hilltop in the clearing and I
realized that we were at the hilltop on the southwest end of the clearing.
We were not the only ones having problems. From our vantage on the hilltop
in the field we saw the guy we had met at control #4. He was also wandering in the
fields. We than began to work our way back to the NE and into the narrow part of
the clearing running NE-SW. We
looked up and down both sides of the clearing looking for a fence.
There were several old ruined fences, but no control.
Finally some others began to show up in the area.
One of them said we were close but did not say anything else and he was
gone.
With a little more confidence, we turned to the NE again and followed the
field. Just a short distance from
where we had been on two occasions was the control!
It was at a fence corner. We had lost about 20 minutes wandering
around the fields.
Time for a new map. This time a small strip of orienteering map. I plotted the heading and we were off.
MAP4
(strip of orienteering map, 500 meters between north lines for scale of
about 1:10,000)
9 REENTRANT
I seemed to remember that there was a dirt road from #8 to
the SW where it intersected a road to the NW (seen at the upper left edge of the
map. However, we decided just to
play it safe and plot a bearing straight to the control.
There was a power line and a dirt road intersection about 100 meters
before the control. This made a
good attack point. Hit the control
straight on without any problems. Picked
up another strip of orienteering map
MAP5 (strip of orienteering map, 500 meters between north lines for a scale of about 1:15,000)
10 CULVERT inside
This one was going to be a little more challenging.
The map showed a long route of over 1 km along a dirt road and a paved
road after an initial trek of about 500 meters over unmapped ground.
We plotted the course and intersected the first road right on track. We could see the denser vegetation just to the east of our
location on the north side of the road along with the road junction just to the
east. We opted for the direct route
through the woods instead of the long 1+ km route along the roads. We made good time through the woods and spotted the building
just to the west of the marked location on the map.
The road was easy to spot and soon the culvert was in site.
There was a sign there instructing you to go into the culvert and
continue out the other side. The control was located at the exit point of the culvert.
The culvert started out easy, no water or mud.
But as you approached the far end, the mud began to fill the culvert
until it was about half full of mud making it a muddy ordeal to get out.
Out of the culvert with Laurie the meet director and the photographer
waiting. Here we picked up an
aerial photograph and we were off to the next control. Note the mud on the map
and the tear at the top. Nick was wet and muddy and had a little
difficulty getting the map.
11 MANMADE OBJECT
Looking at the photo, we decided to head west along the
road we had just crawled under. This
lead us to the main road. We turned
north and jogged along the road which crossed over the lake. On Saturday morning the small portion of the lake on the west
side of the road had frozen over solid. After
crossing the lake, we turned to the east following a road for a short distance
before turning left and following a clearing uphill to the north.
There was a trail at the end of the clearing.
A few steps down the trail was another clearing with a playground.
There was the control hung next to the slide.
12 BUILDING N end
The area was open to the NE from the playground and I
remembered from a previous visit to the area that there was a picnic area and
parking with a road that led back to the west that intersected the main road
again. So we followed it to the
main road. A short distance north
on the main road, we turned to the west and followed a dirt road that slowly
turned back to the north. Around
the area where the road turns to the east, the woods were very open and we could
see a small building to the north of us. We
ran to the building which turned out to be the restrooms for the surrounding
picnic area. Nick went around one
side and I went around the other side. We
met on the far side but no
control here. We looked around and
there was a shelter a short distance to the north. We could see the control hanging there. There was someone here checking on the control and said that
it was in the wrong place and they were going to move it back to the restrooms.
We punched the control and left them to move the control.
13 CULVERT inside
From the shelter, it was a very short distance north to the
lake. I remembered there being a
trail along the edge of the lake, so we found it and headed east until we hit
the main road again. We jogged
along the main road to the north. Ahead
we could see some instructions and a course official.
We were instructed to put on and secure a life vest, pick up two paddles
and take one of the canoes located on the east side of the road, at the north
edge of the lake. Here again the GNC meet
director Laurie Searle with the photographer. I handed her my small camera
and asked her to snap a picture or two. The control was
located a short distance away in a culvert that forms a tunnel for canoes
between the two lakes. The control
was located at the on the northwest side of the road. We paddled back to the location where we had picked up the canoe.
All of the equipment had to be placed back in its original location
before we were allowed to proceed. Time
for a new map. This was another
strip of an orienteering map.
MAP 6 (strip of orienteering map - 500 meters between north lines)
14 STREAM bend
Looking at the strip map, there was water blocking a direct
path from the control #13 to control #14. This
was the same area as the practice orienteering course that I had gone out on a
few days before. I remembered that
the lake only had a small finger to the north and there was a trail around this
part of the lake, so we took off to the north, through the parking area and
found the trail that took us around the finger of the lake (just off the north
edge of the map. We could have
followed the trail the long way around (off the map to the south) but we decided
to shoot a straight line over a small hill to the bend in the stream.
At the top of the hill we were at the edge of the clearing shown on the
map and continue downhill to the stream. We
hit the control straight on. There
were two separate places with logs that allowed crossing the water without
getting wet. This took you to the
base of a large dirt wall which had been draped with a cargo net
The control was located here at the base. After punching the control, we
were instructed by course officials to put on a helmet and climb the net.
So, up we went. Not too difficult. There
were lots of pictures taken at this location.
Once on top we were instructed to follow the blue tape.
15 CAVE ! end
.yipe!
After leaving the cargo net, we followed the blue streamers
and found Chuck Ferguson manning a rope bridge (one high rope and one low rope)
across a deep stream. Nick started
it off. He managed to slip off the
rope just as he reached the far side getting wet up to his knees.
I quickly followed Nick and was a little more careful exiting off the
ropes. More blue streamers and
there was the cave! A small concrete tunnel that headed under the dam and under
the lake. A posted sign said the
control was at the far end. It was
very dark and luckily I had a small AA battery flashlight. I gave the light to Nick and off he went leaving me trying to
catch him. I quickly found out why
he was moving so swiftly. There was
about 6 inches of ice cold water swiftly flowing on the floor out of cave!
We finally reached the end where the control was located about 200 feet
inside. Nick had little trouble
trying to punch the control card and hold the flashlight at the same time.
I finally caught up to him and held the flashlight for him.
As soon as he punched he was off, leaving me in the dark.
By this time our feet were numb from the cold water.
Nick was going as fast as he could so he could get out of the cold water. Upon exiting the cave, we were give a new map.
A nice orienteering map. Unfortunately,
we were not on the map and the next control was not on the map.
MAP 7 (orienteering map 1:10,000 scale for the east side of the park)
16 REENTRANT
Our current location (#15) and the next control (#16) were
located on the west side of the main river and the map was of the east side of
the river. The good news here was
that there was a trail that followed the west side of the river and the map had
some good details of boulders and rapids in the river. Our feet were still numb from the ice water in the cave. To
try and get some blood flowing in the feet we jogged south along the river to the east.
After a minute or two the feet began to feel a little better. When the river began to turn to the south, we saw the rapids in the river
marked on the map. We continued
south along the west side of the river until we found the next set of rapids
marked on the map. We used this as
the attack point and headed SW into a reentrant.
It took a little time to get off the trail. There were a lot of briars
bordering the trail. After a couple of minutes of fighting the briars, we were in
the reentrant and came upon the controls without any problem.
A new map again. Unfortunately, you were not allowed to take it.
This was a memory leg to #17 and then on to the finish.
MAP posted on the tree (sorry, no copy of this map)
17 MARSH middle
This one looked to be a fairly easy leg continue up the
reentrant to the west and over the ridge, down the other side where there was a
road, follow the road around to the south and then west where the swamp should
be on the north side of the road. Found
the swamp without any problems. The
control was clearly visible just a short distance from the road (about 20 meters
or less). This one should be no
problem. Since our feet were
already soaked, we just decided to go straight through the 6 deep water to
the control. About half way to the
control, I took a step and sunk up to my knee in mud.
Back up a step and try going to the left a little, not much better.
Nick was working his way around to the right with a little more success.
As I worked my way to the left, there was the 6 foot alligator (he would
have been frozen if he had been real!). I
was getting close now! Two more
steps and oops! Now Im stuck in
mud up to my waste. Nick managed to
make it to the control. I was able to take a picture of him from my low vantage
point as he punched the control. Nick
came back around and was able to hold onto a tree and pull me out.
Now we were out of the swamp and headed back to the finish at the group
shelter
FINISH group shelter (300 meters to finish inside building)
We followed the trail and road that were used to get to the start for the Saturday orienteering. It was a couple of hundred meters. We probably should have taken the same route as we did when we started, but I opted for the roads this time. Nick managed to draw on some energy from somewhere and sprinted the last 100 meters back to the group shelter finish. I was somewhere just behind him...out of breath.
