Three fantastic days of orienteering on three completely different terrain types were provided by Lincoln Orienteers in the Port Lincoln area over the June Long weekend.  A warm up event at Louth Bay covered various terrain of the foreshore, township and dune areas on the golf courses.

The SA Long Championships at Broccoli Hill provided orienteering on a unique technical terrain with challenging courses planned by Dave Winters (in photo above perhaps warning John Soden about what to expect at Broccoli Hill), with controller Robert Smith.  Scrubby vegetation in the lower lying areas has become more extensive than when the area was first mapped, meaning maintaining map contact on the hard courses was essential (Course 1 is shown below).  Broccoli Hill is named for the numerous small copses of eucalypts that are dotted across the terrain - when the sun is low in the sky these copses look just like the broccoli display in your friendly neighbourhood supermarket or fruit and veg shop. This sight is particularly noticeable from the summit of a massive limestone outcrop in the south-east of the map that has been named Broccoli Hill.  Then to recover from your run, the Lincoln club provided some excellent catering.

The third event was on a granite terrain map, Gurra Yarda, just north of Port Lincoln.  Open hillsides with small to large granite outcrop made for faster running (at least on the downhills), with the open running interspersed with some native plantation areas.

All results can be found on Eventor

1. Louth Bay
2. Broccoli Hill
3. Gurra Yerda

And all courses on Route Gadget

1. Louth Bay
2. Broccoli Hill
3. Gurra Yarda

Orienteering SA offered a choice of free orienteering courses for individuals and families to do around Pakapakanthi Park and Victoria Park Wetlands as part of the Nature Festival. Pakapakanthi/Victoria Park has undergone a transformation to create a wetland with path network, boardwalks, viewing points and picnic areas, enhanced with plantings of trees, grasses and aquatic plant species.

Orienteering helpers were on hand to introduce newcomers to orienteering, and they could try courses ranging from short introductory courses from around 0.5 to 1 km, to longer ones around the wetlands.Courses used SPORTident to record course time. One of the longer courses around the wetlands is shown below.

Also offered were free children’s KID-O orienteering activities for the younger ones up to around 8 years of age.These were:

1. Number Ob- a basic maze course based on numbers
2. String courses - with controls punched selected from animal cards
3. Make your own map - of the surrounding park using orienteering symbols
4. Scavenger Hunt - find varous items in nature
5. Wombat Hunt
6. Playdough Mountains.

Each child received a card to be stamped at each activity.

Over 100 participated in all the activities, and some of the younger ones doing KID-O are below.