A few members of the troop got together to try their hand at the permanent orienteering course located in Brecksville Reservation. We started at around 8:45am at the Nature Center with a brief overview of how to use your compass to orient a map and help guide you in finding orienteering controls. Most of the controls were located along the trail, but there were a few that took some searching off trail. The overall course was about 3.8 miles long and Brecksville Reservation has some rugged terrain to cover. After finding three controls the youth wanted to follow Chippewa Creek to the next control and the adults wanted to go back to the trail to locate it. A race ensued with the adults reaching the next control first. We stuck together for a few more controls to get the hang of it and then decided to split up around the halfway point. The youth went on their way and the adults followed about 5 minutes later. After locating two controls the adults checked in with the youth since they hadn’t seen or heard from them in awhile. It turned out that the youth took quite a while locating the next control and so the adults directed them to their position. We stuck together after that finding the other controls and returned to the starting point around 12:15pm. It was a good experience overall and everyone learned something from the trip. Those finding their way were Sam, Michael, Thomas, Mr. Deran, Mr. Botzman, Mr. Makowski, and Mr. Wrabel.

Orienteering Brecksville Reservation Photo Album