Aberdeen Weekend Orienteering

With few events happening at the moment it becomes necessary to travel a bit to get some proper orienteering. A fairly long drive to the north of Aberdeen and the dunes at Balmedie for a SOL event described as a medium distance orienteering event - shorter than the usual SOLs. I choose to try Black course though which increased the distance to a more normal event. Nice terrain and landscape with lots of challenge from the complexity of the dunes but easy visibility of the features making it difficult to get too lost even if finding the specific part of the dunes was difficult.

Was generally pleased with my navigation for most of the event but had two disastrous controls with big errors. Last of the 11 finishers on the black course which wasn't a surprise.

A short walk along the shore after the orienteering.

After than too a drive up the coast to Newburgh and the mouth of the river Ythan. The estuary was teaming with birdlife and there was a seal colony on the far side of the river with lots of seals in the water keeping watch over the humans.

A night in a Premier Inn and the next morning an onward drive to Glen Tanar near Aboyne. Pretty wild forest and a course with long difficult unrunnable legs. Navigation a real challenge so pleased that I did find all the 10 controls I looked for even if some required substantial relocation efforts. The first 9 controls took 2.5 hours at which point I decided to take the fastest route back to the last control. Not the most fun but rewarding and good practice. Need to be more realistic on course choice for the toughest standard O courses.