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It's easy to pinpoint your location in a city. Just grab a map and look for the nearest street sign. But how do you know which way is which when you're out in nature?
My kids got a lesson in losing and finding themselves in the woods a couple of weeks ago, when we took an orienteering class with a group of friends.
Orienteering is an international sport that involves using a map and a compass to race from point to point in a park or wilderness area. It became an Olympic event in 1977 and is growing in popularity in the United States.
But as we discovered, you don't have to have the endurance of a marathon runner and the cartographic skills of an explorer to have fun on an orienteering course. At a less competitive level, it's simply a way to add purpose and interest to a family hike.
The Minnesota Orienteering Club welcomes beginners at orienteering meets around the state. Individuals also can buy or rent maps and hit one of the half dozen permanent courses that have popped up in recent years around the Twin Cities.
My family opted to schedule a private two-hour class at the Tamarack Nature Center in White Bear Township with a group of friends with children ranging in age from 3 to 11.
"Orienteering builds that awareness of where you are and how to pay attention to your surroundings. And, I think that's terribly important, whether you're going to the Mall of America or the Boundary Waters," said instructor and naturalist Anna Newton.
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While geocaching uses a hand-held GPS unit to get you to a point marked on a map, orienteering relies on old-fashioned technology — the compass.
COMPASSES AND MAPS
We started indoors, where Newton taught us how to cup the compass in the palm of our hands, with the large arrow etched into the base facing away from us. A needle with one red end wobbled on a pivot under the clear plastic cover, pointing to magnetic north.
Our job was to get the jiggling red point lined up with the marking for north on the cover. To do this, we had to carefully rotate our whole bodies. We looked like a tai chi class as we slowly turned to face the back wall.
"OK," Newton said. "Where's north?"
We pointed to the wall.
"Where's south?" We all pointed to the opposite wall.
Hey, this was pretty easy!
Next, we learned how to orient the map. You do this by setting the compass on top of the map and lining up the vertical north-south lines of the map with the north-south line on the compass. It's harder than it sounds, and several kids needed help to get their jiggling needles on the right trajectory.
Finally, we headed outside and, after finding the first orienteering point together, split into teams of two or three kids. I tagged along with my first-grade son and two buddies.
"Parents, one word of advice," said Newton. "Stay a little bit behind your children. Let them make the decisions. Let them make some mistakes. These mistakes are teachable moments. Work with them to figure out where they went wrong."
I had to bite my tongue immediately as the three boys charged across a field in the wrong direction. They stumbled over gopher mounds and through patches of purple lupine heading toward what they thought was point E, which their map showed was next to a stand of pine trees.
Each team had received its own punch card with a list of seven points in the beginner section of the course we had to hit in order. Other teams were assigned slightly different points in a different order.
"It's supposed to be around here," said one boy as he wandered in circles on a cushion of pine needles.
"Do you know where it is?" one of them asked me.
"Do you know where you are?" I responded.
The boys laid the map down on the paved trail and managed to line it up using the compass. My son looked around and spotted the nature center peeking through the trees behind them.
"There's the building!" he shouted.
He glanced at the map. "Oh ... then ... it can't be here. We're too close to the building!"
They ran off again, this time in the right direction, down a paved trail toward a grove of scruffy jack pine. Point E was a wood post marked with the orange and white international orienteering symbol. We used a punch fastened to the post to punch a unique pattern in our card.
POINT TO POINT
Our team ended up finding three points before it was time to return to the classroom. Other groups had more success. A third-grade team found six points, pretty much without adult help. A fifth-grade boy found all seven points by staying on the paved paths and walking leisurely with his mom.
Two 9-year-old boys took off on what they thought would be a shortcut through the woods and ended up getting so turned around in the undergrowth they only found two points. They learned an important lesson: Shortcuts on maps aren't always the fastest route. It all depends on terrain.
Still everyone had a good time and came back red-cheeked, sweaty and full of stories.
"It was hard because we were going one way, and then we thought it was the other way, and then it ended up being back where we first thought it was," said Luke Magistad, a 7-year-old in my group. "But we found it!"
"It was hard to locate where you were," chimed in my 6-year-old son.
It's easy to see the virtues of the sport. It's gentle on the environment. It's good exercise. It fosters team building and confidence. It teaches map reading and improves your spatial intelligence.
But most of all, it's plain old-fashioned fun, just like hunting for treasure is fun.
THE SCOOP
What: Orienteering
Where: Tamarack Nature Center, 5287 Otter Lake Road, White Bear Township
Information: 651-407-5350 or co.ramsey.mn.us/parks/tamarack
Hours: Visitor center open 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday; 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday; noon to 5 p.m. Sunday. Trails are open a half-hour before and after sunset.
Cost: $2 to rent a compass, map and punch card. Groups may schedule a two-hour orienteering class with a naturalist for $6 per person (10 people minimum).
Target audience: Fourth-graders can learn to use a compass on their own. Younger kids need more help. All ages will enjoy the hike.
Crowd pleasers: Finding your first punch point
Avoid: Giving your kid the answers. Let children make mistakes, get lost and learn to find their own way.
Tip: If you have never used a compass and map before, brush up on your skills with a book on orienteering or with resources at the Minnesota Orienteering Club at mnoc.org. The site also lists local meets and parks with permanent courses, such as Lake Elmo Park Reserve and Afton State Park.
