Dead Raccoon

Went to finish the "boat house" area today and saw that raccoon again. It was lying next to the same tree he used to hide under. Dead.

Mapping in Fred G Bond Metro Park. Part 1

As I promised before, here is the first part of my "mapping in the Bond park" saga. Comparing with the map refresh I did in Schenck forest a year ago, this one (though a refresh too) proved to be much more difficult. I think I already spent as much time in the Bond park as I did in Schenck forest and I am only about 50% done. There were several things that complicated this map refresh work for me:

• The base map was indeed very old and outdated. Not only the trails has changed, but also vegetation and terrain.
• There were several big construction projects completed after the base map was created. Community Center, Seniors Center, new boat house, new parking lots had to be added to the map along with appropriate changes in elevation lines.
• This time I decided to map vegetation (white/green/dark green areas as well as fallen trees), which I didn't do in Schenck forest.

All these factors made an impact and slowed me down considerably, but I am still confident that the new map will be ready in time for the next year sprint event.

Anyway, here is what I did (step by step):

1. November 5
Went to the park and talked to Tracy (park's manager?). She gave me permission to map the park and in general was very supportive. She would love to have a new map with a set of their fixed controls plotted on it. She also gave preliminary OK for our sprint event next year.
Then walked around the park and compared it to the base map. Oh, boy. So many new constructions! Also noticed that the dam at the lake was plotted on the base map 5-7 degrees off! Here is a portion of the base map which was updated the most.


2. November 6 - 13
Spent the next week by working with the aerial image of the area and moving new features to the base map. 5 most affected areas were:

1. Community Center
2. Seniors Center
3. Fenced area with tool shacks and equipment
4. Additional parking lot
5. Restrooms by the parking low

Note how elevation lines are all wrong by the Community and Seniors Centers.


Here is an aerial image I used (it is a few years old). I took it from Cary Parks web site (I checked Google maps too, but it had "summer" picture, which is hard to use because of tree shadows).


3. November 17
I went to the park and compared my "aerial like" map of the Community Center with the real Community Center. It was clear that the whole block with the Community Center and parking lot was somewhat misplaced:

• It was too close to the road on the left
• The building was too big
• The building wasn't aligned with the trails intersection (see arrows on the map)

This day I fixed the building's size and readjusted the whole area, but not enough as my future trips to the park proved.


4. November 23
I finally was able to place the Community Center "block" correctly, so it would correspond to the western road and eastern trails.
Also fixed the outlines of the fenced area and reduced the "garden" south from the fence. The "garden" was actually plotted on the base map with a "25 yards" mistake. After that my trust for the base map accuracy completely evaporated and I started to double check every feature on the map. (Jumping ahead, I indeed had to fix several similar errors in other areas of the park later on)


5. November 24
With Community Center properly is place, I was able to do more refined work in that area. Put new trails and open areas on the map. Note though that the elevation is not fixed there. I haven't done it before and didn't even know where to start, so I was putting it off.


6. November 25
More refining work (still afraid to touch elevation lines):

1. Mapped intricate details inside the Seniors Center (I wonder why, we shouldn't be running there anyway)
2. Added the "greenhouse" area
3. Made the first pass on vegetation south west from the Community Center (as you will see, I re-did this part a few weeks later)
4. Mapped the scary "impassable" area (again re-did it later)

7. November 30
My first attempt to put correct elevation lines in place!
Not the final one, but it was a big step for me. From that point on, I at least wasn't afraid of doing it. And practice makes perfect, right?


I guess it is enough for the first part :-) More to come...

Dying Raccoon

Was mapping the "boat house" area at the Bond Lake yesterday and found a dying raccoon concealed under the roots of an oak tree. So sad and disturbing was the encounter, I simply can't shake it out of my head. The raccoon was half-hidden under the roots and I probably wouldn't have noticed it if not for its heavy gurgling breathing. The sound gave me a start, I stopped and saw the poor creature no more than a yard from where I stood. The raccoon was old and undoubtedly very ill. It was visibly shaking and its heavy breathing was painful to watch. When the raccoon noticed me, it uttered a low growl, but didn't even make an attempt to hide or escape. It just lay there. Dying.

I let it be. That's how it works, right?..

Dec 13 event at Piedmont Environmental Center

Tanya and I went yesterday to COK event at the Piedmont Environmental Center in High Point. This is the one Josef always organizes in December and it is the one (from COK's events) closest to the Raleigh area (only 1 hour 20 min drive for us). We've tried it once 2 years ago and liked it very much. The place is small (so the map has 7500:1 scale) and the forest and terrain are somewhat similar to the Johnson Lake area.

There is no place for Red course, the highest one is Green. But not "regular" Green. The way Josef sets it up is that the course has at least 20 controls on ~4.5 km. It's like a "long" sprint. Definitely feels like sprint. I like sprints - I like this place.

Unfortunately, I don't have a map for the course (as it is COK's event), so no picture today. I'll just say that I ran the course almost cleanly. In one place I missed the control (because of the map deficiency) and lost about 4 minutes. Also overran by two other controls (yeah, 7500:1 scale makes you do that :-) ) - another 2-3 minutes. The rest of the numerous controls were just fine. Ended up spending 48 minutes and getting (I think) second place.

Will COK team do this event next year when Josef is back to Czech Republic?

December 7 event in the North Umstead Park

It was rather cold. After all it was a December meet, right?..

Actually, I should rather say that it was hot to run, but cold to walk. I am glad I had spare cloths I could change into at the finish.

Tanya and Michael walked the Orange course and I ran Brown. I thought I would do Green, but changed my mind in the middle of the course - after 3 weeks of nurturing my right leg and non running, I was terribly out of shape... I have to do something about it, even if I can't run I should at least ride the bicycle between the meets.

Anyway, to the course. First of all, I liked it: many controls, short/medium legs, clear forest. Thank you, Artem!

All in all I made just one 3-4 minutes mistake, everything else I took the way I intended to.

#1: down to the creek, up to the road and almost straight shot to the re-entrant and gullies with the control.
#2: up the hill, then down to the north-east side of the clearance, which I used as an attack point.
#3: to the "horse" parking lot, then through the camp, crossed re-entrant and went over the ridge to the re-entrant with control (left from the control), then simply ran right till I found it. The reason I went through the parking lot and the camp was that I was looking for an easy terrain to run. I am not sure it was the best decision but I don't regret making it.
#4: up the hill and watched re-entrant on the right side without going into it. Then up to the road.
There I realized that that hill took nearly all my strength and stopped to decide whether I really want to continue on Green or cut to Brown. I decided to cut to Brown.
#5: used the road, didn't see the trail on the left, but saw the re-entrant, went into it and over the hill to the second one and reached a creek. At least I thought it was a creek, in reality it was a ditch - I was 100 yards more to the left than I thought... Naturally, I went left along the "creek" to find the control, but the "creek" disappeared and I realized my mistake. Returned back, reached the true creek and took the control.
#6: walked all the way up to the road, then ran to the control keeping the power line on my right side.
#7: ran west, noticed the small hill on my right, reached the road and navigated to the hill, then ran down the hill till I reached the small cliff with the control.
#8: to the road and used the road's bend as an attack point. Also watched small re-entrant on the left to find the control.
#9: very easy, using small parking space as an attack point.
#10: used the road all the way, then cut across the creek and used trail to get to the control.
#11: used the trail as much as I could, then walked up the hill to the finish.

Spent 40 mins (according to my watch) or 37 mins (according to the printout).

After the finish I sat down with Mihai, he is going to help with Bond Lake park mapping, which is great. I already did some work there (and will write about it later), but there is plenty of work for both of us for this winter.

Tanya, Michal and I also stayed and helped with controls pickup, so I got the chance to take some of the remaining Green/Red controls.

Here is my route. Click on the image to enlarge. Blue - mostly running, yellow-brown - mostly walking.

From Orienteering

November 16 event in the Umstead Park (Whispering Pines)

Yet another great day for orienteering. No rain, and the temperature was just right.

We arrived at early (at 11.30) as Michael and I volunteered to help with the start and registration. So, naturally, we worked during the first hour until Nadya and Charles released us. And Tanya was watching two little girls our friends left with us for the weekend. With 40 girl scouts we had a lot of people attending the event, many newcomers too, which is always good to see. The only bad thing was the download box not working (again!). I really see it as a problem now. We should either test it a day before or get a spare one (which I guess is expensive...). Artem and Ken kept doing some manipulations with the box and at the end they were able to fix it somehow, but many runners left without the printed results.

Initially we planned that all three of us will run and watch after the girls in turns, but we ended up only with me and Tanya running. Michael decided to stay at the start.

Tanya ran the Orange course and I did Green. Well, actually, I did my usual "1 hour" run, which turned to be Green this time. I liked the course. It wasn't very difficult, but Nadya and Charles hidden the controls pretty well (as usual :-)). It added to the challenge. Also there were a lot of steep hills on the route, which I couldn't avoid and had to walk up quite a bit. Anyway, here is how I ran:

#1: went to the left, crossed the re-entrant and walked uphill; then when I saw cabins on the left, turned and went down to the control.
#2: walked uphill, then ran north until the slope started to go down. There I stood for a few seconds and located the stony ground on the other side of the re-entrant (I wouldn't be able to use this trick in summer time!). Then just ran straight to that stony ground and up to the control.
#3: walked up the hill, ran down aiming to the bend of a re-entrant, crossed it and walked up another hill (I told you, a lot of uphills walks...), crossed the re-entrant and ran along the slope will the control.
#4: straight to the road and them took compass bearing to the control. Missed it and reached the open ground far to the left. Corrected the mistake and took the control. Met Ken and Terese there and we ran together back to the road.
#5: used the road to get there, attacked from the road's turn, watched and counted gullies and dry-ditches without crossing them; then turned to the cluster of dry-ditches with the control.
#6: thought about using the road again, but decided against it; crossed the first re-entrant in its higher part, then went down into the second one and ran along the slope to the re-entrant with the control.
#7: walked up to the road and ran till it started to curve; met Bill there; ran by the big re-entrant and crossed to the small re-entrant I was looking for; unfortunately, didn't notice it and reached another branch (eastern) of the same re-entrant; looked for the control there, didn't find it, looked at the compass and realized the mistake; went west and got the control.
#8: ran north-north-west over the hill and down the slope (but not straight down!), then cut through the green to the trail; the green area was bad, I could have probably been better off running all the way down that hill and then turning west, but I really wanted to reach that trail; after I got to the trail the control was very easy to find.
#9: used the road to get there, that was a mistake: the road went up, so I spent a lot of effort; I should have used the lower ground to get to the creek instead. Once at the creek, the control was easy to get.
I looked at the clock at #9 and realized that I spent 35 minutes to get that far. I wanted not to exceed 1 hour, so I had to turn back now, which meant finishing on Green.
#13: walked all the way up to the road, then ran east crossing and counting upper parts of re-entrants, reached the hill and followed it to the saddle.
#14: ran south-west using the high ground, then went down to the re-entrant and reached the road; used the road to get all the way to the control and walked up crossing gullies till I found it.
#15: back to the road, across the bridge; ran by the shore till the first re-entrant, but it was very slippery on the dry leaves in that area, so I decided to get away from the shore asap; went over the hill to the middle of the second re-entrant, crossed it, went up another hill to the beginning of the third re-entrant and aimed to the control from there; unfortunately missed and realized the mistake only when I saw that familiar stony ground ahead; turned back and took the control.
#16: was too tired to attempt the straight run, so used the re-entrant to get almost to the lake, then went up the control's re-entrant; it was easy to find this way.
Then barely managed to crawl up to the camp - the slope was very steep and slippery...

Ended up spending exactly 1 hour on the course.

Huge thanks to Nadya and Charles for organizing the event, it was fun!

Here is my route. Click on the image to enlarge. Blue - mostly running, yellow-brown - mostly walking.

From Orienteering

November 2 event in the South West Umstead Park

Very interesting orienteering today. No trails, no easy controls, every leg was challenging. In conjunction with perfect weather it made the course very satisfying and enjoyable. Big thanks to Joseph, Ruth and Josef!

There was also an unusual start location. We had to carpool and drive to the Old Reedy Creek road entrance. I've never been there, though, the forest itself was somewhat familiar, as Tanya and I organized an advanced event in these parts a year ago.

But back to the event. We signed up for 9.15 group, arrived on time and carpooled with Nadya and Charles to the start location. Tanya had to be in the Raleigh Little Theater shortly after noon, so we had only 2 hours to run our courses. Tanya and Michael decided to go together on Brown and I was going to tackle the Green course. I decided upfront that I must not run more than one hour (because of my knee), so I was going to watch time and switch to Brown or Red depending on how fast I was going.

Tanya and Michael started and I followed in a few minutes.

#1 was probably the easiest control on the course, but even this one was carefully hidden, so after I found it I told myself that I should expect a difficult course.

#2 proved the statement nicely. I tried to go straight north keeping to the higher ground, but veered to the left and crossed the creek to the west of the spot I was aiming to. Then I saw Tanya, Michael and Larisa even further to the left and ran toward them. That was a mistake. When I met them they appeared to be sufficiently lost and when I looked around I realized that I was rather lost myself. I decided (correctly) that I must had run to far to the west and walked east, then Tanya noticed #17. I ran toward it, checked the number, located it on the map and quickly ran to #2. Lucky.

#3 was a disaster. It took me 10 minutes to find it! Ouch...
I went up the hill and watched the re-entrant on the left. When it ended I turned north-west with an intention to cut north when the hill starts sloping down. The problem with this approach was the fact that the hill proved to be very flat and I simply couldn't distinguish where to turn. Plus I veered to the left again. As a result I reached slopes which were going down to the creek to far to the left (sounds familiar, right?). Several other people were walking in the same area looking for #3 as well. I noticed Eugene and Miles, there was somebody else too. After a few minutes of aimless wandering I decided to find a new attack point, went down to the creek and found the creeks junction. Yes, I was too far to the left, but at least I knew where I was! From the creeks junction I ran along the big creek and took #3. Whew...

I took #4 cleanly. Ran east up the hill, then north-east-east in parallel to the slope, crossed a re-entrant (again rather flat one) and then went up the hill toward the control.

Avoided an area with fallen trees by walking uphill and cutting straight to the road, used the road for about a hundred meters and went down to #5 using northern slope of the re-entrant. I would probably be better off by simply using the re-entrant's bottom, as there were a lot of fallen trees on the slope.

Crossed the re-entrant and walked straight uphill, then ran south-south-west, crossed a small re-entrant with a dry ditch and went south down the spur until I reached the bottom and found #6 a few meters further.

#6 to #7 was the longest leg and I am happy with the way I handled it. First I walked south-south-west over the big hill, then ran keeping the high ground, noticed beginning of the big re-entrant on my left and finally hit the top western branch of another big re-entrant I was running toward. Exactly where I wanted. From that point it was easy: down to the bottom, then south and looked for the pit across the second western branch.

I chose the slope running to get to #8. I think I would had been better of walking uphill and running there instead. The slope was cluttered with fallen trees and there were quite a few dry ditches too, not an easy run.

#8 was very close to the finish and I had already spent 42 minutes and was tired. So I decided to cut the course short and finish on Brown. The funny thing was that if I would simply walk from #8 to the finish it would be Brown! But I thought Brown also included #9, 10, 18 - 20... Which in reality was Green. So I ended up running Green thinking I was running Brown.

I lost time on #9. I was tired and walked up the hill. I ended up too close to the road and couldn't see the control which was about a hundred meters to the east. Finally I realized what was going on, went east and saw the control from far away.

At #9 I also parted with Eugene. We happened to run with similar speed from #3 till #9. Some controls I took faster, others - Eugene, but the end result was that we saw each other on all these controls. At #9 Eugene got a headway, as he didn't wandered to the west as I did, but apparently he lost a lot of time getting to #10, so I took it earlier and proceed with the rest of the Green course.

#10 was easy to find, but hard to get to as I was very tired. I went down to the re-entrant and further east to the big creeks junction. Then walked up the hill, crossed another re-entrant in its higher part and proceeded to the small re-entrants with the control from the top. When I reached them, simply ran down to take #10.

Walked back uphill, then west till I reached the familiar re-entrant, went up and to the top western branch to take #18.

Walked south uphill, then continued south, noticing the beginning of the second western branch and avoiding the green area. Then down to the control (#19).

Remembering the hard northern slope and crossed the creek and took souther slope. Well, it wasn't any easier... Still the control (#20) was easy to find by going along the slope and then up toward the road.

Ran further toward the road and then to the finish. Finish time: 68:09.
The time was an "OK one", #2 and #3 added minutes...
But I really enjoyed the course, and that's what counts, right?

Here is my route. Click on the image to enlarge. Blue - mostly running, yellow-brown - mostly walking.

From Orienteering