Green Ridge Rogaine

On saturday, the SVO (Susquehanna Orienteering Club), in conjunction with Garrett College of Adventure Sports, organized a long-range orienteering event called Rogaine. Sherpes, Hung Like This, and Just Dave, formed a team and named themselves "Three Guys, Three Rivers", since we were all from the Pittsburgh area. Sherpes had already done a rogaine the year before, in Allegany State Forest in New York, although he only did the six-hour event. Just Dave did the Night-O and the Boyce Park O-meet organized by WPOC, the Western Pennsylvania Orienteering Club. Hung Like This runs with the Hash House Harriers. On friday afternoon, we drove for three hours to the Green Ridge State Forest, located 20 miles east of Cumberland, Maryland. After pitching tent, eating a pasta dinner that was cooked at 4 PM, and it was still warm in its pot, and listening to the mandatory 8:30 meeting, we then retreated to the dining building and talked strategy. We were given a couple of topo maps that had trails on it that were not on the orienteering maps given to us, and with a red pen, we marked those trails on our maps. The dining hall closed at 10 PM, and we finished the strategizing on a picnic table outside. Then it was bed time. The background noise of the adjacent I-68 highway was present all night. But we got our good sleep. At 5:20, we rushed out, quickly prepared ourselves, and at 5:40 we got our safety briefing. Five minutes later, the rogaine was officially started. We weren't quite ready, so we walked back to our car, picked up the compasses and whistles, and set out on our "intent" itinerary. Just dave had a camelback with some munchies and medical tape and few other accessories, Hung Like This had a water bottle belt and a water filter (in case if we needed to get water from streams), Sherpes had a water bottle belt. We all had running shoes, long pants, and short-sleeve shirt. Temperature was not going to exceed 75, not oppressive has the day before. Leaves were wet from the rain of the day before.
From past experience with Score courses, we decided to leave the easy ones near base camp to the final 30 minutes. Since we asked if walking on the interstate was not against the rules, we planned to reach the north-east corner of the map where there were several high-value controls, then work pretty much clock-wise.
Our first control to target was 30. Clue sheet indicated a reentrant. We looked for it, but never found it. Climbed the hill back, and tried a different reentrant. No avail. We decided not to waste any more time, we crossed the creek, followed it downstream, reached a forest road, and eventually got us where the control with highest points was located, 71.
Control 71 turned out to be very easy. We found it at 7:30 AM.
Our next control was going to be 67. We wanted to reach the creek below and from there, take a direct climb on a hill to reach the control area, but we did not recognize well which side stream was which, and we ended up walking downstream on numerous bends. Eventually we took a spur to gain high ground, reached the control area, looked for it for a good 20 minutes, and after repeated attack points used, Just Dave found it, to our great relief. Time was 6:10 AM.
From control 67, we went straight down to a road located south. We followed the road, then left it to follow a wash in downstream direction hoping to find a spur nearby. We never found the "stream intersection" and instead followed a very evident spur, then abbandoned, followed the stream upstream, got back to where we were before, but in a hunch, followed a slope next to the creek and found the control. Time was 9:07 AM. Later, talking to other Rogainers, everyone said how hard this was.
With a mix of bushwacking and trail, we found the reentrant where control 51 was. Time was 7:45.
From there, we wanted to reach control 60. Once we were on top of the ridge, we weren't sure if it was where we wanted to be, so we ran portions of trail to verify our location. Eventually, we found 60 on a saddle point, after being tricked into an other saddle point. Time was 10:15 AM.
From there, we quickly descented the hills and reached stream and road below. From the road at a hairpin turn, we quickly found control 55. Time was 10:50 AM.
Our next control was to go pretty much directly to control 50. What happened is that we missed the spur directly north of control 55, and instead followed a spur that was going west. We realized the mistake, talked a bit, one of us wanted to descent down to the creek and climb the hill again, this time going north. We eventually decided instead to continue going west until a road was found, then follow the road to an easy trail leading to the control, which we found quickly at 11:30 AM.
Back on the road, we walked until we found a water stop, marked on the map with a yellow star.
From there we went straight West to find control 42 on a spur. It wasn't that evident, so it took some time. Time was 12:25.
From there, we continued west, gained a road, then followed a wide ATV trail, and easily found 35. Time was 12:45.
Continuing on the ATV trail, we spent an excessive amount of time trying to find 45. Eventually, we gave up, and decided to continue on the ATV trail to a side trail leading to a reentrant near the control. This trail was our "catching feature". We finally found it. Time was 1:30 PM.
Continuing on the wide ATV trail, we met a family of five that said they could not find 61 and 66. We started looking for 61, and after three passes, it was finally found. What happened is that the stream that we followed upstream actually has a stream intersection, and the spur was between the two streams. Time was 2:20 PM.
Control 66 was incredibly easy. We found it in 10 seconds after leaving the trail.
From there we bushwacked to a stream below and followed a trail until we could recognize two side streams coming from SE, and thus identify the spur between the two. Found it at 3:20 PM.
From there, we climbed a hill towards control 41. From a road "Y" intersection, we got our bearings, and walked downhill looking for a spur. We found many, but no control. Then, after criss-crossing numerous times the terrain, had a hunch, followed a reentrant downhill, and from down below, saw an obviously identifiable spur, and after climbing it, saw the glow of white and orange decal. This was a tough one. Time was 4:05 PM.
At this point, we started organizing our On-In. To finish the 12-hour rogaine, we had to be at base camp before 5:45 PM, with penalty of 10 points per minute late. Back on the road, and for a long straight line, we then left it and walked downhill in the dry seasonal stream (clue has it marked as reentrant)looking for control 31 and found without problems. Time was 4:45 PM.
From there, we walked/jogged on the road, towards base camp. In our intentions, we wanted to get control 25 from the horse-shoe turn, and then back to the road to camp, but we were out of time. We easily bagged controls 11 and 10 on the way. We arrived at the finish line at 5:31 PM.
Bananas, oranges, cookies were devoured, other rogainers slumped on the grass unable to stand or move. The SVO folks quickly checked the control cards and computed to score totals. Among the six-hour participants, the highest score was in the high 300's. Among the mixed gender teams doing the 12-hour event, the highest score was in the 500's. Among the men doing the 12-hour team, third place had 703 points, second had 720, and first had 817. The team "3 guys, 3 rivers", had the top score.
We talked a bit with the other rogainers, and discussed which controls were the hardest. Many said that 67 and 65 absorbed an hour each, preventing some from having time left to find 71. While we found 71 easily from a trail, many had a hard time finding it coming from 67. Some people found 60 hard to find because of the saddle before another saddle where the control was at. The only control that we attempted and that we did not find was 30. Asking around if anyone found it, nobody could answer because no one attempted it, so it is still a mistery where it actually is.

Using Google Map Pedometer, we routed the itinerary and found to have walked about 31 miles. If we had found the controls immediately and using our intended and more optimal route , we would have walked about 25 miles.