Springton Manor Thanks
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Topic created by Dasha on Sun Jul 22, 2012 at 6:04 pmThanks to Fred Reed, as well as to Bailey and Sam Reed and all others who helped with this fun-filled event at Springton Manor! The courses were fast, fun, with plenty of route choice. Many new orienteers took part in the training exercises with lots of smiling faces after the event! Thanks Fred!
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Reply by camperpat on Mon Jul 23, 2012 at 8:15 amWhat a great day orienteering! Cool temperatures, the park was beautiful, full of wild flowers and deer. The course was fun, the creek i crossed cooled me some more. And all the wild blackberries I stopped to eat really added time to my course, but I felt it was worth it. thanks the Burtons
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Reply by FredR on Mon Jul 23, 2012 at 8:35 amThanks to everyone that came out and made it the place to be on a Sunday afternoon. We had nearly 200 orienteers!
I'm grateful for all the people that pitched in, including helping out the crowd of new people into the sport. We wanted this to be a welcoming event for them and I think we succeeded. I hope everyone that wanted help got it.
Thanks to Mary Frank for jumping in at registration from the beginning and spending nearly the whole day there with a few scout training sessions thrown in the mix. Mark also provided a bunch of instructional help--and Michelle followed in their footsteps by taking a little girl under her guidance through the White course. Carol and Bob Fink, and Ron Barron were the early volunteers and jumped right in to get everything on the ground and tame the early hords that decended on the registration table. Special kudos to Patty Policelli for getting all those people into the epunch system--I speak from experience that it is a tough job to get right and do it quickly enough to keep the crowds from revolting.
Mike and Lisa Carter, Bob Gross, Dave Morgan, and Scott Thatcher pitched in at various times and were the all-important late crew to help gather controls and clean up the mess. Scott Thatcher wins the last-man-turn-out-the-lights award.
A special thanks go out to Robert Buraczynski for coming up from Deleware to hang controls on Saturday along with Sam and myself.
And I can't say enough about all the help I got from Sam and Bailey at all stages, from course design to cleaning up. They were everywhere yesterday.
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Reply by anniemac on Mon Jul 23, 2012 at 2:28 pmIt was a really nice day, and I enjoyed moving up from Yellow to Orange at this venue. It was a confidence-building experience! Thank you, Fred, for the great communication you gave prior to the event, and to all those involved in helping out.
I've been doing a lot of "training" lately, and thought myself quite dedicated to improving my orienteering skills as of late. However my dedication pales in comparison to that of a young Lithuanian who my Dad (Hugh) and I ran into as we were leaving for the day. He was walking along the road, about 2 miles out from Springton Manor, at 12:30pm, looking like...well, an orienteer. It was Mari Jonas, the fellow looking for transport earlier in the week to the event, and unfortunately, no one was able to give him assistance. That did not stop him. So eager was he to participate in this sport, and so steadfast from hearing the words of his father who orienteered 'without cars to take us to events', Mari decided he would get there somehow. This was his journey, one way:
Bus from Atlantic City to Philly: 62 miles
Train from Philly to Downington: 37 miles
WALK from Downington to Springton Manor: 7 miles (minus the 2 we drove him back)
When we asked him which course he'd be competing in, his reponse was, "the longest one." So add 6 km to Mari's day. How's that for dedication?
And does anyone know if he got home alright?
Ann MacMullan -
Reply by camperpat on Mon Jul 23, 2012 at 6:19 pmThis message is for Mari Jonas, coming from the shore . If you ever need a ride again, we live near the train station in New Jersey and can pick u up in Acto or in Lindenwald. camperpat@hotmail.com e-mail me
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Reply by churchill31 on Mon Jul 23, 2012 at 7:38 pmWe just wanted to thank everyone who took time out of their busy day to help us try to improve our orienteering skills. Thanks especially to Fred Reed for being so encouraging and to Mark Frank for taking us out on the intermediate training course to explain the meaning of the words that we hear so much in the orienteering world. You are all a great bunch and we so look forward to coming out and actually finding our way through the woods.
Dave and Joanne -
Reply by CarolKlu on Tue Jul 24, 2012 at 6:34 pmThanks to everyone for a wonderful day at Springton Manor! Thanks Fred! My daughter Dana brought her friend Dan for his first orienteering course and he really enjoyed the day. I'm thinking they will be back for more (actually they are planning to go to the events at Frances Slocum)
As for Mari Jonas - we know he at least got back to Philly ok. We drove him to the Paoli train station where he had to wait less than 10 minutes to get the train back to Phila. He also told us about his dad who walked (or ran) to orienteering events when he was in school. Mari orienteered for his school and they took school buses to the events.
