Ski orienteering has been on our bucket list for some time now and this year we decided to commit and got our entries in. We have alpine skied for many years and although I did some cross country skiing as a teenager, Rory and Euan have never worn the skinny ski’s before. Unfortunately school sport prevented us arriving early so instead we hired equipment and turned up on the morning of the event and spent an hour slipping and sliding around until we started to feel a bit of control about our technique!
Although the snow was a little thin in places, it was a gorgeous blue sky day with the temperature far exceeding those cold Easter carnival days and some of the competitors wearing t shirts. The 30 competitors ranged from seasoned cross country skiers with little orienteering experience to seasoned orienteers with little (to zero) cross country skiing experience to those who only had a little of one or the other! Fortunately Marina and Fedor Iskhakova who had planned and organised the event and were on hand at the start to provide some guidance and help as required.
Due to the limited snow conditions the long course had a couple of loops and I found it reminded me of MTBO in that I couldn’t read my map whilst skiing so I had to use a bit of map memory to recall my route choices. It was absolutely stunning when out at the further parts of the map when there was nobody else around and just blue sky, snow and my own huffing and puffing!
The event was incredibly social with it all based out of the welcoming Nordic Shelter with big smiles, hot chocolates, lollies and oranges for all the finishers and big bars of chocolate for the prize getters! Rory and Euan enjoyed it so much we then went and covered another 10km afterwards which included playing in snow holes and meeting many of the other competitors who were exploring the trials they either didn’t cover or checking out where they made mistakes maybe!
If you’re like us and have thought about giving ski orienteering a go then I’d thoroughly recommend it and we will definitely be returning.
Angus Shedden
