Orienteering at school for ages 13-15, Chapter 9: WE ARE APPROACHING THE EARTH!

WE ARE APPROACHING THE EARTH!

The spacecraft is approaching the Earth and from above, we can see the “small ball” getting bigger and bigger. We can identify Europe, Greenland, North Africa, Asia and the Atlantic Ocean. The closer we get, the more countries we recognise. Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland are right in front of us, Iceland top left and UK bottom left. Gotland is clearly visible in the Baltic Sea as are the white icecaps in Norway and Iceland.

We steer the spacecraft towards the West part of Sweden and suddenly the main road E6 between Gothenburg and Oslo appears like a winding snake through the county Bohuslän. The braking rockets light up and it’s time for landing. The goal is Fjällbacka School in the village that have become famous by Camilla Läckberg’s detective stories. The roundabout appears a little weak at long range, but becomes clearer as we get closer. This roundabout is our “last safe” or “attack point” to find the school as fast as possible.

In the lower right corner we get glimpse of a brown area, the school’s football field. We focus on the brown rectangle, flying a few laps over the area. We see the school’s characteristic features and gymnastics hall clearly. We land softly on the southern part of the ball court, right next to the gymnastics hall.

The map is a simplified representation of reality and the smaller the area you want to draw, the more detail you can put on the map. On the Google Earth picture you can see houses and roads very clearly, but you can even discover trees, play equipment and soccer goals. This means that a map of a school and school yard can be very detailed. This is very important when you learn to navigate. What you see in reality is included on the map. The map becomes credible and students trust what the map shows. Having a reliable map is what makes orienteering fun!

All maps in this booklet are drawn in the international map norm for sprint maps (ISSOM). The colours are logical and easy to understand. All houses are grey, all roads are light brown, lawns are yellow and trees are green. Fences, walls and other manmade objects are black. All that is wet is blue, e.g. lakes, streams, wells and ponds are drawn in blue. The olive green colour denotes private areas and flower beds. More colours and map symbols are described on the following pages.

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