David Currie

102After the England-Paraguay match was over we headed out to Bordon Heath again to tag control sites. It was nice to be there in the sunshine for a change although let’s hope it isn’t quite so hot on the day or there will be juniors melting all over the place! At least they won’t have to experience the assortment of midges and mossies that abounded when we finally left around half nine in the evening. I didn’t envy the army cadets who were out on the area under canvas. As predicted, the bracken is now over a metre high in some places but in general it shouldn’t impede progress too much although later runners may benefit from elephant tracks in to a few controls. The stinging nettles are also pretty viscious but are mercifully few and far between.

Spent a large part of today planning courses for the Junior Inter-Regional Champs individual day to be held on Bordon Heaths on 24 June. We have deliberately planned the courses long as previous events on the area indicate that times will be fast. However, running some of the legs later in the day revealed that all of the recent rain seems to be bringing the bracken on nicely in some parts. Nettles are also starting to take hold in some potential control sites so we’ll have to watch how things change over the next month.

Came across the interesting OpenStreetMap project which aims to create copyright free geographic data. Participants in the project are asked to upload GPS tracks and/or convert the tracks in to labelled features. The project seems to have a good start in Southampton with a recent weekend workshop also aiming to map the Isle of Wight. If I ever have a spare couple of hours at home (unlikely I know) then I’d be tempted to head out and fill in a few major roads around our house.