Discussion: Looked at your leg comments...

Looked at your leg comments from Hurd and thought I should mention one thing that really stood out to me. Had to do with controls 8 and 10. In both cases you thought you were looking for a boulder. In both cases it seemed to me you weren't processing how the boulder sat in relation to the contours (or other features on the map). And it would have helped if you had.

#10 first. About when I passed the two large boulders, I noticed (on the map) that the boulder I was looking for was on the back left side of a small knoll. I looked up, there was the knoll, so I knew exactly where to go. It wasn't until I got closer that I saw the boulder, but this made it really easy.

#8. The clue was actually a spur, but even if it had been a boulder, you should have been looking for a boulder on a small spur past the first green patch and before the second. I could see the spur from some distance. Quite easy. Whereas there were boulders scattered around, some mapped and some not (properly). You could spend a lot of time running around checking boulders, and get quite lost in the process.

Get more used to seeing how the boulder sits in its surroundings and you'll spend a lot less time looking for them. :-)

(properly) - Are you saying the “not mapped” were good off or should have been included? As you note, there are a lot of boulders in that area. So two problems - locate them and decide if they should be added. Struggled with both issues there and welcome feedback. Generally used a hip height rule for adding. Difficult when an almost is much wider than high.

Agreed - on #10 the double large boulder were my attackpoint, so navigation up to that point was to them, and as I approached them I noted my boulder should be on the end of the knoll, which is where I started moving to my right.

#8 I definitely should have been looking for the spur but my initial goal was to navigate to just past the the first patch of green, then dial it in closer - my problem was the first patch of laurel (very light green) wasn't mapped so I pulled up just before the first mapped patch. I don't always unfold the map to check descriptions - had I been using separate descriptions, spur would have been on my radar from the beginning, as it was I didn't pick up that from what I was envisioning from the map.

Thanks for the input, it is much appreciated..

George -- I thought the mapping of the boulders was fine. No complaints at all.

From an participants point of view, there are usually much easier ways of telling which of those carefully mapped boulders you want to go than by just looking at boulders. If you get used to doing that, you make the O' much simpler.

Thanks. Even after all that careful time in the area, i still must stop and study it carefully before trying to use any as a feature. Great things, but which is it. Certainly not worth it for the Winter Series.

George, several specific comments about the map. They are all prefaced by the following -- I was surprised to see something. That doesn't mean the mapping was right or wrong, just that I was surprised.

Number 3 (these are all on the medium course). I was surprised by how deep and steep the reentrant was. It might show it better with a slight adjustment of the contour lines. (Or it might be just fine as is. I wasn't standing around to think about mapping.)

#4, there was a small but noticeable spur parallel to the one with the control but NW of it so I ran into it first, small but obvious. I looked for the marker there first. There is a little bit of a spur mapped there, but it doesn't extend much. Maybe a use for a form line? Don't know, I moved on when the marker wasn't there, only then being surprised to notice the bigger spur ahead of me, where the marker was.

I left #10, headed east then turned SE along the marsh (on the E side of the marsh). I was expecting some thick vegetation at the start. Surprised not to see anything much thick?

#12, lots of mountain laurel around the top of the hill. I was surprised not to see any green on the map. When I neared the control, going through the laurel, it was pretty easy to get through. So maybe a case of visually thick but not actually thick?

All are pretty trivial but I thought you might be interested. I don't know what you had for a lidar contour plot. When I did Earl's Trail, Eddie made me a plot with 1-meter lines. The lines were really good, so I mostly just used the 5-meter lines as is. But sometimes something wasn't quite right. The info was usually just sitting in the contour line a meter or two higher or lower, so I just grabbed that. Don't know if you had anything similar.

Thanks again for doing the map and setting up the courses. Really enjoyed it.

Thanks for the comments. And glad you enjoyed it.

3. I think this is an old mica quarry like those above 4. I do have 1m contours and will look at those for this and your other comments. As shown the reentrant is at least 10m deep. Is that enough? Seemed about right.

4. The smaller reentrant is carefully hidden under the circle. My bad. Should have cut it or moved enough to expose the line. I assumed use of the trail to the quarries on the L and then attack.

10. There are a few veg issues I need to deal with. Thanks for reminding me of this one.

12. I also was surprised by the laurel. Don’t remember it from our setting excursion. Should examine this area too. It is light greenish and may not have registered. I was more concerned about impassable stuff. And making sure the courses worked. Like the stream and green just S of the road crossing to 10.