Before I start this trip report, Katie would like it prefaced that the main thing that occurred on this trip was in fact orienteering, despite what this report makes it seem.
To start our trip in the usual chaotic manner, Harry Bratcher-Howard forgot his shoes, had to return to his accommodation which then led to him dropping all of his stuff down the stairs, before a search party was required to go and collect him. Down at Green Park Sainsburys, Alexandra brought enough layers and snacks for a week long trip while Hugh packed extremely sparingly with only one small backpack. Will continued his streak of not being able to fill up an MPV, but this time he got the diesel all over his hands. Starting the jam led to many interesting song requests, including Let It Go from Frozen which led to renditions of the song from both vehicles. Katie was under the impression that, after living in Wales most of her life, she could navigate successfully. Regardless of this, she took a turn out of the services that took us back along the M4 to Bath. Even with this detour, we arrived at Pen Rhiw Wen with a lot of time to do some courses on the fell, but not before doing the control description game and getting some funny looks from the other Universities that were there. There was a range of courses planned for our training, including some compass challenges, corridors and long legs. Katie and Harry F went out on the long legs course and, in an attempt to slow Harry down, Katie did some coaching for how to orienteer on fell which includes looking for big features like contours and ridges, and using them to determine where you are. For lunch, Will brought uncooked microwaveable rice and a curry – maybe he thought that there would be a microwave on the fell? To finish off the training part of the weekend, there was an inter-university 2 x 2 relay.
On the way to the night event at Briton Ferry Woods, Hugh lost his song request privileges for the rest of the weekend after he suggested Everything is Awesome from the Lego Movie. At the night event, Harry Bratcher-Horizon made another appearance with his headtorch that is probably brighter than the sun. I’m sure he was glad to have a map with detail on it, unlike the cursed ghost map he had for SpookO. Everyone enjoyed the night event, with some amazing results from Ed with 420 points, Joel and Katie both with 500 points, a true changing of the guard for our orienteering secs. Katie attributes part of her result to the stress-inducing fireworks going off nearby making the woodland feel like a warzone. Nothing like mild PTSD to make you run your best!
Despite vague communication with UBOC, the food shop was completed – somehow with much more food than was on the shopping list. Food prep was quite chaotic with all of us crying over onions, Katie vehemently disagreeing with the addition of mushrooms into our pasta sauce, and Will deciding that we needed to organise cooking tasks as if we were trying to obtain Mahara skills (lucky IMEE students?). Luckily, Ed and Will have backup careers if engineering doesn’t work out – they plan to become dinner ladies (direct quote from Edward Stockham himself).
Thanks to one of the university’s pet warthog snoring all night (phrasing courtesy of Adam), most of us didn’t sleep very well. If anyone was asleep, they surely awoke to the song that played as an alarm at 6am. For those who went on Fresher’s Trip, it would have been an unwelcome flashback to being woken up at 7am by Christmas Is All Around. Unlike on Summer Trip, Alexandra did not migrate into anyone’s beds during the night; possibly because Katie poked her in the ribs in the middle of the night when she started to drift towards Katie’s mat in her sleep.
With a yellow warning of rain ahead of us, we headed to Kenfig Burrows for our final part of the weekend. Will and the MPV team almost didn’t make it as he almost missed the turn to the event location. We had some fabulous results with Ethan and Pip both winning their courses, Harry B-H having a very speedy run despite a knee injury, and everyone got some good experience on orienteering on sand dunes which was a new type of area for many - good preparation for BUCS at Merthyr Mawr. Most of us settled into the navigation as the event went on, and it was a mostly enjoyable area until you had to go up an extremely steep sand dunes for the run in. Will had uncooked microwaveable rice for lunch again, maybe he just can’t get enough of crunchy rice. Being the model citizens that we are, we donated to the Welsh Junior Squad – for some cakes in return but it’s the thought that counts?
On the way back to Bath, there was lots of rain so we couldn’t see much on the motorway, warranting some rude gestures between the drivers when the MPV cut in front of Katie’s car (aka Peggy the Kia Picanto). Alexandra was in full control of the music in the car this weekend, which meant she could finally play some Hozier without her choices being removed from the jam and replaced with Wurzels songs.
Thank you everyone for such a fun weekend and thanks to Katie for all the amazing planning that made it run so smoothly; hope everyone had a great time!
Alexandra
BUMC Orienteering Captain 25/26