The minis in the mist and the murk and the mud!

It was the final day of the JK International Orienteering Festival today - Relay Day with teams of three competing in a range of age classes.

The bad news was that the winter weather front went through overnight so we awoke to snow and mist and an assembly area thick in mud.  Good job orienteers are bonkers folk who enjoy these conditions....

Tony was running second in his team so he disappeared off to the changeover pen fairly quickly.  I was running third in my team so I planned on taking some photos before my run, but my camera refused to work in the dampness, so I took my time getting changed before entering the pen and freezing for thirty minutes before Sue arrived in the  run-in skilfully negotiating the mud which had already taken out several speedy competitors.

Team-mate Lindsey had warned me about the rhododendrons which meant that I visited every bush trying to find my first control....and my run went downhill from there...literally, in the mud!  So I think I went out in 9th position and came in, in 11th, sorry team!

Our club tent was sitting in liquid mud so we had to bodily lift it and walk it through tent city to a patch of grass to pack it away - we are not looking forward to that job tomorrow!  Then it was time to get changed without covering ourselves, our luggage and our clean clothes in goo.  Tony helped push out a large volvo and came back with his clean jeans covered in mud!

Three hours later and we were home and bathed and fed and finally warm.

So my only blip of the day is this one of the minis starting their relay, you can just about make them out in the murk.  It's a tradition that they go off first and are hugely cheered by the spectators.