Saturday 13th June - 11.00am

That’s the start of a fun day for all the family.

What is orienteering? It’s kind of treasure hunting; kind of - but without the treasure… you have to work out where the clues are by reading the map, you find the clues, once you’ve gone to all the places marked on the map you’ve finished! Like all great occupations, it’s simple and fun (if you think different click on the comment bit below and tell us what it really is).

We’ve linked up with the National Trust to bring you an introductory day (or half a day - or less!) In the morning, you get to learn about map reading and have a go on the ‘nursery slopes’ at the southern end of Carding Mill Valley (where you come in). We’ll have people to help you and you can do several orienteering routes if you want. We do ask - actually we insist - that children are accompanied by an adult; all the slopes are pretty steep and you can fall over and so on.

Once you’ve got good at it you can have a go at the competitive routes that start from the top car park in the afternoon.  It’s still fun, and we’ll still have people at certain points trying to make sure you don’t get totally lost, but this time you can win prizes!

It’s deliberately cheap to enter (£3 for up to a group of four people), and you get to take home an orienteering map from Carding Mill Valley which means you can do it again as often as you like, using all the different routes shown on it.

So how exactly does this save the planet?

Whilst you’re orienteering your carbon footprint is zero. Definitely better than car treasure hunts. Or watching telly.