The art of navigation

Really productive last two days for me, attending a two-day workshop for Providers of the National Navigation Award Scheme. The idea was to learn and share ideas for teaching navigation, moving away from the "traditional" ways of teaching hill navigation, and thinking afresh. Lots of great ideas to maximise time and help clients "visualise" what they should be doing, as well as learning by doing and not in the classroom. Plenty of things for me to think about and incorporate into our
existing courses to make them even better. Thanks to Nigel Williams for delivering the course, and to James Woodhouse from Lathallan School for hosting and organising the conference. Great stuff.

Contours in the classroom

Contours outside

How best to introduce the compass....?

National Navigation Award Scheme (Silver)

Over in the West Highlands around Fort William and Kinlochleven over the last couple of days running a private National Navigation Award Scheme (NNAS) Silver course for new client Heidi. Heidi had plenty of experience in less mountainous parts of the UK and had previously completed her NNAS bronze award. A good feel for the map and how it relates to the ground meant she had a strong base to build on, and it was great to see her progress over the two days. We spent two long days looking at taking a bearing from map to ground and following it accurately, measuring distance travelled using timing and/or pacing, coarse vs fine navigation and attack points, aiming off etc etc. By the end of the two days she had more than shown her ability to navigate accurately across stretches of open country. The first day we made use of the hills to the South of Roybridge and the River Spean, on the second we were in the unfrequented hills to  the east of Kinlochleven. Both of these venues were perfect for our purposes, and even the mist and drizzle was a bonus for these days, really allowing some "poor visibility" navigation. A Pass at Silver award for Heidi---well done and thanks for your company.

For more info on the NNAS scheme see our webpage:

http://www.onhighhills.com/navigation/

Winter Navigation Workshop

Yesterday I was a delegate at the Mountain Training Association (MTA) winter weekend, hosted at Glenmore Lodge. I attended the Winter Navigation workshop as part of my Continuing Professional Development. We had a great instructor, Nick, and we spent the day navigating around some of the lower slopes on Cairngorm, looking specifically at how to 'winterise' navigation. In the evening there were two excellent talks, one on the history of navigation (really interesting), and one on decision making in avalanche terrain. Only a couple of hasty phone pictures from the day-----too busy concentrating! Many thank to the MTA and Glenmore Lodge for putting on such a great event for MTA members.

The other side of Cairngorm

Out with Alex today to do some navigation training. I set him a mixture of legs on the quieter side of Cairngorm, which he accomplished well.  We looked at some techniques and little things that can help a lot.  As an interval we visited the El Alamein Refuge. This is tucked well away and not marked on any maps, and although in disrepair still has a great atmosphere. It is one of two huts (the other being the now dismantled St Valery) built in the Cairngorms to commemorate the 51st Highland Division. Weather was overcast and drizzly, but not much wind. Burns all in spate after the recent heavy rains, glad no river crossings required today.