Permanent O-Course at Hemlock Overlook

New Permanent O-Course at Hemlock Overlook

A brand new, permanent orienteering course has been installed at Hemlock Overlook Regional Park, near Clifton, Virginia! Designed by QOC's Tom Strat, and installed by Jim Harmon and his crew at the George Mason University outdoor education center, the layout of these controls offers a variety of year-round training opportunities or perhaps an easy way for club members to introduce friends or youth groups to the sport of orienteering.

Twenty wooden posts with 6" square orienteering symbols are waiting for you to find. Eight of the controls are mapped as a Beginner's Course (2.3 km), and the other twelve controls are mapped as a Score Course (3.3 km). Note: north/south lines are 500 meter apart

Beginners Course
start The gate
1 Trail junction
2 Dry ditch
3 Trail/stream junction
4 Foot of western cliff
5 Eastern ditch
6 Southwest rootstock
7 Trail junction
8 Trail/stream crossing
end The gate (same as start)

Beginners Course
start	The gate
1	Trail junction
2	Dry ditch
3	Trail/stream junction
4	Foot of western cliff
5	Eastern ditch
6	Southwest rootstock
7	Trail junction
8	Trail/stream crossing
end	The gate (same as start)

Score Course

Note: north/south lines are 500 meter apart

start		The gate
1	40 points	Hilltop
2	60 points	Southwest boulder
3	20 points	Stream/ditch junction
4	20 points	Hilltop
5	50 points	Rock outcrop
6	50 points	Clearing, east edge
7	30 points	Reentrant junction
8	40 points	Boulder field
9	30 points	Rootstock
10	20 points	Rootstock
11	70 points	Ditch junction
12	70 points	Northern knoll
end	The gate (same as start)

While the Score Course controls can be visited in any order try these sequences for training at a particular skill level:

Yellow: 6 controls, 2.3 km. Start - 4 - 1 - 2 - 9 - 10 - 7 - Finish.

Orange: 10 controls, 3.7 km. Start - 7 - 4 - 3 - 8 - 5 - 1 - 2 - 6 - 9 - 10 - Finish.

Green: 12 controls, 5.6 km. Start - 7 - 8 - 2 - 9 - 5 - 6 - 11 - 12 - 4 - 1 - 3 - 10 - Finish.

Master Maps for the courses are available from the QOC store, which is open during regular club meets.

The park is open year round, and is not terribly overgrown in the summer. Parking is free. To get to the park, take the Fairfax County Parkway to Ox Road (Route 123). Proceed south on Ox Road for ½ mile to Chapel Road (Route 641). Follow Route 641 west into Clifton, then south out of town. In about 0.8 miles, turn right onto Yates Ford Road and follow it until its end at the park. The Start/Finish point is the locked gate, as marked on the master map.

If you notice any damaged or missing posts, please report them to Tom Strat (email to strat@alum.mit.edu). Have fun!

Web master note: If you have a color printer and want to print out the map, the best way is to use Netscape. Place you mouse on the map and click on the right button of the mouse. Choose "view image" and print this. With Explorer, you need to save the map, then open the map file, zoon out if you want, and then print it.

Maps are copyrighted by Quantico Orienteering Club and may be used only for the trim courses.