The Skills of Orienteering

This page is meant to give you some skills and techniques for learning and improving your orienteering. Whether you are new to orienteering, an intermediate orienteer who is still getting lost from time to time, or a seasoned veteran, we hope you will find tips here to improve your skills. If some of you very seasoned veterans have some tips to share, please send them along to

First - for the beginner orienteer - here is an excellent site which gives some basic pointers such as map orientation, keeping in touch with the map (thumbing and map folding) and use of handrails.

Now, with those thoughts in mind - try to walk through this course

You can handle all that and you are now running the intermediate courses - but Whoa - what are all these symbols in place of words describing the control locations? Check this PDF for a full description of the international symbols and print off your own copy from our IOF page. and try this quiz to help you learn them

For a version en français, try this this

Still having difficulty relating some of those features to a map? This visual glossary relates the international symbols and orienteering terminology to features on a map.

Whether you are a beginner or advanced orienteer, it is important to understand that maps can indicate forbidden areas. That is, areas deemed dangerous or private and it is forbidden to enter or cross so that we can continue to enjoy fair and safe orienteering while respecting the land owners and environments in which our races take place.

For local events, suffice it to keep the following few rules in mind:

  • Do not enter private property - marked on the map as lime green
  • do not enter bodies of water with solid lines bordering them
  • do not cross fences marked with double hatches
  • do not enter cultivated fields
  • do not enter out of bounds areas marked with red vertical cross lines

For a full explanation of this rather complex matter, see this discussion at http://www.barebones.ca/2010%20Forbidden%20features.pdf. Anyone travelling to competitive meets should read this article.

Of course, the best place to develop your skills is in the woods. The Ottawa Orienteering Club often offers training courses at beginner and intermediate levels to help you enjoy the sport. See the local events page for details.

Finally, once you finish a run, whether you finish the course or not, report to the finish and share your experience with others. Use the Sport Ident split times to see which legs you did well and talk to others to see how you might have done better on other legs.