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Holyrood Parkrun Takeover and Taster Session - Saturday 12th October 2024
Interlopers took over the Holyrood Parkrun on Saturday, and provided an orienteering taster session afterwards ...
It started with a rainbow: the park was looking beautiful as Parkrun was getting set up with the sun picking out autumn colours in the trees by Holyrood Palace, complemented by the orange-and-white kites starting to appear around the green... It felt auspicious for the Interlopers Orienteering Club Takeover at Holyrood Parkrun and an opportunity to share the joy of orienteering with runners who might like the chance to try out a new sport after their lap of Arthur’s Seat. However, we all know what rainbows mean – there’s a lot of water around and sure enough it headed our way!
Nonetheless, the eighteen Interlopers who pitched out to support Parkrun were glad to do so, with the usual good craic with familiar and new faces. Many of us are regulars at a Parkrun somewhere and it’s really nice to support the Holyrood one as local to many of us. Given that there’s also an orienteering map of the park, it was also a great opportunity to put up an introductory course for those curious to try out and see how orienteering could make a fun and different type of run (many thanks to the Holyrood Park Rangers for permission, Edinburgh University Orienteering Club for use of the map and Mairi Eades for planning). After all, who wouldn’t want to test their map-reading skills after exhausting themselves going round Arthur’s Seat in the freezing rain? Just channel your inner sat-nav and enjoy the challenge!
As ever there was a good crowd of runners, some from as far afield as Queensland Australia. This event was a great example of how complementary Parkrun and orienteering are, with a significant overlap in their communities in terms of interests in being active outdoors. Many orienteers are Parkrun regulars so the chances of meeting one on a Saturday morning are quite high. It was nice to spot some Moravian, West Cumberland, East Lothian, and Edinburgh South orienteers amongst the crowd today.
Many thanks to Holyrood Parkrun for having us along, and to everyone who came up to find out more about what we do!
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