Syracuse Parks & Facilities

About the Course & Markers

Welcome to the Jensen Park Orienteering Course (JPOC). The course itself is made up of many separate courses of varying degrees of difficulty. All courses start at the footbridge south of the Bowery at orienteering control point E. A control point is an orange and white marker set in concrete on the ground with the words JPOC and a unique letter on each marker. The unique letter is how you identify each control point.  This course has not been updated or maintained for several years.

Pace Course

The course also includes a 100-meter pace course for determining pace count. The 100-meter pace course also starts at orienteering control point E. Walk at a magnetic heading of 280 degrees towards the southwest corner of the north parking lot and you will find another control point labeled 100-meter. The distance between this point and the start point at control point E is 100 meters.

Methods of Navigation

There are many different methods which can be used to navigate the course:

• You may choose to navigate the courses using just a compass and bearings.
• You may use a global positioning system (GPS) to navigate the course using the GPS coordinates (World Geodetic System 84 datum) provided.
• You may simply use the map and try to locate the points using park landmarks to help you find the points.

Compass Courses

The compass course is based on three levels of difficulty: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. These courses meet the requirements for the Boy Scout Orienteering merit badge.

• The beginner courses (PDF) are intended to be short (approximately 1 kilometer) and provide few obstacles to allow users to practice basic compass work and distance utilizing their pace count.
• The intermediate courses (PDF) are intended to be longer (approximately 2 to 3 kilometers) and involve obstacles which require offsets and orienteering over longer legs. The intermediate course meets the orienteering requirements for the Boy Scout First Class rank.
• The advanced courses (PDF) are the longest and most challenging and contain large obstacles that present a challenge to navigate around.

GPS Courses

In addition to the traditional compass courses, JPOC can be navigated as a GPS course. The GPS courses (PDF) are also divided as beginner, intermediate, and advanced based on the number of points and the distance between the points. The GPS coordinates for all sixteen control points are listed on the advanced GPS course.

Map & Landmarks Course Navigation

Finally, the course can be navigated utilizing only the course map (PDF) and using landmarks on the ground to locate the control points.

Checking Your Navigation

However, you choose to navigate the course, we hope you have a good time. Once you have completed the course utilize the Answer Key Sheets (PDF) to see how you did. Good luck and enjoy the course!