The Cardinals make a disastrous mistake

We had never spent any time in Port Orchard, so it was great to have an excuse to go there for one of our favorite sports: Street Scramble! We decided to do this Street Scramble on foot, primarily because we already had two good scores in the family foot/pee-wee class for the series championship, but also because we've been having fun on foot this year.

We planned a route where we would hit all the close in checkpoints and then go east of Blackjack Creek, where it seemed there were more points available in the same area as to the west. Cameron and I planned our route this time, which got us 370 points (we were two minutes late--more on that below).

S-23-16-15-14-12-34-13-52-36-37-53-43-22-35-44-E

We got all the checkpoints in town in the first 30 minutes and headed out along the water to cross Blackjack Creek. We were excited to get all the way out on the pier for 53--and that checkpoint didn't disappoint. We got all our other planned checkpoints and arrived at 44 with 25 minutes left. We figured we needed about 20 minutes to get back from there (remember, Corinne, age 6, was traveling under her own power).

I argued for getting checkpoint 17 on the way back--it was just a slight detour down by the track at the school. I should have known better; ten point checkpoints are rarely worth the effort. Anyway, a gate was partially opened, so we went in, around the outside of the track (that was closed off because it was being painted) and discovered that 17 was a sign *on the other side of the fence*. There were no openings or gates on the fence. Gwen tried to climb the fence and ended up with multiple cuts before giving up. We figured there was no way the kids were going to be able to climb it. We followed the fence around and found *no way out* on the north side of the field. We ended up backtracking all the way back to 44 and, after wasting 10 minutes, ended up back on the road with only 15 minutes left. Corinne was already tired, so we did some light jogging and fast walking (which meant jogging/running for her just to keep up). We made pretty good time back, but got stuck at a red light in town for about a minute and ended up returning two minutes late. Not only did we not get the 10 points for checkpoint 17, we lost 20 points. The lesson is: never go for 10 point checkpoints unless you're absolutely sure about their location.

After all this, even getting 17 and returning on time wouldn't have changed our ranking (third) in family pee-wee. In hindsight, we should have gone for checkpoint 33 and tried to return on time.

All in all, we enjoyed the Port Orchard Street Scramble. Next year, consider offering a three hour option, too!