If you grew up in or around Toronto, you had at least one class trip to the Burrlington Outdoor Resource Centre, more commonly known as BORC.
I loved field trips. There’s nothing I enjoy more than being anywhere other than where I am. And field trips were like recess on steroids. Getting out of the classroom and clambering onto a filthy school bus filled with ripped seats, loud kids, an annoyed bus driver and even more annoyed teacher - nothing beats it.
BORC was presumably an excursion meant to expand our knowledge of plants and woodland creatures (I think), but was really more of an excuse to let loose children for an afternoon unsupervised. At least, it was back then.
In the morning we went on a guided tour/nature walk - having animal scat pointed out while some kids squealed in disgust and learning the difference between deciduous and coniferous trees. After that it was lunch at the resource centre lodge - and then the real fun began.
Orienteering.
Orienteering is a scavenger hunt combined with ‘outdoor adventure activities’ using a map and a compass to find the items on the list. But this being an educational trip, it was also a science lesson about the food chain in Ontario forests.
Every kid would choose from a bag a card that said either ‘carnivore’, ‘omnivore’ or ‘herbivore’. Part of the scavenger hunt was finding food for ‘your’ animal - and if you were a herbivore - you could be eaten by classmates. Get eaten three times and you were out of the game.
When it was my turn, I reached into the bag and pulled out disaster. The worst possible draw. A field mouse. The lowest on the food chain. The herbivore that could be eaten by omnivores AND carnivores. Even worse - I was paired with another field mouse.
One of my less admirable qualities is being wildly competitive about the most insignificant things. My secret shame as a kid was how much I loathed getting participation ribbons or being picked last for any team, my body refusing to move quickly or agilely - always the weakest link in Red Rover.
But BORC orienteering, I was confident I could win. It would just take some cunning and ingenuity.
I came up with a foolproof plan. I turned to my partner and gave her the instructions. We would take off immediately when they said ‘go’ and run as far as we could in a single direction. That way nobody would catch up with us. We’d escape detection for a while and then quietly head back to look for the scavenger hunt items. Being the middle child of three girls, I excelled at being invisible. There was no way this couldn’t work.
But, it wasn’t too long before I realized my grave miscalculation. A plan can’t be foolproof when designed by a fool.
We were completely lost.
The good lord blessed me with many things, but a sense of direction was not one of them. As my dad was fond of saying, ‘the journey of a thousand miles starts when Ruth gives directions.’
Neither of us knew how to use a compass, and even if we did - we had no clue where we supposed to be going anyway. These were the days before cell phones, we weren’t even wearing watches. We didn’t know how far we’d gone, or for how long. The scavenger hunt clues were no help at all.
Still, I was determined we were going to win. I figured we couldn’t have gone that far and if we just kept walking we would eventually stumble onto the scavenger hunt items.
But, every time we heard a noise in the bushes or voices I would make us flee in the opposite direction and create even more distance between us and the finish line. Every rumble was a possible carnivore or omnivore coming to claim us. I couldn’t let that happen.
Eventually it dawned on me that we might be in trouble. I conceded leadership and my partner took over the compass. We meandered aimlessly. I started to feel kinship with my people who wandered the desert for 40 years.
And then - from the distance we heard the clamour of voices. It was our teacher, one of the BORC staff and some extremely irritated looking classmates.
‘Where have you been? We’ve been looking for you everywhere.’ We had been saved. We weren’t going to die somewhere in the woods of Kleinburg, Ontario.
Tired and relieved, we trudged back to the lodge. The game was over and we were already late to be heading home.
Still, I had a burning question. I turned to the BORC guide who had found us.
‘Did we win?’
‘Just get on the bus.’
Technically, it wasn’t a yes, but even more technically - it wasn’t a no. And, everyone had to stop what they were doing and divert all their attentions and energy into me. That almost made me a celebrity. A pyrrhic victory perhaps, but a quasi win nonetheless for this little field mouse.
It was one of my better field trips.
The "field mouse" definitely won. I enjoy your storytelling Ruth!
I remember :)