Swanson Road

Swanson Road provides a mix of mid-Atlantic spur and reentrant terrain, combined with Patuxent River lowlands and marshes. Unlike Patuxent River Park, there are many steep areas at Swanson Road. Calculated climbs for each course may be low, depending upon the route choice. Although this year's event will probably occur before the first frost, visibility checks on site were actually a bit better than the map might indicate.
Rootstocks are not shown and none are used for controls.
Environmental sample wells are four-inch white plastic pipes scattered throughout the park and are shown on the map as blue Xs.
Other man-made special features include trail markers, decorative farm equipment, and the occasional old vehicle or other debris, all shown with black Xs. Some dump sites are not mapped, especially along Swanson Road Spur.

Wavy Leaf Basket Grass Alert
During our course design and site checks we found Wavy Leaf Basket Grass for the first time ever at Swanson Road. Courses avoid these areas, but we have marked the basemap with a unique out of bounds symbol to let our participants know where to avoid this invasive weed that limits our use of Patapsco Valley Parks. Here’s the symbol:

Rides aren’t so free. The terrain shows several rides which would seem at first to present high speed options – however, most have some amount of deadfall across them, or the surface may be obscured by ankle high vegetation.
The recently mowed trails around fields near our parking area are shown as rides-slow running. They still have some long grass and cut off saplings, which could make a hard stumble for the incautious.
The model aircraft airfield remains out of bounds, except around the edges, which is reflected on all appropriate maps – and no planned route choices should tempt participants to cross the actual airfield – If you feel the urge to sprint across the well-tended grassy open ground… curb that impulse – and stick to the edges.
The map has been updated to reflect the most recent status of the fields. In the north of the park, they were planted with sorghum and may be harvested by game day. If they are not harvested, route choices should be available that minimize crop damage by our participants.
Planted crop field edges are almost all good running.
Fields close to our parking area have been allowed to grow wild with nature working hard to reclaim them. One set of fields that was merely rough open a couple years ago is now full of waist-high blackberry and consequently mapped as dark green. Another field near our parking area has some blackberry, but is more appropriately mapped as rough open-scattered trees.
Most non-crop fields have chest-high growth.

Beginner Course Notes:
For the Beginners, the Green Trail which is used for much of the course has now been mowed, but will probably be slow running. See note above about recent mowing.
Beginner Course (White 1:5,000) Intended to provide an interesting tour of the Park’s trails near our parking and central operating team area.
Advanced Beginner Course (Yellow 1:5,000) Most controls can be found on or near the designated paths. At least one control requires a bit of off-trail work, but should reward the participant with a fun, hilltop view of our event. For some legs, a willingness to go cross country may yield faster times. Attention to detail will also be important, because some White controls will probably be encountered along the way.
For Yellow runners looking for a challenge, but not ready for Intermediate level courses, the Yellow-Long course may be preferred.
Second Advanced Beginner Course (Yellow-Long 1:7,500) This course is aimed at those Beginners almost ready to move up a level. This course takes a wider loop around the park, has some controls off the trail, but nearby, so they can be reattacked if needed – plus at least one leg that could be an Intermediate (Orange) leg if taken through the woods and not along paths.
Intermediate Course (Orange 1:7,500) This event’s Orange course is aimed at those confident Intermediate Orienteers preparing for their next step. This course covers much of the middle area of the park and features prominent landforms, strong handrails, and clear catching features. This course is also intended to give our Intermediate participants a taste of a slightly more complex presentation by using a two-sided map and should be a great introduction to those looking for a strong Orange test before leveling up.
Advanced Courses
Beige, Brown, 1:7,500
Green, Red, and Blue 1:10,000
Beige: Intended to provide fun orienteering challenges with limited climb and stream crossings. Aggressive, confident Orange runners may find this Beige a fun step up.
Brown, Green, Red, and Blue all use some portion of the relatively new northern portions of the park, with Blue making full use of the park. Where there are stream crossings, we confirmed that reasonable (feet dry, lower slope) options were available without deviating too far from the leg during site checks. The weather and your route choices may prove us wrong, but we tried.
Brown is a short advanced course designed to keep you off the trail and in the woods.
Green takes advantage of the park’s interior.
Red and Blue maximize use of the park with portions set in northern farmland, then south to a river’s edge view – and wrapping up with a woodland sprint.