Event Areas

The main areas mapped for our events are listed below

The club has also produced a number of maps for public and private organisations which you can find out more about here 

Area Notes
Holywells & Landseer Parks

This consists of a municipal park and a public open space in the centre of Ipswich. There is a mixture of parkland with mature trees, a wooded scarp slope, and large, undulating grassy areas, together with a good path network and numerous point features.

 

The mixture of features, plus its accessibility and visitor facilities, makes it ideal for smaller fixtures such as our Simon Peck Summer Series and our Sport England-sponsored Ipswich-O events.


Location: TM 176425
Ickworth Park North

Once the estate of the Marquis of Bristol, this large National Trust property to the SW of Bury St Edmunds combines open parkland (which has recently become more accessible) with several sizeable blocks of "runnable" mixed woodland, including the Twist, Dairy & Albana Woods to the north of Ickworth House. Unusually for Suffolk maps it also has some water features!

 

The area is large enough to support the full range of colour-coded courses.

 

Details of the visitor facilities at Ickworth Park can be found here.


Location: TL816614
Ipswich High School, Woolverstone Park

The private grounds of Ipswich High School at Woolverstone have been mapped by the club in 2015. Use for orienteering is strictly by permission of the school.

 

The grounds comprise extensive parkland and formal gardens with fine views across the River Orwell, together with a valley of mixed woodland and some complex areas of school buildings.

 

The map offers good opportunities for sprint style courses and training events.


Location: TM 195386
Kenton & Goose Hills

A long, low, scarp covered with coniferous woodlands of various ages lying behind (and owned by) Sizewell Power Station. The area is just large enough, and with sufficient detail, to support a modest colour-coded event.

 

A permanent orienteering course (POC) created by the county council 20 years ago is still mainly intact and usable.


Location: TM 454637
Kesgrave: Grange Farm

This is an urban map of a typical, very flat, suburban housing estate at Kesgave. It has a good off-road path network and several public open spaces.

 

Suitable for smaller events.


Location: TM 231450
Knettishall Heath

Knettishall Heath is one of the club’s longest standing and most popular areas and has staged many colour-coded events. It contains an interesting variety of "runnable" mixed woodland and open heathlands sloping down to the River Ouse between Diss and Thetford. There is plenty of vegetation detail and a good path network. The numerous surface features include shallow pits from chalk & gravel extraction & from an early brick works, traces of odd-shaped excavations resulting from military training in the area, & low earth banks marking out the perimeters of early plantations. "Hut Hill" is a bronze age round barrow, while an odd circular area, known for some time as "The Warren" is now thought to be of a much earlier origin, unrelated to rabbit breeding, according to a recent archaeological survey.

 

After many year under local authority care the area is now owned by the Suffolk Wildlife Trust which is taking a more pro-active approach to management, including the removal of stretches of fencing & the clearance of small areas of woodland to produce corridors linking the three main areas of heathland. The old waste dump area to the south is also being managed as rough grassland. Information about the reserve can be found here.


TL 956806
Martlesham Heath

An area of heathland and woods around the “new” village of Martlesham Heath. It has several brown-mapped features dating from the area's use as a military airfield and many paths ducking in and out of the mini-housing estates. A modest extension has been added over Dobbs Lane, through additional woodland with paths and the remains of old military installations.

 

Suitable for smaller events.


Location: TM 244452
Moreton Hall Estate

This is a residential estate to the east of the A14 in Bury St Edmunds. It contains the usual suburban mix of quiet roads, paths, cycle tracks and small open spaces and has the commercial area at its southern edge. The map currently in use has been derived from Open Orienteering.

Suitable for smaller events.


TL 873641
Needham Market

This area contains a small country park centred on the River Gipping and adjacent water-filled gravel pits, together with nearby pastures and low chalk downland. There is a good network of paths and much vegetation detail. The map has been extended to include the streets of the town on both sides of the High Street. The country park has a permanent course planned for use by school children.

 

Suitable for smaller events.

 

Details of Needham Lake Country Park - including links to maps for the permanent orienteering course - can be found here.


Location: TM 094546
Nowton Park

The "Nowton and Hardwick" area on the edge of Bury St Edmunds consists of Nowton Park and Hardwick Heath linked by the intervening complex residential area. Both parks are managed by the local authority and both comprise of deciduous woodlands and areas of grassland, dotted with ponds and other point features. The parks can be used separately for local events or in combination as "Nowton and Hardwick" for Regional events. Because of the more wide-ranging visitor facilities the larger Nowton Park is used as the starting point - and for the off-road shorter courses - for "Nowton and Harwick" events and the previous results for both the combined area, starting from Nowton Park, and for the stand-alone Nowton Park events, are given below.

 

Hardwick Heath has its own overview page here.


Location: TL 864623

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