Filling in your Route Sheet

The celebratory dinners take place in Montrose during the final week of the Challenge and are available at an additional cost, payable direct to the Park Hotel on the day of the dinner. Please indicate which celebratory dinners you wish to attend and if you would like to bring a guest, should there be enough space. Thursday is often the busiest day and if we are tight for space you can find out about the priority for places here.

Please note, a request on the Route Sheet is not a commitment by the Challenger to attend nor a guarantee of a place – it is so we can supply the Park Hotel with an estimate of numbers and organise a waiting list if one is required. Confirmation of places will take place during the second week of the event.

In the Daily Itinerary section, each day of the event has 2 rows: one for the description of your Main Route, and one for the description of the Foul Weather Alternatives (FWA), if necessary. Scroll down to see two examples of an ideal route description.

The key requirements for this section are:

• We don’t need an essay! Be clear and concise so it is easy for your Vetter and Challenge control to understand. Limit the use of linking words (e.g. ‘follow’, ‘then’). Use compass points (e.g. N, SE) for significant changes of direction (see examples at the end of this document, or for more detailed examples, and see the ‘How to Fill in Your Route Sheet’ video on the TGO Challenge YouTube channel).
• Please, only use place names taken from the Ordnance Survey (OS) Landranger1:50k maps.
• Grid References (GR): Please only use when no place name is available and for wild camps. Use two prefix letters and only give six figures (If not familiar with UK national grid system, there’s a short video on the YouTube channel).
• One main route only – no multiple variations (exception is escape routes to FWA).
• Distance and Ascent: Metric measurements only, please, so use kilometres (km) for distance and metres (m) for ascent . Ascent is the total of all climbs on that day and is never zero!
• Overnight Halt Points (OHPs): We need to know where you intend to stay each night: your OHP. If you are wild camping then state the place name/general location and the associated Grid Reference – you don’t need to state ‘Wild Camp’ as it’s generally obvious! If you are staying in accommodation/campsite, please provide the place name as well as, if known, the name of the hotel/hostel/B&B/campsite; in this case we don’t need a grid reference.
• High Days: If your route for the day goes over high summits or ridges, then please input ‘Yes’ otherwise answer ‘No’. This highlights high days to both Vetters and Challenge Control. If you’ve answered yes, you probably need a FWA (see below).

Here are examples of routes with appropriate route sheet descriptions. First an example of a relatively simple day with a suggested route description:

Next we have a high day which requires a FWA:

A FWA is generally required for days that involve exposed high ground such as summits or ridges or any persistently high ground. Routes over 900m always need a FWA, whilst routes under 500m usually do not – see the Event Details and FWA webpage for a more detailed explanation. In addition, all unbridged crossings of major rivers must have a FWA.

Entering FWAs into the Route Sheet can be somewhat convoluted as they can be single, multi-day or complex FWAs, so this section is aimed at providing some guidance on how to do this.

Poss put info below on FWA page with link here

• Single-day FWA: If your route is planned to go over high summits/passes and then return to a lower level, a FWA should be planned that takes you from that day’s start point to that day’s end point but avoiding the summits/passes, i.e. avoids the tops and use a low level route; however, brief exposure at higher levels may be acceptable, especially if on a good track e.g. Corrieyairick Pass.
• River crossings: If your route is planned to ford a major river (e.g. River Feshie) you will need an FWA, in case of the river being in spate, which diverts to a bridge to cross the river and then rejoins your Main route.
• Multi-day FWAs: Sometimes, a high-level route is extended over several days, so it is not possible to stay at the same end point each day (e.g. crossing the Cairngorms). It is therefore necessary to have a FWA planned that lasts more than one day, which rejoins your route at some later date. In this event, the route description for each day of the multi-day FWA needs to be written in the appropriate day’s row (including distance, ascent, OHP and GR), until your FWA route rejoins the Main route.
• Complex FWAs: On some routes, a planned FWA will, in itself, need a FWA! For example, your planned FWA is low level; however, it fords a major river. If this river is in spate, a FWA will need to be entered to avoid the ford and use a bridge. This would be entered underneath the FWA from your Main Route as a second FWA, together with the associated data. Make sure that it is clear in your wording which FWA is for which section of that day’s route.

When you have completed your route planning, step through each day’s end points (there may be more than one on some days if you have taken an FWA) and make sure that you have a route planned for the following day from each of these points.

As part of our safety procedures, you are required to nominate points at which you will check in with Challenge Control, so they must have a mobile signal, a landline or WiFi (check the Phone in List  for acceptable locations). These are to be no more than 4 days apart and must not include the Start and End points of your walk. There are to be a minimum of 4 PIPs and a maximum of 6 (although solo walkers/high level routes are encouraged to phone informally between official PIPs).

There are a number of places on the crossing where routes tend to converge and thus Challengers gather in significant numbers, which we refer to as ‘Pinch Points’. There is, within the form, a list of the common ones and tick boxes to complete if you intend to go there (either staying or passing through). We use this data to forewarn these locations of the expected numbers of Challengers and dates (so they can provision for an invasion of lots of hungry Challengers!).

The great majority of Challengers use digital mapping software to plan and plot their route across Scotland (and are provided with a free, 8-month subscription to OMN (Anquet) mapping software to support this).

The plotting of a digital route produces a gpx file. These are very useful for both Vetters and Challenge Control, so if you have prepared your route on a digital platform please add them to your submission. The Online Route Sheet gives you the choice of:

• attaching of up to 2 files.
• giving a link to a shared folder.
• sending them via email.

We prefer to have the whole route as a single gpx file, with each day clearly identified as a sub-file within it (e.g. Fri12 Main; Sat13 Main, Sat13 FWA, etc.) or as 2 files (one file containing the Main Route gpx subfiles, and one for FWA gpx subfiles).

If you or your mapping software are unable to create gpx subfiles and therefore have more than 2 files, please send individual files via a shared folder or via email and the Coordinators will link them together. You can try GPX studio, which is a good tool for merging separate gpx files into a single file: see how to do this on the TGOC YouTube video.

Note that we still require the same amount of route description and ascent/distance figures as described above. We may be able to reduce the information required on the Route Sheet in the future as the system evolves, but at present, the Route Sheet remains the primary document for describing your route.

If you intend to re-use a route (in whole or in part) that you have had vetted previously, but not been able to walk, then indicate it in the Route Sheet so that we know not to vet it from scratch.

Each time you submit your Route Sheet for vetting, please make sure that you change the Version Number (i.e. from Version 1 to Version 2, Version 2 to Version 3, etc.) together with a brief description of the changes. This helps us in knowing a change has been made and locating it within the document.