OK - So, I let you know what I know.
When you go orienteering, you check in at the start. There are usually several different courses set up by the volunteers, from easy to hard, as you can see below:
- White, beginners (2-3km)
- Yellow, advanced beginners (2-3.5km)
- Orange, Intermediate (3-5km)
- Brown, short advanced (3-4km)
- Green, longer advanced (4-5km)
- Red, even longer advanced (5-7km)
- Blue, really long advanced (8-12km)
From my experience the White is predominantly on regular hiking trails, while the blue is predominantly off-trail.
After you check in and pick your course (DH and I did white, but we are more than ready to try yellow), you get a map and a compass and a start time. When they call your start time, you are off.
As you progress through the course on the map, there are control points to stop at. After you find the control point, you punch your card with the punch provided at the control point. Each punch depicts a different symbol. On our first course, which was white and predominantly on a regularly marked trail, we had nine controls to find and a corresponding nine punches on our card.
After completing the course and checking back in, our time was recorded. The goal is to complete the course, as evidenced by the various punches in your card in the correct sequence, in the fastest time.
My understanding is that at the higher levels, people run the course, like trail running. DH and I hiked our first course. You can find more information at our local club's website:
https://www.dvoa.org/
However, I must say that going off the regularly marked trails to find the control points by finding land features (embankment, rock, cliff, stream, bridge, tree, etc.) is very interesting and like trying to figure out a puzzle. Now you know what I know!