Piney Lakes Reserve is at the junction of Leach Highway and Murdoch Drive, Winthrop. The reserve covers approximately 67 hectares, comprising around 50 hectares of bushland and wetland environments, home to the Piney Lakes Environmental Education Centre, and 17 hectares of developed parkland to the south and west of the reserve.

For orienteering purposes, it is best to enter the reserve off Murdoch drive. Here you will find a car park and nearby toilets. The start of courses is also located at the corner of this carpark. Individuals or small family groups are welcome to come at any time to attempt the orienteering courses. All school and larger groups must contact the City of Melville Customer Service Team on 1300 635 845 to enquire about reserve availability and lodge a booking application form. This is to avoid clashes with incompatible activities or maintenance works.

Courses

There are 3 standard line courses available for downloading:

Easy: A short course with obvious best routes and no large deviations (1.8km, 10m climb).
Moderate: Longer course with some significant route choices and some indirect routes. Expect to cover about 25% more than the “straight line” course distance (3.0km, 20m climb).
Hard: Designed for maximum route choice options with indirect routes. Expect to cover about 40% more than the “straight line” course distance (4.0km, 25m climb).

There is also a scatter course with all 20 controls.

The start and finish for all these courses is at the northwest corner of the main car park. Other starts could be used by anyone prepared to design their own course using the existing control sites shown on the ‘all controls’ scatter course map.

Getting Started:

Information on the types of Control Markers and the Control Letter Codes, to check whether the course was completed correctly, can be found in the Anytime Orienteering Piney Lakes Guide (PDF).

Organisational and Safety Guidelines can also be downloaded.

To access the map download page, complete the form below.
Your PDF map(s) will be available on the bottom of the next page.