ORA
Ranges
There
are 5 ranges in Ontario that I shoot on through being a
paid up member of the ORA. I consider myself very lucky in
this respect. All of the ranges are DND ranges. Two of
the 5 go out to 1000 yards. Well that’s not quite accurate.
The Mons Range at Camp Borden does indeed go right back to
1000 yards. The other long range is The Connaught range in
Ottawa and it goes back to 900 meters. So if you do the
math it’s close enough to a 1000. The photo in the top
banner on my website was taken on the Mons range if you
look super close you can see two targets up on the right
side of the range. There is a berm running down the centre
of the range which creates what some have coined the term
“vortex.” It just simply means they don’t know what the
heck is goes on with the wind in the shooting positions
near this berm. Anytime you have an earth wall as high
as the ones that exist on some of our ranges be prepared
for the unexpected to happen. On the far left side of Mons
is a long row of trees. This can have an effect on the
shooting positions closest to it. What type of effect? Well
that’s up to individual shooter to find out. In either case
with a tree line or berm you won’t discover what’s going by
firing just a couple of shots downrange and if you do I’ll
guarantee you it will change the next time your out and
you’ll start all over. When you think you’ve got it all
figured out something comes along to change it.
Cedar
springs is a beautiful range to shoot on it over looks lake
Erie and the furthest we can shoot on this range at least
in ‘06 was 600 yards. We used to be able to shoot further
but things change. On the left side of the range there is a
long row of trees. On the right side of the range is
different types of farmer worked annual crops. The range
faces south, south east to be more precise. So during the
morning you are faced with sun that’s almost coming
directly at you and you need to learn to deal with that
aspect. Hats, caps any type of headgear is good here. You
need it to keep the sun out of you eyes which is going to
be coming directly at you in the morning from sort of your
left side then working its way over to your right side
towards the afternoons. Your other option on this range is
an umbrella. The Umbrella Corporation made of up nefarious
shooting individuals who’s membership is in constant state
of flux hangs out here. They have some type of unwritten
rule that umbrellas are allowed on the firing line. This
group has even come up with ingenious devices which they
stick in the ground to hold the umbrellas. I’ve been trying
for years to find what their secret code amounts to.
It’s possible it’s some type of handshake I’ve yet to
discover that allows you to become an elite member, sort of
like the Masons I suppose. Suffice to say that if you want
to take an umbrella to the line you can but you’ll have a
better chance if it has the wildest combinations
imaginable, then I guarantee it gets to go forward.
Where
this picture was taken is on top of some recently installed
septic type system is not where you can shoot. It use to
be, but not now. The 600 yard line is about horizontal with
the first yellow wind flag you see on the right. From there
you don’t quite get the view you’re seeing here. Now some
might say gosh it looks pretty easy to put a shot over the
butt or embarkment right out into the lake. This is not the
case. From a prone firing position on the firing line you’d
have to have cranked on one pile of windage to do this. As
a safety precaution down on the lake side of things there
are buoys out in the water designating the impact area
where a bullet might strike. Should any rounds go over the
butts they would fall harmlessly into the impact area.
There are warning signs plastered over all of the buoys and
boaters should head these warnings for obvious reasons.
Some boaters believe by some misguided divine right that
they are exempt from obeying the signs, that the warnings
apply to the other boaters or the other guy but certainly
not to them. To guard against their misguided notions and
because we put safety first in anything that we do we have
established a procedure whereby we have a beach patrol on
duty anytime the ORA has activities on the range. The beach
patrol is in operation for the full time we are firing on
the range. They have binoculars and radios and are in
contact with the RSO short for Range Safety Officer on the
firing line. If the beach patrol sees a boat that is
motoring or sailing close to the impact area they will
radio the RSO who will then call a cease fire on the fire
line until such a time as the impact area is deemed safe
again. The range is located naturally in Cedar Springs
which is not too far from Chatham, which is within throwing
distance of Maynard’s backyard lucky him or maybe you’re
more familiar with Windsor.
The
Winona Range is located on the south side of lake Erie
close to Hamilton and it sort of faces Toronto which is
across the lake. We can shoot up to 800 yards on this
range. I like this one because it is only about an hour and
a half from my house and it’s pretty easy to get to once
you get across the 401 at the top of Toronto. Of course
when I leave it usually very early in the morning and the
only trouble you run into is the usual daily commuters who
don’t realize it’s the weekend and travel along at a snails
pace in the left most lane with absolutely nobody on their
right for miles ahead. In a couple of the photos you
can see Des Vamplew instructing his son Tom. In the
background you can see the firing positions. What you might
think are the targets are actually the number boards. The
targets are further down below the number boards which
indicate the target positions. Those boards are located on
the butts and the targets are a distance from them at
ground level. This is a fantastic sport to enjoy if you
have a young son or daughter. If you are seriously looking
for a way to spend quality time with your kids you need to
look no further because this is an excellent way to do it.
If they are in their mid-teens they can even make some
money down in the pits pulling targets. Most of us shooting
on the line are more inclined to pay for having our target
pulled rather than spent time in the pits when we can be
shooting. Tom, Des’s son has pulled targets for us many a
time and so it was nice to see Tom on the firing line. His
dad has shot numerous competitive events over the years and
has been on many Canadian shooting teams. The instruction
Tom would receive from his dad would be the best you can
get. With a spotting scope on the left side of Tom I would
put odds on the fact he’s receiving TR type
instruction.
Pat Vamplew has been on many Canadian Shooting teams and
he’s been around the world representing Canada in many
shooting events. Pat can be seen cleaning his rifle. You
may have guessed it right Pat is related to Des they are
brothers. Both of them are excellent TR shooters. They have
long histories maybe not as long as Art Grundy. Now that’s
long... and distinguished just like Art! In competition you
wouldn’t know they were brothers. On the firing line,
neither gives into the other. I took the photo of Pat
cleaning his rifle and come to think of it also the ones of
Des and Tom in June/July of 2004 at Winona. Both of these
days were great days for shooting weather wise. The Winona
range is very similar to Cedar Springs but it has it’s own
quirks with regards to wind and possibly mirage. that’s one
of the interesting things about firing on different ranges.
Each of them is different and as diverse as the people
firing on them. You have to learn how to shoot on each one
of them.
We have another range in Kingston, Ontario which goes out
to 300/500/600 yards. We don’t normally shoot 100/200
yards. Our starting distance for most of our competitions
and most practices is the 300 yard markers. Kingston is
another beautiful range. Come to think of it all the ranges
we shoot on are great. it’s weird that I don’t have any
pictures of that range but as soon as I can remember to
take some I will. The one good thing about Kingston is that
you never have to worry about “boats in water” or
technically “boats in the impact area”. There’s no water
behind the butts at Kingston to interfere with our
shooting. Well no water close to the range that is. But
there are times when deer run out onto the range in
particular fawns. They must have gotten used the noise from
the rifles. So much so that they’ll just wander right out
on the range, hang about for a few minutes and then
disappear. Of course we stop shooting when this happens.
Kingston is a tough range. It might be short but I’m
telling you it’s tough. Just ask Norm Barber and half a
dozen other guys who have shot it. Including the infamous
Bob Pastor. I believe that’s where the term “vortex” was
born. Kingston is a little further for me to travel to but
any range time is worth it in my opinion. Kingston can be
done in a day. By this I mean that if the competition is
held for only one day you can travel early morning, shot
the match and head back home. If the match is a two day
event many of us travel up on Friday evening, book into the
Executive motel which is not too far away from the range
and we are well rested come morning for the matches. At the
end of the competition many travel home but I have stayed
an extra night at the motel and come back Monday morning
when the traffic heading back to Toronto is much lighter.
if you’ve never shot a match in Kingston you should try
it.
Mon’s really is where we do most of our shooting and
it’s the range we use for the Provincial matches. There’s a
whole lot of reasons why. We can start with distance for
one. It goes right out to 1000 yards. It’s situated deep
within Camp Borden. There are no boats power or sail
anywhere near where we shoot so there’s no stoppages in
this regard. It’s one of those weird quirks that I’ve
noticed that going from my house to Mons is about the same
identical distance as travelling to Winona give or take 10
kilometers. I prefer Mons naturally because I’m into the
long range thing. This means I like to do most of my
shooting at the 800/900/1000 yard markers. The picture on
the left shows Terry Perkins doping the wind I would
imagine, Norm Barber is adjusting his trusty ear protectors
and Gord Ogg is assembling gear on the line. The
Apocalyptic missing from this triumvirate plus one is
Bob Pastor who was probably taking the
snap.
The other photo of a bunch of f-classer has me and Leo
D’Amour (blue shirt) and I can see Don McInnis on Leo's
left and Bruce Conti is on my right. The leg belongs to
Gord Ogg! The
final range to talk about is of course the Connaught Range
in Ottawa. Connaught as far as I’m concerned is the best
range we’ve got. Now if you were to ask me a couple years
ago I would have looked like a thermometer trying to tell
you about it or fill you in on some of the weird things
I’ve experienced at Connaught. Suffice to say I think I’ve
got it under control now. We hold our annual DCRA matches
there and folks come from many parts of the globe to shoot
the matches. These matches are annual they happen every
year and they happen in August. This year we had the 2006
DCRA 900 Metre F-Class Open Tournament. There were quite a
number of shooters who showed for the match.