Wishing everyone at the group a warm and merry Christmas and a great 2024.
To the children of all ages for attending meetings and enjoying yourselves
To all the parents for responding to all those emails, and helping the young people get to the right place, at the right time, with the right stuff!
To the leaders for all their organising and patience
To the adult volunteers who do so much behind the scenes work to manage the charity, support the leaders, and to keep the site and grounds a safe and enjoyable place to scout.
Thank you so much to everyone at the group
Have a great break and see you all after the holidays!
This year it really was a chiller camp, with cold weather all weekend – getting as low as -4 C on Saturday night.
Friday
As usual, we pitched camp on Friday evening, after getting all the tents up we erected the Christmas tree and tucked into a sausage-in-a-bun. In a foretaste of what was to come, there was definitely a nip in the air as we sat down to eat.
Entertainment for the remainder of the evening was decorating the mess tent and the traditional Christmas Quiz. In a shock, hopefully never-to-be-repeated turn of events, the scouts beat the leaders!
We survived the freezing conditions over the weekend for our ‘Christmas’ Camp at Kingswood Grosvenor Hall in Ashford.
On the first evening we all went to the huge gym to play a few games in an attempt meet our group leader, Finn, and to burn off some energy.
Before bed time one of our scouts decided to see if the smoke detectors could really be triggered by an aerosol, as we had been warned (spoiler: yes). We had a fire alarm drill….
Saturday and Sunday saw us split into four groups and rotate around the following activities:
Leap of Faith (climb up a 10m pole then throw yourself off in the direction of a trapeze
Archery
Obstacle course – circular course with challenging things to do
Laser tag – either inside or outside
Nightline – maze games while blindfolded
3G swing – be hauled up to 10m before being dropped on a giant swing. It is 3g as you experience 3g at the bottom.
Problem solving – team brain games
Jacobs ladder – in pairs, climb up a ‘ladder’ where the rungs are increasingly far apart
We are back from our Christmas Camp at Wilberforce. If you ‘like’ us on Facebook you will have already seen these over the weekend, but for those that haven’t, here they are!
After a surprisingly short journey squashed into the minibus, we arrived at Bears Wood campsite on the outskirts of Croydon on a chilly Friday evening.
There was some initial shock at just how cold it was inside the hut during flag-break and investitures, but the scouts warmed up after they explored the whole site with a game of capture the flag. They were welcomed back to much warmer hall by a roaring fire and mugs of hot chocolate.
One good night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast later, we faced the outside. I think they describe the weather on Saturday as ‘wintery’ – waterproofs were going to be required!
First two activities were mini quads and bungee-run.
http://youtu.be/dCy8AxPknDI
After lunch, the scouts tried the trust wall – where one scout traversed each side of a climbing wall, where each ‘hold’ could only be used on one side of the wall at a time; the assault course and the blind trail (one scout attached to a guide rope, the others blindfolded carrying cups of water).
The whole group played laser-tag until it got dark, before retreating to the hut for some impromptu fort-building in the hall and sock-drying in front of the fire.
Christmas dinner for 23
We held a Camp Carol-fire round their splendid terraced camp fire circle before topping-up with mince pies and hot chocolate.
Sunday arrived with brilliant blue skies, so after breakfast we went out for a mini orienteering course before even more mince pies, silly games, secret santa and striking camp.
Good bye until next year!
Providing fun and adventure for boys and girls 4 years old and up.
