Hi All,During the weekend of 27/28/29th April 2012, 19 of our Scouts, 2 Leaders & 1 parent helper made their way by minibus & car to Walesby Forest Scout Campsite near Newark, to take part in this year’s District Scout activity camp.
Jason, Tim, Debbie Y (Jason’s mum) and myself had already been up early Friday morning to pitch the marquee and mess tent and to also unload most of the camping equipment needed for the weekend that we had packed the night before.
A massive thank you to Tim & Debbie here for giving up their time to assist us with this task. Tim also offered to do the food shopping on the night before.
We then drove back to the West Midlands and had approx 1hour to get ready before picking up the Scouts from HQ to take them to the site.
We arrived in decent weather on the Friday evening and pitched all of the Scout sleeping tents and finished off organising the camping equipment.
Once again we had one of the largest numbers of Scouts on site.
In just a few hours the camp was complete and supper was soon on the go. We cooked burgers on baps and made hot drinks and biscuits available for everyone who wanted them before starting the long task of preparing for bed!
Some of the Troop also collected firewood ready for a camp fire on Saturday evening.
In between all of this, some of the Leaders were called to a meeting and briefed on the arrangements taking place over the next 2 days.
It was a cold night.
On Saturday morning we awoke to cloudy skies and many of the Troop were up & about very early in the morning, excited about the day ahead.
Some cereal, sausage or bacon baps and drinks were welcomed by all for breakfast and it was soon time to begin the programme of activities organised for the day.
At 9.30am we had our first flag break before the Scouts were let loose on the site!
Our Troop was split into 2 teams and each team took part in 6 activities on Saturday and 2 more on Sunday.
The activities included; Jacob’s ladder, leap of faith, archery, air rifles, cave maze, assault course, water zorbs, zip wire & giant crates.
Lunch was Pitta breads with a choice of fillings, savouries, hot or cold drinks plus crisps, biscuits and fruit.
The weather remained dull all day, but this did not prevent any of the activities from taking place.
At approximately 5.30pm a 6-a-side football competition was organised for those who wanted to take part. The rest of the Scouts gathered more firewood and helped to get a camp altar fire started.
For dinner we had a choice of spaghetti bolognese or bangers & mash. Pudding was bananas & custard!
At around 9pm a wide game was organised for all of the Scouts & Leaders to take part in, which involved trying to capture the opposite teams lantern located and each end of a very large field!
We had a supper of marshmallows, biscuits and hot or cold drinks and were then treated to a good old fashioned sing song around the camp fire, aided by Tim and his awesome guitar playing. I have to say that I was in particularly fine singing voice during the session, just ask the Scouts! After the entertainment, some of the Scouts continued to roast their marshmallows on the alter fire before finally retiring to bed.
It was a very wet night.
On Sunday morning we awoke to even more rain, in fact it never stopped!
Breakfast consisted of lashings of bacon, sausage, beans, egg and bread plus hot/cold drinks.
Due to the appalling weather we skipped flag break and at 10am we started the second day of activities. The Scouts to their credit did not let the weather deter them from having a good time.
At approximately 12pm we had lunch, similar to that what we had on Saturday (and anything else that was left), and then started the inaugural task of breaking camp.
It continued to rain all day as we took down the tents and loaded the equipment onto the minibus and trailer.
At this stage I would like to thank all those parents who made the long trip up to Walesby to help us break camp in the dreadful weather conditions and take groups of Scouts home. Everybody pitched in to help us pack away as quickly as possible and to free up the minibus so that we did not have to make a return trip to site.
At 3pm the camp was closed and we were soon heading back to Douay Road in the minibus to unload. I have to say it took several days for the tents to dry out before they could be packed away as they were very, very wet!
Many thanks to all those Scouts who took part and I hope you all had a good time. Extreme thanks once again to Tim P for helping us out as part of the Leadership team during the whole weekend and to Debbie Y for helping us pack the trailer and for joining us early on Friday morning to help set up camp. Without their help, Jason and I would have struggled to make the camp viable.
Also a big thank you to Emily for preparing the menu and sorting out the camp duty rota!
Going to camp is a major reason why young people join the Scouts, the fun of living in a tent can be unbeatable. You will hopefully appreciate how much effort goes into running a camp and we try to organise and attend as many as is feasibly possible, so that all Members of our Troop get the opportunity to attend at least one over the year.
Yours in Scouting,
Adam, Jason & Tim
