Caythorpe Scouts and friends take on Monopoly Run again!

For the fourth consecutive year for Caythorpe Scouts, last Saturday we headed up to London to take part in ‘Monopoly Run Live’ with almost 8,000 Scouts, Explorers and Guides from across the country.

Billed as “a real-time version of the popular Monopoly Run board game”, Monopoly Run Live is played on a single day in central London and involves visiting the actual sites that the board game is based on. There are multiple 'mini-games' run simultaneously, enabling hundreds of teams to compete on the day, yet each team will only have a maximum of seven other competitor teams, giving everyone a good chance at winning. (https://monopoly-run.co.uk/)

This year we joined forces with 9^th Grantham Scouts, Grantham District Explorers and 2^nd Market Rasen Explorers, meaning 36 Scouts and Explorers joined this amazing day out.

It’s always an early alarm call for Monopoly Run, and this year was no different as our meet time was 06:45 at Grantham Station. It was a particularly chilly morning, yet the 31 minute train delay didn’t dampen (or even freeze) our spirits. That said, we were all happy to get onto the train!

After an easy journey to London, we split into our teams, gave safety briefings on travelling on the underground and general safety while in a big city, and headed to our starting point, Waterloo Station. It was a quick turnaround for some teams as the train initial delay meant we didn’t have long until our Monopoly Run apps ‘unfroze’ and our games began. Most teams remembered to check in at Waterloo Station before leaving. The team that – ahem – forgot – learnt the hard way when they then arrived at their first checkpoint to find that they had to return to Waterloo to check in. One learns quickly from such mistakes….

The big difference this year for our Scouts was that our teams weren’t all playing in the same ‘mini-game’ so while there was still a degree of competition, it wasn’t as stark as in previous years. Not that any of our Scouts or volunteer leaders are competitive. At all.

Each team will have had a completely different experience of the day, as you’ll see if you click on the links below showing the routes they took. When you consider that the event is run by volunteers, it really is an incredible set-up and the technology is mind-blowing.

It’s fair to say that teams used all modes of transport permitted: underground, buses and a whole lot of walking, even running. Some felt like crawling at times. There are lots of stairs in London.

Energy levels dipped and peaked, especially for Team Terror when they bumped into famous astronaut and Scout Ambassador Tim Peake outside Hamleys! The Monopoly Run App may be amazing, but it doesn’t capture how many bags of Haribo, chocolate bars, flap jacks etc were consumed to keep us all going throughout the day. There’s also evidence that some fruit was taken with packed lunches – see photos.

Challenges popped up via the App, including getting a team photo by a street sign not containing the word ‘street’ or ‘road’, getting a team photo of a statue with the team mimicking the statue’s pose (which explains some of the photos!), getting a team photo with a piece of fruit, and getting a team photo with the team in a red phone box. Who knew that lots of these are locked these days? There was also a quiz based on well-known sweets, which teams could complete and earn a few extra pounds.

Our rendez-vous time was scheduled as 17:30 at Leicester Square, however many of our teams happened to bump into each other around 17:00 and still had energy to burn and money to earn, so Leaders quickly agreed to change the plan and meet at 18:00 at Kings Cross. This was a good plan, as moments later the MR Team put an announcement on the App saying there was a protest at McDonalds at Leicester Square so to avoid the area. As you can see, although it’s a fun day out, safety is always on the organisers’ and volunteer leaders’ minds.

So, as 18:00 came around, the teams all arrived at Kings Cross. Weary Scouts and Explorers took over a space and rested their weary legs waiting for the train platform to be announced.

The train was on time, on we jumped, and north we headed. We know of at least one Explorer who slept part of the way home; we’re sure a few more nodded off!

With Scouts and Explorers reunited with parents at Grantham Station, we all headed home, exhausted but with hundreds of different stories to tell of our London adventure.

As always, huge thanks go to our Scouts and Explorers who behaved impeccably on the day and without tooooooooo much complaining and mumbling about sore legs and feet. And to our volunteer leaders and parents who came along on the day, a huge ‘Thank you’. It’s not just another Saturday you have volunteered, but also a good number of hours in the planning, risk assessing, communicating with parents and preparing the Scouts and Explorers for yet another amazing adventure. Thank you!

Team Hungry: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/c0jsz

Team Furious: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/9uj4h

Team Prepared: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/e5zvk

Team Emperor: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/s0p7w

Team Valiant: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/ckpn3

Team Terror: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/wkk2i

Teal Defiant: https://hq.monopoly-run.co.uk/postrun/fds7i

To better understand what it's all about, have a look through the Team Pack.

Photos from the day, in no particular order: