Highlight of the week was a camp & investitures on Brownsea Island, the birthplace of Scouting
As the academic year finally drew to a close, 49 Scouts and Explorers from Caythorpe and Foston didn’t even get a lie-in on Day 1 of their holiday as they headed off on a week’s Scout Camp, held at Buddens Activity Centre, Dorset, and Brownsea Island.
Saturday
Bright and early on Saturday morning, and after a little carpark and coach park confusion, parents and guardians waved their young people off to a six night adventure in Dorset.
With a pit-stop in Oxford (where some Scouts seemingly spent a disproportionate amount of their camp pocket money), the five hour journey flew by and before we knew it we were offloading kit in the pouring rain at Buddens Activity Centre, just outside Wareham in Dorset.
Tents, event shelters and the mess tent were erected as Scouts, their clothes and shoes got wetter and wetter. Everyone was immensely grateful to Claire, who set the bar high with the first night’s offering of burgers and salad. The excitement of the first night kept the young people chatting until quite late, but eventually our new home fell silent aside from the breeze and gentle showers which proved to become a bit of a feature of this adventure.
Sunday
Sunday was our only full day at Buddens, with the Scouts and Explorers divided into activity teams. Throughout the day they rotated between the zip wire, leap of faith, climbing, archery and tomahawk throwing. Throughout the week the teams also had chores to complete; fetching water, food prep and cooking and washing up. Parents and guardians will be delighted to learn our young people were all very competent and capable, and are able to do these at home too! In the background, Claire was once again working hard to ensure that the food prep and cooking teams knew what they needed to do, as Sunday’s evening meal was a broad range of delicious curry options.
Monday
An early start saw us partly breaking camp after breakfast, sorting out personal belongings so that we would only be taking to Brownsea Island the absolute necessities (we knew that the ferry had luggage limits and that on arrival on the island we’d have to carry our belongings a c.25 minute walk to our camping area, including tents and food). Somehow, with the help of a dozen Explorer Scouts we managed, and some Scouts even managed to take full pillows, clearly not getting the message about bare essentials! The ferry ride from Poole to Brownsea Island was brilliant fun, and the icing on the cake was the fact that we had a bit of spare time on Poole Quay so managed to boost the local economy with everyone buying ice creams before leaving the mainland.
Tuesday
After a very welcome, slightly lazy start with flag break at 0900, we congregated for some investitures and a group photo next to the The Scout Stone. This commemorates the first-ever experimental Scout Camp conducted by our Founder, Lord Robert Baden-Powell, in 1907 and was erected near the first Scout campsite. We then spent a lazy morning exploring Brownsea Island in our teams, and, fortunately, in the sun. After a picnic lunch back at the campsite, we headed to the beach at Pottery Pier. Here we took part in some paddling in the cooling waters before heading back to camp to prepare the evening meal of pitta pockets (imagine a Calzone Pizza formed in a pitta bread). We almost felt like we were on holiday.
The Scouts were now tired, so with some peacefully swinging in their hammocks and some tucked up in tents, we had a quiet night in readiness for the 0630 rise the next day.
Wednesday
Wednesday was, without a doubt, the busiest and longest day of camp. It started with an early flag break and breakfast, striking camp, loading up and heading back along the 25 (or slightly longer in some cases) minute ‘stroll’ back to the Quay. No Leaders got a lift in the National Trust volunteers’ buggy… promise…. (Well… maybe just a bit of a lift.) After a short wait we boarded the ferry back to Poole Harbour.
On arrival at Poole quay the kit was once again shifted off the ferry by our wonderful Explorers – no-one will mention the tent that ‘almost got away’ into the sea…..
Our friendly coach driver met us to load up all our kit and we hit the road, heading for Beaulieu House for the National Motor Museum. The journey would have been slightly quicker had we not been waiting for a few horses in the New Forest to meander their way along the road, stopping all the traffic. In their own time…..
Beaulieu was great fun. After a picnic lunch that Claire picked up en-route we split into teams and visited the various areas of the site, including the Top Gear tent, the Motor Museum (with some stunning examples of vintage cars, racing cars and motorbikes), the motor parade (including the real-life vehicles from Dr Who, Del and Rodney Trotter’s Reliant Rialto, James Bond’s Jaguar XK-R (with rockets, machine gun) GEN 11 from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to name a few, and even a falconry show.
The icing on the cake for this action packed day was a visit to a dry ski slope where we all (including leaders) enjoyed tubing. This in basic terms is where you sit in a large inflatable ring with a slippery underside and are launched down the dry-ski slope. ‘Dry’ is a little bit of a fallacy; to aid the ease of passage to get to your destination (a big yellow foam pad at the bottom) there is a constant spray of water onto the slope and consequently everyone who has a go gets wet. Initially there was a little reluctance from some to take part but it was incredibly addictive with most trying various strategies to race to the bottom as quickly as possible, including going down backwards and being pushed by ‘friends’ at the start. As the rain started to fall we all had dinner in the ‘Alpine’ restaurant before getting back on the coach at around 2030 and heading back to Buddens. Happy and exhausted, we once again found ourselves putting up tents in the rain, although this time it was dark, too. We kept telling ourselves how this is great for building resilience!
Thursday
Another early start after another rainy night, flag break was at 0800 followed by breakfast and a stroll to the coach to head to Poole Park water activities centre. Despite tired young people, the incessant drizzle (interrupted only by heavy rain) did not appear to have broken the spirit of any of our intrepid travellers. Throughout the day they enjoyed stand-up paddle boards, kayaking and dingy sailing, under the expert tuition of the Rockley Water Sports team. The bonus of taking part in these activities in the rain is that you’re already wet when you fall in.
On Thursday we were sad to say goodbye to Claire as she had to head home for her son’s Graduation Ceremony. And equally delighted to welcome Bryn from 1st Foston to the Leadership Team, who travelled all the way to Dorset for one night to help us strike camp.
Back at Buddens we rounded off the day with a bit of light entertainment with our camping neighbours, who we’d invited round for a hotdog supper and some campfire songs.
Friday
After another late night and early start we were up and ready for activities by 0900. While the Scouts and Explorers enjoyed their final activity of camp, the Leaders busied themselves taking down the mess tent and event shelters, packing everything into trailers and cars ready for the journey home. On their return to camp, Scouts and Explorers packed their belongings and tents, enjoyed a quick picnic lunch, boarded the coach and headed back to leafy Lincolnshire.
All in all, and despite the weather, we had an amazing week away which has once again reinforced the close and long-standing friendship between the 1st Foston and 1st Caythorpe Scout Groups.
We all had our moments, whether missing home, a bit nervous of trying a new activity, losing something (please label everything!), itchy insect bites or just being soggy and wet through. But on the plus side we saw our Young People smile, laugh out loud, make new friends, support each other, try new activities, learn new things, try and enjoy new foods, carry each other’s bags, cook together, wash up together… the list goes on, but they really have gained some #SkillsforLife
Finally, thanks must go to the volunteer Leaders. Claire, Gen, Les, Marie, Mark, Sam and Sarah have given up a week of their annual leave and family time to organise and run this camp, with Bryn joining for the last day to help bring everyone home. Without their hard work and dedication this camp could never have happened and our Scouts and Explorers wouldn’t have had the amazing opportunity to visit Dorset and sleep in the very place that Baden-Powell experimented with his vision of creating the amazing movement we all belong to: The Scouts.
A final thought. The comment we never thought we’d hear on camp: “Charlie, don’t put your necker on the peacock!”
Here are some photos* from the week, in no particular order. We hope they bring back lots of happy memories to our Scouts, Explorers and Volunteer Leaders :)
(* note: there are a lot of photos.... if they aren't uploading to your device, we suggest making a cup of tea and grabbing a biscuit while waiting for them to load. Or trying on another device.)
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