Scout/Cub summer camp

Being a fairly new leader, I wanted to experience summer camp, so with a lot of logistical planning, the boys and I, together with 3 of the Duce kids, set off on Sunday to the UK's Scout headquarters of Gilwell.

The theme of camp was Harry Potter and lego and I had been nominated to be Head of Ravenclaw - Deena was Head of HufflePuff

 At the sorting hat ceremony, Alex was put into HufflePuff

 Nicholas was put into Gryffindor

Lots of activities had been planned with various badges in mind and the cubs were split from the scouts and took part in whatever had been organised for them each day. There was also "free time" each day, Nicholas loved the swing ball!

Sue had been tasked with the "Naturalist" badge and the kids loved looking for bugs and making bird feeders..  

 Then all the cubs went grass sledging!

 Meanwhile, all the scouts were pioneering - building a bridge!

On Tuesday, it was a trip out to Legoland where the scouts all got to go off on their own and the cubs were split up with a leader to do whatever rides they wanted to... To be honest, Legoland during the summer holidays is just scary - too busy, really hot and the queues were just too long.

  My group only got to do 3 rides, the cars included

But they enjoyed the splash water park, even if they couldn't really move about much due to so many people wanting to cool off in the water!  I came down with sun stroke on the way home and had to stop twice on the motorway to throw up - not good....

That aside, my badge that I'd been tasked with had been re-scheduled to the afternoon whereby the kids worked on their DIY skills by making a wooden boat, got creative with modelling clay and a huge box of Owain's lego!

 A game of cricket on one of the fields showed off the skills of catching and throwing

 Whilst other stuff was going on, I managed a bit of down time with Owain being creative with lego..

Toasting marshmallows is a must at camp  and sandwiched in between two chocolate biscuits makes them yummy!  A few camp fire songs rounded off the evening.

A game of Quiddich on the last day, along with making mandrakes and a Tri-Wizard tournament ended off camp nicely.

After dinner and the award ceremony everyone headed off home via alternative routes due to an accident on the M25.  After stopping twice for Alexander to be sick we made it home just after 8pm.

It had been a long week, but definitely an experience!  The time and effort that Carol, Simon & Kat and the other leaders put into planning and running the week paid off for all those kids that attended having a great time.