World Challenge
Weekend Away
-ReportOn Saturday 6th October everyone who is going on the World Challenge Mount Kilimanjaro
trip, left school at 9.00 for Phasels Wood Scout Camp. This was a 2 day preparatory camping trip. We
travelled to the camp near Hemel Hempstead in 3 separate mini-buses.
The trip to the camp was incredibly entertaining, at least for me and Abbie Collingwood.
Everyone on our mini-bus seemed a bit tired as it was first thing Saturday. Both Abbie and I thought
that our bus needed some waking up so we asked for some music to be played. For the 35 minute
trip Abbie and I sang along with all the songs played on the radio, making up the words as we went
along. As you may imagine, everyone was wide awake by the time we arrived at our destination.
When we arrived Mr Dean asked everyone to grab any rucksack handed to them and take
them down to the tent site. Some bags were really heavy, it is almost like some people brought their
whole wardrobe with them in order to be prepared for the rest of the day and the following day. As
we walked down the year 12 boys decided to be funny and knock people over with the bags on their
backs. People would fall over very easily due to the weight of the bag they were carrying.
After that 100-metre walk to the campsite we were split into 3 groups. We then went on to
divide the food for the next 2 days between each individual’s bag pack, in order to lighten the load
we were to carry. After this we walked down to where we would later pitch up our tents, sitting in a
circle in order introduce ourselves to our leaders for the weekend. As we went round, the leaders
caught on that nearly all the boys in the group were rugby players and everyone was involved in
some sport. They judged that everyone would be fit enough to complete the walks ahead of us.
Our leaders then went on to teach us how to put up a tent we would be living in during the
stay in Tanzania, one whole month! They asked for volunteers to put up the inside, Monty and Dom
went in, and came out looking really hot and flustered because the inside was like a sauna, refusing
to do the rest because they did not want to get hot and sweaty. We then went off in our 3’s to set
up our 3 man tents. In my tent was Abbie and Charlotte. We were the last group to put ours up
because we were really slow putting the poles in and pegging the guy ropes. When we were all
satisfied with this we then put into the tent our sleeping bags, mats and clothes we did not need for
our walk. As I was getting out the bag for the walk I heard someone run over and start laughing. As I
peeped out the tent I saw Mr Dean there un-pegging all the left side of our tent. I then had a right go
at him telling him if he did not put the pegs back in I will go and do the same to his tent. He
obviously did as I said because he is a scaredy cat.
Our leader then got us to do some trust activities with our group. We split into pairs and one
of us would be blindfolded, the other would have to guide us through speech around a wooded area
of trees. This was quite difficult because Abbie did not trust me and was convinced I was going to
lead her into a tree. So she decided to walk around like a zombie with her arms out in front of her at
all times. But Ben Harris nearly led Emma Green into a hanging branch from a tree.
Another trust exercise we did was we all stood in a line facing each other, with our arms
stretched out in front of us, and we had to do an action where our arms would go up and down
World Challenge
Weekend Away
-Reportalternately. One person at a time would have to run through this scissor like motion, trusting us to
drop our arms before the person ran into them. Pete went first and ran so fast I think everyone was
surprised they dropped their arms in time. The girls would have to repeat on average twice because
we would run with our eyes closed or our arms out in front of us. However, Abbie being the girl she
is, had to repeat this 4 times because she would squeal or try and walk through this activity. This was
quite entertaining for the teachers and leaders, plus the rest of us.
For our lunch we had decided on Pitta bread, ham and cheese, assortment of nuts and jelly
for snacks. This was not exactly ideal as the Pitta bread would fall apart and the cheese was in
triangles which mean it would have to be spread with our fingers. This was not very nice. I think the
only thing everyone looked forward to was the 2 cubes of jelly we would get. Yet even those were
not amazing.
After lunch we went for our walk, Abbie was our leader for the first part of our walk, singing
as she went in order to lighten the mood of the group. We sang ‘I Would Walk 500 Miles’ byThe
Proclaimers’ as we felt it was fitting for our walking mood. We left Marcus in charge to read the
map, because no one else knew how to read one. As we walked across the fields we came to a
stretch of woods. As we walked through the woods our leader brought to our notice Charlotte was
missing. He then went on to talk to us about what we would do in the case of a team member going
missing. We all decided to re trace our steps to where we last saw Charlotte, shouting “Charlotte”
and “Dora” as we went. We eventually found her and Mr Taylor, no one noticing he went missing
too.
As the day went on we had a 5-minute stop every 30 minutes of walking. Every time we
stopped our leaders would talk us through different scenarios we may come across when on our
expedition; such as leaving someone behind when we get on transport to a new location or the
many uses of a huge florescent yellow piece of fabric.
As the hours went past everyone started to become tired and wondered when we would get
back to camp. Marcus led us all through a field and we bumped into one of the other groups. They
were a bit lost and decided to follow us because we knew better. However their leaders made them
wait for at least 15 minutes before following us. We were making funny faces at them as we walked
past because they had to wait. Walking through the field it went down and up again like a big hill.
Abbie and Sam thought it a good idea to have a race up the hill. As they reached the top Abbie
tripped over, funniest thing I have ever seen.
We reached camp in the end, being the second group to leave and second to come back. We
then went ahead with making dinner. We assigned Emma, Louise and Ben to do the cooking of the
‘Bean Feast’, no one knowing what we were in for when it would be ready. Everyone went back and
forth to the cooking to see how it was getting on; it was not a nice sight. In the two pots was a
watery brown lumpy mixture of ‘Bean Feast’. It looked horrible. When dinner was ready we all ate
‘Bean Feast’ and rice. Some of us tried to get away with just rice. No one got away with this. We
then went on to tidy and wash everything. With just head torches to help us. This was not very
effective because everyone was blinding each other with the brightness of their lights.
World Challenge
Weekend Away
-ReportIn the morning Pete shouted into everyone’s tents “Wakeup, Breakfast is ready”, which he
shouted into our tent until he heard some sort of a reply with a “go away”. For breakfast we had
porridge with one pot being over cooked and the other still quite gloopy. Seeing as I had never had
porridge before I went with the more over cooked one. It looked more appetising than the gloopy
one. Max, Pete and Marcus told us all they dumped a whole load of sugar in, in order to make it
more appetising for everyone. I think we all added more sugar to our porridge just to be sure of this.
As more of us appeared from our tents we all decided the same thing; ‘Bean Feast’ has made us all
feel slightly ill.
That day we went for our second walk. Before we went we did some more group exercises.
The first one was a piece of rope would be lied down on the floor. Four of us would be blindfolded,
step forward, reach down for the rope and by communicating with each other we would have to
make a square with the rope. We then did a second exercise. Marcus would lie down on the
fluorescent yellow fabric, which was folded to be a stretcher. 6 people volunteered to all grab a bit
of the fabric and lift Marcus up. This would be used in an emergency if one of us had broken our
ankle or anything, which would stop us from walking. After these exercises we went for our walk,
taking a different route from last time.
When we set off we walked down a main road, then went up a trail into a wooded area.
Because we trusted Marcus to lead us to the right place, we did not realise he was leading us in a big
circle round the woods, until a dog walker we walked past earlier, walked past us again and made it
known to us and Marcus we were going round in a circle. When we got back on track we then got to
a football field. The signs told us if we walked into the field we would be prosecuted and fined. After
close inspection of the map Marcus led us down a tight path, which led us round the perimeter of
the fenced football field. As we walked on we walked over the motorway and into a field filled with
sheep. As we reached the end of the field we realised the sheep were all running away from a dog,
we all found this quite funny. We then walked through a cow field filled with cowpats everyone 2
steps you took. Many of us in the group may have stepped in some cowpats. Walking through the
woods we went though the previous day when losing Charlotte, we all decided to play ‘I-spy’. This
was quite annoying for everyone as Miss Bell and Mr Taylor answered nearly every ‘I-Spy’ correctly.
We got back to camp in just about 2 hours of walking. We then went on to putting our tents
down. This was really entertaining seeing everyone scream taking down the inner part of the tent, as
there were hundreds of spiders on the top of the inside of everyone’s tents. There was then the
mission of packing all the pegs, poles and the rolled up tent into one tiny bag. I held the rolled up
tent whilst Abbie and Charlotte struggled to put the bag over the tent. We all found this the hardest
part of the weekend as no one told us how to put the tents away; we had to figure it all out for
ourselves.
Luckily, after all the groups met together again, we got to have soup, chocolate and a drink
from the world challenge company. I think we were relieved to see some decent food after the food
we had been eating all weekend. I was just happy to see some sort of chocolate.
World Challenge
Weekend Away
-ReportOverall I found the camping really enjoyable and I cannot wait for our expedition next year. I know
we all learnt things from our trip, finding out about real scenarios and things we need to check off
our list before, during and after we go on our expedition. We all got to know each other better and
everyone got on really well, having many inside jokes as we went. This has really got everyone now
thinking that this expedition is for real and we need to take it more seriously, doing more training to
ensure we are in top shape for our expedition. We will all think about what we will do for food etc.
closer to the time. Know all we have to do now is keep raising our money and get our kit ready for
the hard month ahead of us in Tanzania. But I am sure we will enjoy it thoroughly and learn many
things whilst we are there.